TOXIC SHOCK SYNDROME: THE EXHIBIT Toxic Protection / Confidence Shock / Talkin' Toxic / Toxic Shock, The Musical

From the biography of musician Lisa V. White:

Lisa's Bio

What was the name of your first band?

In the eighties, I was in an all girl band called Toxic Shock (yes, in regard to you know what). Most of the gals were married. Actually, I think they were all married but me. Anyway, we were discussing names for the band, and the husbands came up with Toxic Shock. One of the guys was in a band called Fused Junebug, and we played a gig together. The gig was on somebody's property in the woods, and was supposed to be a pig roast. However, they forgot to bring the pig! There was a trailer with four spigots connected to it. Ooh, my favorite! Rice Champagne! Budweiser! Needless to say, the crowd was very shiny faced and cheery. It was a fun gig even though we had only been a band for one week, had one rehearsal, and collectively, knew only four songs. LOL!

In the above example, an "all girl band" was named by band members' husbands. Interestingly, despite the fact that Lisa V. White's first band was named Toxic Shock, she uses "you know what" to refer to tampons and/or menstruation.

It may also be the case that the husbands who "came up with Toxic Shock" aren't aware that people develop toxic shock syndrome in a variety of ways, not related to tampons. This may be a result of the media coverage toxic shock syndrome received in the early 1980s in the US, related to the introduction of superabsorbant tampons.

There is also an Adelaide, Australia band that goes by the name Toxic Shock. Above is the cover to their CD "What Part of YES Don't You Understand?" [Self-release September 2001]. They say of their band's name: "Getting five women to agree on a band name is more difficult than many might realise. Toxic Shock was the only name we came up with (after about a thousand suggestions) that no-one hated."

In 1997, Julianne Cheek, a researcher at the University of South Australia, Australia, had a paper published, entitled, "(Con)textualizing Toxic Shock Syndrome: selected media representations of the emergence of a health phenomenon 1979–1995."

It was a year later, in 1998, that the band Toxic Shock formed: Perhaps choosing their name based on some of the "media representations" analyzed by researcher Julianne Cheek.

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