Downstage, together with Arts Commons Presents and One Yellow Rabbit’s High Performance Rodeo, are delighted to co-present HOT DYKE PARTY, a theatre-rock-concert celebrating dykes, butches, femmes, and queers of all sorts! 

Bianca Miranda, Downstage’s Producer, sat down with the band –– Arthi Chandra, Blue Chu, Cindy Kao, Hanna Meyers, Hayley Sullivan, and Thule van den Dam –– to hear about how they started, who should come, and what they hope the audience takes away.  Plus, they put together a playlist for you to get into the vibes of the show 😉

Bianca: Let’s start with an introduction to the band!

Arthi: We are a six piece band from Vancouver. We started this as an exploration of a theatre-rock concert and we decided to just be a real band because there was so much excitement and great reception. We’ve been really lucky to play in Vancouver a few times now and it’s been really cool to start taking our show to other places. Calgary is our first official tour stop!

Bianca: We’re so excited! Talk us through the lore of the band a little bit. How do you all know each other?

Hannah: Arthi brought us all together for this theatre-rock concert just over a year ago.  Hannah, Arthi, and Cindy knew each other from theatre school. We all went to SFU in Vancouver together. Then, Arthi and I knew Thule from a different musical project which also happened to get Hayley involved by the end of it. I always forget this –– Arthi, how did you and Blue meet? 

Arthi: I met Blue because Blue is very good friends with the first woman I was ever in love with.  I feel like that’s a fun, dramatic retelling of the story. Blue and I met at a party. And then karaoke later.

Hannah: So Arthi was really the mastermind and brought us all together in this very fun theatre project that turned into a band! 

Arthi: And people just kept asking us to play. They kept asking us for the songs after the first couple shows.

I think the charm of it being a theatre rock concert was that we were playing a rock band. Like, we were playing the idea of a rock band but you can only do that once or twice until you’re like, oh we’re just actually doing it. The idea of charming amateurism wears off after a certain point. It’s still performative in a way but the lines blurred a bit more between theatre and band.  

Blue: We also just wrote so much music! During our workshop period, we didn’t just focus on writing songs. We had a lot of fun coming up with musical riffs and ideas, and when some of those didn’t quite feel like they would fit into a full song, we decided to include them as interludes between the songs.

Arthi: We did 14 songs in 3 weeks! 

Blue: Our music chemistry is really beautiful which was a nice culmination of the luck of six creatives coming together and the luxury of time. That doesn’t always happen. We were so fortunate to get the funding (thank you, Arthi) to have two separate three-week periods of Monday to Friday rehearsal times to dive in and create. It was such a dream project and still is to be a part of!

Bianca: Could you talk more about the form of your show? What makes this theatre and what deviates from that a little bit?

Arthi: For me personally, it was also expanding what I thought the form of a concert was.  So, taking the idea of a concert as a form as opposed to us being musicians. I didn’t enter this as “I’m a musician who wants to write songs with a band.”  I was like, I would like to explore the form of what a concert is.  That’s what it was.  So, for me, I think this project was started (when it was a project) through an exploration of form and that felt theatrical to me.  That felt like an exploration of performance and performance-making. The origins of that for me keeps me rooted in this theatre world, where I’m like, “What is performance in this band? What does that look like?”  But concerts are also inherently performative. I realized that form and practice can be two separate things, like the practice as a musician and the form of a concert can be two separate things but they’re linked.  In the same way that the practice of an actor and the practice of a theatre maker can be separate but there’s a link.

Thule: As someone who’s more on the music side, the method of how we built this is incredibly theatrical.  It felt very un-intuitive for a musician, if I’m being honest.  But it allowed us to side step a lot of the pit falls that you might find if you bring together 6 strangers and try to become a band.  Because the structure was so clear - we had a director, a goal, a due date that let us build something fast and then afterwards, be like, what did we just make or become? I’ve made music with other people my whole life and the onus is very much on the music and then we’ll be on stage as a band.  And here, I think, it was flipped.  We’re going to be on stage as a band and so we’re going to make music in order to do that.

