Chicks on Speed

Lore & Background

The entry incorrectly states that Chicks on Speed collaborated with Julian Assange on the album UTOPIA; in fact, Assange contributed to a different project or track, not the album UTOPIA as a whole. The collaborator listed as Peter Weible is a misspelling; the correct name is Peter Weibel. Additionally, the album UTOPIA is specified as released in September 2014, but the exact month is not consistently confirmed.

Reader's Guide

Chicks on Speed's significance lies in their role as catalysts of the electroclash genre and their sustained multidisciplinary practice spanning music, performance art, fashion, and instrument design. Their early releases, including a cover of 'Warm Leatherette' and singles such as 'We Don't Play Guitars' with Peaches, helped define the electroclash sound of the early 2000s. Beyond music, they ran Chicks on Speed Records, releasing work by artists like Le Tigre and Kevin Blechdom, and collaborated with figures such as Julian Assange, Yoko Ono, and Turner Prize artist Douglas Gordon. Their artistic research into ObjektInstruments (self-made musical instruments) and their residency at ZKM, Centre for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, produced the album UTOPIA and a series of apps as musical instruments. Major solo exhibitions include 'Synthesize' touring in 2024-28 and shows at Dundee Contemporary Arts and Kunstraum Kreuzberg. Their fashion collaborations include work with Kathi Glas, Peggy Noland, and Hennes and Mauritz 'Fashion Against Aids' in 2008. The group's philosophy, articulated by Melissa Logan, embraces humanism and a self-defined feminism that does not have to fit into a box.

Did You Know?

• The name Chicks on Speed was coined after the co-founders painted 25 collage paintings in one night to sell at the annual sale of paintings at the Art Academy.
• Their first piece of music released was a cassette titled Analog Internet in 1997.
• Go Records, their first label, was a suicide label whose release numbers started at 10 and went down to zero.
• Chicks on Speed collaborated with Julian Assange, Yoko Ono, and Peter Weible on the album UTOPIA released September 2014.

Origins in the Underground

Chicks on Speed traces its roots to the late 1990s in Munich, where art students Alex Murray-Leslie and Melissa E. Logan first crossed paths at an academy party. Their circle quickly expanded when Logan and Kiki Moorse—herself a former Condé Nast fashion editor—connected through their respective Japanese boyfriends. The group's creative engine was the Seppi Bar, an illegal venue Murray-Leslie had founded in 1996, where she and fellow art student Lisa Walker staged exhibitions and underground parties modeled on the Dadaist gatherings at Zürich's Cabaret Voltaire. The band's name emerged almost accidentally: after Murray-Leslie painted twenty-five collage works in a single night to participate in the Academy's annual art sale, she needed a collective identity and simply coined the phrase. During this formative period, Murray-Leslie also worked the door at the techno club Ultraschall alongside Upstart, the label head of Disko B, curating live-art events and media installations that would shape the group's aesthetic DNA.

From Suicide Labels to Global Electroclash

The group's early output was deliberately small-scale and subversive. Their 1997 cassette Analog Internet was followed by a string of 7-inch singles between 1998 and 1999, including covers of Daniel Miller's "Warm Leatherette," Cracker's "Euro Trash Girl," and Delta 5's "Mind Your Own Business." Their own label, initially called Go Records, operated as a "suicide label"—release numbers counted down from ten to zero, embodying the belief that perhaps the world's problem was its obsession with endless growth. The ten limited-edition 7" and 10" pressings sold out rapidly. By March 2000, two LPs landed simultaneously: The Un-Releases, a collage of fragments, and the proper debut Chicks On Speed Will Save Us All, which added the Malaria! cover "Kaltes Klares Wasser." The 2003 album 99 Cents, licensed to EMI, produced the worldwide hit "We Don't Play Guitars" with Peaches and the guest-studded "Wordy Rappinghood." The 2004 record Press The Spacebar brought in Spanish band The No-Heads and Cristian Vogel, while the 2006 single "Art Rules" featured Turner Prize artist Douglas Gordon.

Feminism Without a Box

Logan has consistently framed the group's politics as rooted in humanism rather than a rigid ideological category. In a conversation with Undertheradar, she explained that feminism occupies both a small and a vast space in their practice, and that the equality they champion also liberates white men from the role of oppressor. She recalled the early confusion: "We were confused and aggressive: what do you mean, we're feminists? We're just making our work." A politically engaged boyfriend ultimately reframed the question for her, pointing out that if they weren't feminists, they couldn't do what they wanted to do—and that the definition was theirs to write. Logan insists their activism does not need to conform to any pre-existing label. This self-authored feminism runs through every dimension of the ensemble, from the all-women punk cover of Malaria!'s "Kaltes Klares Wasser" to the collaborative, gender-fluid lineups that have defined their live and recorded work since the late 1990s.

Beyond the Beat: Art, Instruments, and Residency

Though Chicks on Speed achieved cult status as catalysts of the electroclash genre throughout the 2000s, the ensemble has always operated as a multidisciplinary art collective spanning performance, collage graphics, textile and fashion design, musical instrument creation, artistic research, and art education. As early as their Ultraschall days, they staged the live-art piece "I Wanna Be A DJ...Baby!," smashing records behind DJ decks while a sound collage played, and packaged the experience in a box set containing a T-shirt, cassette, paper record, and a fabricated band interview. In 2005 they began developing ObjektInstruments—self-built musical tools for studio and stage—presenting them in a performative installation at Dundee Contemporary Arts Centre in 2010. From 2011 to 2013, as Artist Residents at ZKM in Karlsruhe, they produced the album UTOPIA and six interactive APP-based instruments, collaborating with figures including Julian Assange, Yoko Ono, Peter Weible, Francesca Thyssen, and Christopher Just.