Thriving: Brown Riot

By Melanie Robins; Photography by Margo Moritz

Many of the good people of San Francisco who like to drink, dance, and eat in the warm sunshine know who Brown Amy is. For the rest, she is one of the founders of and a DJ for Hard French, the city’s hottest daytime soul party. Or, you may have seen her—along with DJ Carnitas (Tom Temprano)—at a Hard French party in Brooklyn, Toronto, or, most recently, in Santa Cruz, CA. If you did happen to catch Brown Amy, she was likely staring intensely into her bin of ‘45s, searching for just the right song to play for the hundreds of energetic fashionistas dancing freely around her.

But I know Brown Amy in a different context. I’ve been following her around hip San Francisco hair salons for years because, well, she’s my hair stylist. She’s damn good too. What that woman can do with a razor…no words. During my time in Amy’s chair, we’ve talked a lot about our lives and ambitions. I’ve learned so much about her as a person—I can honestly say that Amy is one of the most genuine and easygoing people I know. I’ve also learned about the woman who is most important to Amy: her unapologetically creative and vividly beautiful girlfriend, Jenna Riot.

Amy and Jenna have been together for three years. Like most lesbian and gay couples, by the time they formed a unit they had already endured years of confusion, disapproval, shame, and denial. For Amy, the daughter of a Mexican pastor in Long Beach, CA, her strict religious background was not only the key obstacle to her embracing her sexuality, but also an oppressive force regarding music. According to Amy, the rebellion against her parents started when she was 13 and it was completely fueled by music. “A friend gave me a Sex Pistols tape and told me to listen to it. And that got me into a punk scene that changed my life.”

Amy and her brother both delved deep into the punk scene. They would hide their records and bring them out once their parents left. Sometimes Amy and her brother would forget to hide the tapes and their parents would find and take them. Amy tells a funny story about her sister getting busted:

“My sister had a Warren G tape and it had that song, ‘Ain’t No Fun.’ …So my dad went into the car and my sister forgot to take it out of the tape player. My dad got the family together and held the tape up and said, ‘Whose tape is this that is talking about ‘sucking balls’ and ‘licking pussy’?’ and then he cracked the tape in half. We all started dying laughing. We couldn’t believe my dad was saying that stuff.”

Amy credits music for helping her transformation into self-acceptance and saving her life. Her parents have even come to terms with her musical choices. Unfortunately, they are less understanding about her sexuality. She says they still don’t accept the fact that she’s gay. But she copes: “I deal with it. I could be really bummed about it or accept it. …I have a really great community backing me here.”

And man, is her SF community ever backing her. Since Amy started DJing out three years ago, she has helped start—and grow—arguably the biggest, sickest daytime dance party in the city. Amy takes a lot of pride in Hard French and DJing in general. She explains why she likes to DJ:

It’s about being able to play stuff that I like and watching [people] enjoy the music that I put a lot of time and effort into finding…

and seeing them have a good time and build a community…and not just a queer community.” Amy points out that unlike many of the city’s queer-only parties, Hard French shoots for a more diverse crowd.

As Amy spins records at Hard French, her big and beautiful fashion diva of a girlfriend Jenna Riot is likely floating around, standing in front of or behind a camera. Jenna is a virtual renaissance woman of creativity. Like Amy, she DJs throughout the city (mostly electronic, but she loves it all). She also makes music; goes to school for graphic design; and shoots photos for, writes, and runs her body positive fashion blog called Closet Riots.

Jenna, born in Olympia, WA, grew up with a solid sense of self-acceptance thanks to her plus-sized mom. It wasn’t until she moved to CA that problems arose for Jenna. And as she was coming to terms with her sexuality, her family was less than understanding. Eventually the obstacles put in front of Jenna lead her to take action.

At about age 16, Jenna began to reinstate her pride and strength as a woman. She credits this to learning about feminism through the Riot Grrrl movement. “It all happened in high school. I was handed my first [Riot Grrl] ‘zine when I was 16 and I was like, ‘Oh my god, Bikini Kill!” Her next move toward self-discovery came at the first Ladyfest. It was there that Jenna embraced her sexuality and fully entered the lesbian culture. But for Jenna—a femme in every way—even this positive transition proved difficult. “It was hard struggling with identity within [the lesbian] culture. In that culture I was feminine; in that culture to prove who I was I had to look like Amy.”

Today Jenna expresses herself freely through fashion and celebrates other women who do the same with Closet Riots. She explains,

“Closet Riots is not only accepting of all body types, it’s also trying to be more fashion forward [with plus-sized fashion]…

There’re a lot of blogs out there that are only focusing on plus-sized fashion. They’re great, but it shouldn’t be separated from the rest of the fashion world. With Closet Riots, I like to integrate both worlds. Plus-sized fashion should be part of the rest of the fashion world.”

Jenna loves being an artist in ways other than fashion. She is in her second year at City College for graphic design. When asked why she chose to go back to school, she says, “I’ve been designing CD covers and flyers for the past 6 years, so I just decided to go to school for it.” Jenna likes to look at present trends and pull from what’s popular when designing. Still, she has to give a nod to the past: “The whole reason I realized I liked design was from getting those ‘zines when I was 16.”

Like Amy, Jenna has a soft spot for DJing. But her love of DJing seems to be more about the crowd, than the music itself. When asked what her ideal scene would be when DJing, she replies:

“Energy. People having a really good time letting go, letting all inhibitions go, letting loose. I really feed off the energy, whether I’m DJing or singing. I need that energy. I also put it out there. I’m always dancing in the booth, always getting into it.”

Some say Jenna is unfocused with her talents, but she disagrees. “I have a lot of talents and it’s about refining those talents.” Jenna isn’t stopping at one thing because she doesn’t have to. She is shamelessly driven. She wants to be her own boss one day and eventually she will. She says a lot of her traits—“being a woman, being plus sized, being brown”—often stop people from going for what they want. But for Jenna, it’s exactly those things that give her the drive to try.

Jenna has words of advice for women who are feeling full of potential, but who can’t seem to stop doubting themselves: “You’re gonna have a lot of self-doubt and a lot of people who try to bring you down. But if you don’t try, you’re not gonna get anywhere.”

Jenna and Amy have traveled a long way to get to self-acceptance. But they have made it and they are better women, partners, and creatives for it. They both admit if it weren’t for their artistic endeavors, they aren’t sure where they’d be today. As a couple they not only make room for each other’s creative outlets, they celebrate them. As a result, they are both living and thriving as active creatives within their relationship.

Check out their creative work at these sites:

Hard French

Closet Riots

Jenna Riot