Bianca: Having a concert like this feels so incredibly important, especially with what’s going on in our province. What do you hope audience members will take away from the show?

Hayley: Things that you don’t know are scary.  And if you have an idea of something but that’s not your lived experience, or you don’t understand it, you can come to something like this tentatively, experience it for what it is, and allow yourself to have fun - that’s powerful. You get to see 6 people on stage really engaging with the audience and really having fun.  We just want to create an atmosphere where everyone is welcome, regardless of everything.  You can drop your persona at the door and just come and have fun with us.  

Thule: I don’t have big words to say about why or how it matters to see people like you on stage.  Whatever you may be.  And if we fall at some cross section of that, then that matters.  It moves you and connects you.  Even if you don’t see people you identify with on stage but you see people that you love identified on stage - it just matters.  It just does.

Arthi: I also think there’s so many of us.  We’re a diverse group of queer people.  We’re all so different - personality wise, visually, etc.  But to have community and see community on stage, I think that’s something that I hope people can pull from and be inspired by. I hope people can find joy in community and feel in community with us.

Hannah: I grew up in Edmonton and I have a lot of family in Calgary. So this is the place where I first came out. I know how strong and important the queer communities are in Alberta. So, I hope that this is, for those people who can come see the show, a chance for them to celebrate, maybe lift some of that weight off their shoulders. I know how hard it can be when you see another headline. This is a space where you can come, relax, see people who may or may not share an identity or an intersection with you and just see people having fun. Fun is infectious! Hopefully, this provides some sort of a small antidote to the hate and fear.

Bianca: Who should come to the concert?

Arthi: We encourage everyone to come! It’s not just for the dykes, well, it is for the dykes but it’s also for everyone! It’s a place to champion and celebrate queerness but also we really welcome everyone, 16+! 

Bianca: Let’s talk about some guidelines of engagement for the audience. What would you encourage folks to do at the concert?

Blue: I want them to dance, get up, and have fun with us! Or at least feel like if they want to, they can!

Arthi: Please come close to the stage –– dance with us! Enjoy drinks, if you would like to –– get up, come and go. It’s fairly relaxed, like you’re at a concert.  We just want you to be present with us. Feel free to take photos. It really is removing all social cues that we have as a theatre audience, allowing yourself to be embodied with us.  

Hayley: I think the audience can engage as much or as little as they want. All are okay. That’s been the case for all our shows. We tend to have a pretty wide spectrum of audience members –– younger people, older people. People have enjoyed it, whether they’re up at the front screaming, sitting back and chatting with their friends, or enjoying it from afar. Enjoy it the way that you want to.

Bianca: I don’t know about you but I love getting in the mood if I know I’m seeing a concert, which sometimes include looking up the setlist or making my own playlist. What should folks include in theirs to get into the Hot Dyke Party vibes?

• HOT TO GO! - Chappell Roan 
• Cherry Bomb - The Runaways 
• Deceptacon - La Tigre 
• Femininomenon - Chappell Roan
  Champagne Shit - Janell Monáe 
• Feel The Way I Want - Caroline Rose
• Crimson and Clover - Joan Jett and Blackhearts
• Rebel Girl - Bikini Girl

Bianca: What’s next? Where can we find you?

We’ll be at Azimuth Theatre’s Expanse Festival in Edmonton – April 2025!  We’re also hoping to release some music before then. Stay tuned and follow along at @HotDykeParty on Instagram or visit our website at www.hotdykeparty.com

Hot Dyke Party is running for THREE NIGHTS ONLY – January 16, 17, and 18, 2025 in the Engineered Air Theatre at Arts Commons. On January 17, stay for a free SCRATCH PARTY, featuring a live DJ, cocktails, and dancing. Get your tickets at artscommons.ca/hdp.

Photo by Chelsey Stuyt