¡viva la graham!

¡viva la graham! scored the cover story in nashville’s city@night magazine with a feature on fabulous burlesque troupe panty raid! the original three dirty dames have since expanded to eleven ladies, and they’re all throwing a big fourth birthday bash tonight at downtown’s mercy lounge to celebrate. officially, it’s a totally ’80s tease-a-thon, so expect to see the girls dressed up like madonna, cyndi lauper and tawny kitaen, among others. anyone else who dresses up for the event gets a few bucks off the cover charge!

for those of you outside nashvegas who can’t pick up a print copy of the magazine, you can download the .pdf over at city@night’s web site, which we recommend for the gorgeous photos of original members ruby van go-go (pictured) and lula licious… or you could just check out the entire article after the jump.

Panty Raid!
Four Years of Eye-Popping Burlesque
by ¡viva la graham!

Four years ago, Nashville hadn’t seen anything like it.

Local designer and entrepreneur Katy K organized a vaudevillian variety show that included a few saucy acts — some might have called them “inappropriate.” These burlesque acts took the stage wearing outrageous costumes and a flirtatious grin. In the next few minutes, they slowly disrobed as they danced seductively, ultimately ending up in next-to-nothing. While hardly pornographic, outsiders couldn’t really understand that this sexy, satiric striptease was entertaining, provocative, and tastefully done.

Enter Panty Raid!

The burlesque resurgence in New York in the early 2000s hadn’t yet made its way down South, but it wouldn’t take long. When Lula Licious, Ramona Rouge and Ruby Van Go-Go joined forces in 2003, they unwittingly ushered in a new era of consciousness. From the moment they first bared all, they commanded our attention. Immoral or not, Nashville was hooked.

After dozens of live performances and a handful of television appearances, countless wigs and several wardrobe malfunctions, the ladies of Panty Raid! continue to tease their way into the hearts and fantasies of audiences near and far. And they just keep getting bigger and better.

In the past year, they’ve expanded their ranks. Now eleven women strong, the buxom beauties will celebrate their fourth birthday April 21 at Mercy Lounge with a Totally ‘80s Tease-a-thon.

In an exclusive, in-depth interview, original members Lula Licious and Ruby Van Go-Go aim to get City At Night readers riled up about the big event. Yes, these two infamous Panty Raid! dames spill all their dirty secrets — from their very first time to their naughty cake dance. They even have some wise words of advice for aspiring burlesque performers.

In other words, if this doesn’t get your blood pumping, you might want to check your pulse. Read on!

City@Night: How did Panty Raid! meet and why did you decide to form a trio?

Lula Licious: I had been talking to my boyfriend about wanting to do a dance project, and he said I should meet Nicole, Ramona Rouge, who we then knew as the girl who did belly dances. So me and her met, hit it off, then I said, “Well, do we know anybody else?” Because really, with duos, there’s not really much you can do, and I was really interested in doing a can can and kind of go-go-type things.

And she said, “Well, that girl Andrea is pretty hot.” I had known Andrea [Ruby Van Go-Go] for a couple of years. So we all met up, and it just started snowballing.

C@N: What was your first performance like?

LL: It was at 12th and Porter.

Ruby Van Go-Go: Opening for Dixie Rects.

LL: Who was Cowboy Keith’s drag persona. The set list started with us doing our can can. Then it was Nicole doing the belly dance. Then Andrea did a solo, where she did a reverse strip tease. And she got lettuce on her toe.

RVG: Because you have to walk through the kitchen to get down to the stage. And since I was doing a reverse strip tease, which means I come out as naked as I could be and then I get dressed. So I was barefoot, and I guess I got some of the lettuce on my foot. So I was trying to, you know, like erotically put on stockings and I’ve got my leg up in the air and all you can see it lettuce–

LL: Dangling from her toe! And everyone was like, what is that hanging from her foot?

RVG: Is that a tortilla? No! And then I discovered that my underwear was completely see-through under stage lights. In the house it looked great. On video, real porno! I mean, you could see my brazilian. It was bad.

LL: No one told us what to do. No one showed us the ropes. We figured out costuming, see through-panties, which sound men were crappy, what lights make us look fat, what lights make our skin look nice. We figured out where to get our glossies, where to get our t-shirts.

RVG: Where to get our pasties–

LL: Which didn’t come in time for that first show. So when we did a go-go dance, we had to liquid laytex stars onto our breasts. When it got to time to take our tops off, we were like, are we going to do it? And I remember us all looking at each other and us all going -

C@N: Here we go!

LL: And we did it. And the thing of it was that people who had known us were like “I’ve been waiting to see her boobs forever!”

RVG: Now most of Nashville and various places across the U.S. have seen our breasts.

LL: It was really funny and it was so exciting.

C@N: What are the big plans for the birthday bash? Will someone be jumping out of a gigantic cake?

LL: Miss Lollipop will do her birthday number where she sits on a cake. It’s really cute.

RVG: She actually sort of has sex with the cake. Hopefully she has the foresight not to get chocolate this time. Last time after she sat on that cake, she got up afterwards and it was like chocolate cake all over her ass. Not pretty! And red velvet cake is probably not a good idea, either. Yellow cake with white icing is about all you should do.

C@N: Oh my, that sounds absolutely fantastic! Will there be any special guests?

