Barely a week passed between the news, via GoFundMe, that L7 bassist Jennifer Finch was fighting an aggressive form of brain cancer and the announcement of her death. For those who had just taken in the first shock, the second was devastating.
But Finch, 59, anchored a band whose calling card was thrilling, glorious bluntness. Together for the better part of four decades, L7 did not faff around with small talk and pleasantries: They took the stage and rocked your face off. If Finch didn’t want fans to know she was leaving until she had one foot out the door, it would make perfect sense. Either way, it’s a brutal loss.
Finch was one of hard rock’s greatest connectors. A photographer and fixture in the L.A. punk scene by 14, the fact that she didn’t play an instrument was a minor hurdle when she joined L7 in 1986. “I knew I would have to make up for [it] with attitude,” Finch recalled in the documentary “L7: Pretend We’re Dead.” She knew punk, metal and hard-rock musicians up and down the West Coast, and her make-sh*t-happen briskness spurred the band’s rise. (“She was fearless in talking to people and asking for things,” the band’s singer, Donita Sparks, has said.)
Amid the alternative-rock frenzy of the 1990s, L7 was often mistakenly described as either grunge or Riot Grrrl, but the band’s breakneck speed and diabolically catchy riffs had much more in common with Motörhead and the Ramones — and, as a live band, inspired the same kind of devotion. There was nothing girlish or even mock-girlish about their swagger — they were women.
Got a problem with that? The hell you do.
If L7 was a statement, Finch was its punctuation, her crayon-bright hair complementing a radiant humanity. Once the band had the ears of a generation, they made it count, co-founding Rock For Choice (arguably godmother to the later, lighter Lilith Fair) to raise money for abortion access. L7’s statement reads, in part, “We are shattered by the loss of our beloved bandmate, sister, and friend Jennifer Finch, whose fierce spirit, humor and boundless creativity helped shape L7 and changed all of our lives forever . . . the impact she made on music, art and everyone lucky enough to know her cannot be measured. We love her beyond words and will carry her with us always.”
