I am in love with Misstress Barbara. And a little afraid of her. She comes across as slightly angry in every interview. She is a Montreal-based techno DJ who spins the pure, crisp and driving beats that are almost entirely the province of men -- men and dweeby boys -- in dank clubs and basement recording studios around the world.
But she does a lot of things the way boys do. She skateboards. She has her pilot's licence. She runs her own record company.
And she has just released a CD of her mixing techniques with the California label Moonshine, the most powerful and commercial electronic-music label in a domain that generally does not encourage use of the word "commercial." She is a woman in an almost totally male world. The world of angry, roaring, caffeinated, thumping percussion that is techno is like the world of car mechanics or punk rockers: It attracts those who are impassioned by power, by speed and by a certain anger and aggression, not to mention, sometimes, even violence. Which means boys.
And Barbara Bonfiglio does seem angry when I talk to her. She hates this line of questioning. She warns every interviewer that she does not want to be considered a female DJ. She's a DJ like any other, as good as any in the world. She claims she doesn't even admire other DJs. "Sure, Richie is good, you know, but I have never for one second felt envy of any other DJ."
The supreme self-confidence that is not threatened by Richie Hawtin, one of the veteran masters of the genre, is also not a stereotypically feminine trait. This is like Nigel Kennedy dismissing Jascha Heifetz. It takes balls.
And a pair of Prada heels -- like those that open and close Bonfiglio's album, Relentless Beats, with their crisp, aggressive, clacking steps. The climax of that album -- a blistering track by Mateo Murphy, an artist who records on her Montreal label, Relentless Music -- is so outright furious, so white-hot percussive, like the sound of factories having orgasms, that I can't help thinking of it as somewhat, well, testosteroney.
But she doesn't see it as particularly masculine. "No, I don't think it requires testosterone," she replies, testily. "People always say my music is so hard. I don't think it's so hard. I think it's sensual."
The sensuality emerges more clearly on a less heated piece on the album, one that she recorded herself, under the name Barbara Brown. That's the name she uses when she makes house music, a form of electronic dance music that's slightly -- only slightly -- funkier and more melodic than techno. This track, called Dammelo, revolves around a breathy woman's voice murmuring sexy enticements in Italian: " Si . . . mi piace . . . cosi . . . dammelo" ("Yes . . . I like it . . . like that . . . give it to me . . . "). The voice, of course, is hers: Italian is her native tongue.
The sexual -- and feminine -- element of a driving beat is right on the surface on this track. This seems incongruous with a persona who gives herself the classic dominatrix title of Mistress, and then adds an extra "s" to underline the "stress" that she creates. But she insists, "I'm not into hard sex. I'm a very romantic and sensual person. The music is sensual. When I hear bass lines, when I hear the high-hat come in, ts-ts-ts-ts, I'm like 'Wow, I can't listen to anything else.' It's thrilling."
I know what she means, but I think few women do. This is what talking about techno often is: a discussion of popular misunderstandings. "They don't get it," is the techno fan's mantra. I cringed, for example, when The National Post described Misstress Barbara's music as "music made by robots." There is nothing less robotic than pounding drums, and I have never felt more human than when swinging my head around a dance floor.
Bonfiglio is sensitive about little things -- like Glo Sticks, for example, the little phosphorescent tubes that kids bring into dance clubs to create their own lighting effects. Bonfiglio loathes them, says she prefers playing in Europe because they don't bring the bloody things in. It's because Glo Sticks connote raves. "In Europe," she says, "going to hear techno is a normal night in a club. It's not a big event, a special event. Those kids with Glo Sticks are melted on drugs. They're frosted."
The same fury crops up when you mention trance -- a subgenre of dance music. "I hate trance," spits Bonfiglio. "You have this dramatic melody that keeps changing. How do you get into a trance with that? When you see tribespeople in Africa getting into a trance, they have this same drumming pattern, boom-balimbim-boom, boom-balimbim-boom, and that goes on and on.
"Techno is like that -- it's linear. When I'm spinning, I get so into it, my eyes roll back in my head, I'm in a trance, and people say, 'How many e's has she taken?' But I don't do drugs. I'm listening to the music. People don't listen to the music."
This is the techno fan's most common request: Listen to the music. Maybe the heart-speeding clapping and drumming of Misstress Barbara's techno will not seem so much cold and angry as passionate and Latin, like her. The only way to tell is to listen. A complete discography of Misstress Barbara can be found at .