LL: Roky Roulette from San Francisco is coming, and he’s the world’s only pogo stick strip tease artist. He’s male. He’ll have the pogo stick between his legs, and say he’s a cowboy, the pogo stick is the horse. He’s an astronaut, his pogo stick is the rocket. And he’ll be going ten feet up in the air, and just ripping off his clothes. He’s really amazing.

C@N: Tell us more about the special theme.

LL: The theme this time is all ‘80s, so we’re all picking our favorite songs from the ‘80s, like guilty pleasures, and doing numbers to them. Trim Classic Barber & Legendary Beauty will be doing all the make-up, making us look like Madonna and Cyndi Lauper and Tawny Kitaen.

C@N: You mentioned one of Panty Raid!’s newer members, Miss Lollipop. When and why did you decide to expand the troupe?

LL: We had thought at first that we had wanted to have more than three. But at that time, there was nobody. This was uncharted territory. Katy K had done one show, and there were slim pickings of people who could dance or people who even knew what the vision for the thing even was.

So it just stayed at three until about a year ago. Andrea was busy with school and work. Nicole was thinking that she couldn’t do as much and I didn’t want to go to festivals by myself because they’re really big and kind of scary. Everyone had talked about how great our group numbers work, and in New York and Exotic World, they were like “You girls were great!” So I was thinking you know, add a couple, a few more girls, who wanted to do group numbers if Andrea or Nicole couldn’t do a show.

C@N: How many ladies make up Panty Raid! now?

LL: It’s me, Andrea and Nicole. Miss Lollipop, Monique Honeybush, Liz, Sunny, Shalene. Kicky LaRue’s not an official member of Panty Raid!, she’s like an honorary member, she does every show with us. Frankie Apple does shows with us now. and we just added a girl named Gabrielle just to do go-go and can can.

C@N: How has the reception of Panty Raid! changed in the past four years in Nashville and beyond?

RVG: Well, now it’s like we’re a hometown favorite. We have been able to go other places, where people don’t know us or we don’t have any friends in the audience, and we always get a great reception, really. But people get it now. And it’s not like, “I don’t understand, what do you mean you take your clothes off?” You know, girls love to bring their boyfriends. Gay guys love to bring their boyfriends.

LL: Also, we owe a lot to Dita Von Teese and women like that who have made it kind of mainstream. Now when I say I’m in a burlesque troupe, they say, “Oh, like Dita Von Teese or the Pussycat Dolls.” And I’m like, “Yeah, kind of like that.” And also, now when I say “I’m in Panty Raid!,” people have heard of us.

C@N: How do you think Panty Raid! contributed to the resurgence of burlesque in Nashville?

RVG: I hate to be a bitch, but we contributed everything. [When we started], there had been one burlesque show in town, put on by Katy K, and there was only one Nashville girl who was even in that show.

C@N: How big of an influence has Katy K been for you gals?

RVG: She has helped tremendously. She had the contacts in New York, which New York was the first place to really have a big burlesque scene as far as resurgence goes. They were kind of doing it first and she was living there and she knows all those girls, which helped us be able to network with them.

LL: Katy is kind of our partner in crime. It’s like we’re her house band.

RVG: It’s her passion, and I think if she was 25 or 30 and didn’t have her own business, she’d be right up there with us.

C@N: Looking back, what has been one of your most memorable performances?

LL: Definitely Exotic World. It was in the middle of the day, in 120 degree heat.

RVG: In the desert in California.

LL: And there was a sandstorm. So you’re in your eyelashes and you had sand in your eyes. Nicole got really ill because she inhaled some of the sand.

RVG: A girl got third-degree burns on her feet because she did a Josephine Baker thing barefoot–

LL: On the black stage.

RVG: But otherwise it was really cool because it is put on by Dixie Evans, who is, you know, an icon from the ‘40s and ‘50s. I mean, she’s one of the women that we watch videos to get inspired by and she puts on this huge thing. And to boot, other burlesque legends were actually judging the event. And then, peers of ours from all over the country that we admire are there performing as well. It’s very cool to be like, “Oh my God, there’s Dirty Martini! And she’s clapping at my number.”

C@N: What advice would you give to any up-and-coming talent?

LL: Do your homework. Take as many dance classes as you can. Learn how to twirl your pasties. Really look at the old videos.

RVG: Make it a complete package. There are three main elements. Your song, your costume and your dancing. If one is gone, it sucks.

LL: Dixie Evans told me the most important things are your entrances and your exits. Everything in the middle, people are going to forget. People will say, “Man, did you see that costume when she came out?” Or, “That was the craziest ending I’ve ever seen.”

RVG: More importantly, own it. Even if you’re not 100 percent comfortable in your costume or your choreography, or whatever, fucking own it. It shows so much when people are unsure of themselves.

One more thing. Size does not matter.

C@N: Look at Dirty Martini.

RVG: She is five-four and all of two hundred pounds. She is graceful, and what? She owns it.

C@N: Where is Panty Raid! headed?

LL: I feel all of a sudden like Panty Raid! has been reborn. I don’t know why, but in the past couple of weeks — I think it’s this party because of the ‘80s show, too, and how excited everyone is about doing their numbers — I feel more like there’s a familial bond now.

Everyone is amped again. I just feel like all the girls are putting more of themselves into it, more than ever before. I think it’s just great.