‘It’s not even good English,’ remarks Oberbeck, pedantically. ‘It should say, “Rachel Stevens without a bra” They must have thought it looked cool.’ (Softly spoken, she enunciates italics more plainly than anyone you’ve ever heard.) Her disdain is clear, but if it weren’t for the conventions of the red-tops, she wouldn’t have a name for her band.

No Bra’s first single was released in August to acclaim. Munchausen is a dark satire on contemporary social mores, spoken over a thumping electronic beat, in which Oberbeck and band mate Dale Cornish exchange increasingly crazy and exaggerated boasts, culminating in the ridiculous: ‘I was cremated once’. ‘Really?’ counters the other, ‘I think I fancy you’.

‘We wanted to “absurdify” the idea of achievement,’ explains Oberbeck. ‘Typical male competitiveness taken to the limit. It’s a parody of a certain kind of British culture.’ Hailing from Germany, Oberbeck has lived in Britain for 13 years, but still observes this country’s ways with an outsider’s eye. It’s something she seems comfortable with, an ‘un-belonging’ that allows her to see more clearly.

Tall and lanky, with a high forehead and androgynous features, her waist-length, reddish hair serves to emphasise her lack of other conventionally feminine attributes. It’s not surprising that she’s frequently mistaken for a man, or that she doesn’t really care. ‘I don’t actually believe there’s such a thing as men and women. When I was a kid, every day people asked, “Are you a boy or a girl?” I was under the impression that it was cooler to be like that rather than male or female. And then I made other people believe that, as well.’

On stage, she often performs topless, sporting a false moustache, but insists that her work is less about celebrating sexual or gender categories than using humour to undermine them. ‘Consumerism capitalises on the obsession with sexual identity. People want to escape from who they are, but when they have to get jobs, they have to be male or female. It has to be clear. A lot of men want to be women, or vice versa.’ Who does she think gets the better deal? ‘I don’t know. I think masculine values are more prominent. But just because someone gets a good deal, are they going to be happy? No.’



Her defiance of categories carries over into No Bra’s ambiguous sound and image with uncompromising vehemence, but in an industry sold on genre, how will No Bra make their mark? The votes of confidence are piling up. They’ve already been picked to take part in the South London Gallery’s Her Noise season alongside Kim Gordon (Sonic Youth), and appear with Björk and Peaches on the forthcoming Girl Monster CD compiled by Chicks on Speed. That’s got to be a buzz, right? ‘I like this compilation because it’s raw; it’s not saying anything, it’s not very serious. We’re a bit suspicious of mainstream culture. I like things to be basic, I like to just sit in my room and create music.
‘We don’t want to make music to fit a genre. Larry T (New York electroclash impresario) wanted to put one of our tracks on a compilation, but I don’t think so.’ Because that would be the kiss of death? ‘No, not the kiss of death – I just don’t want to have to reinvent myself next month.’

And why should she? Oberbeck’s not Freak of the Week; she’s the real deal, and No Bra is her way of reclaiming a lifetime of exclusion and turning it back on the ‘insiders’, the popular kids, the music biz winners.
She looks around her bedroom floor, strewn with keyboards, socks and knickers, and laughs.


NO BRA PERFORM AT POUND SHOP, HOXTON BAR & GRILL, OCTOBER 30TH AND AS PART OF THE HER NOISE SEASON AT THE SOUTH LONDON GALLERY, CAMBERWELL HIGH STREET. WWW.NOBRA.CO.UK, WWW.HERNOISE.COM