“I use a million guitar tones in a show. Quite a few are just noises – one is labeled ‘Ew’ on the pedalboard”: Meet Venus Grrrls, the UK goth grungers tackling cancer with intense songs, wild tones and Courtney Love’s guitar

Three-fifths of Venus Grrrls are gathered around the table, cards clutched to their chests in a tense game of gin rummy. The goth-grunge group deserve a moment of respite given the summer they’ve been having. Having racked up jam-packed performances at The Great Escape, Isle of Wight, Reading and Leeds festivals, they’re living what bassist Hannah Barraclough acknowledges over her pint as “a bit of a teenage dream.”

Barraclough started on guitar initially before finding her true calling. “I played in a college band and the lead singer couldn’t play bass and sing,” she recalls. “So he said, ‘Oh, you do it, Hannah!’”

Lead guitarist Eliza Lee grew up with classic rock around her, embracing the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin in her mid-teens. “Watching [1976 concert film] The Song Remains The Same and seeing Jimmy Page, I was like, ‘I want to be him in every way!’” she says.

While she was taking her guitar to school to grapple with Keith Richards’ Brown Sugar at lunch break, vocalist and rhythm guitarist Grace Kelly was feeling intimidated by the dexterity of some of the male players she heard on her stereo.

“I have dyspraxia so I struggle with coordination,” she says. “But then I saw Joan Jett – she wasn’t doing anything complicated or crazy, but it was so effective and purposeful. She used her guitar to harness her songwriting and I was like, ‘That I can do!’”

Kelly put a call-out for other female-identifying players at Leeds College of Music. The decision to form a woman-only outfit was inspired by another realization: “The women who had been platformed to me weren’t musicians. Riot Grrrl and Bikini Kill were new for me – female drummers, guitarists and bassists.”

Barraclough adds: “My only female inspiration was the Pixies’ Kim Deal. It didn’t occur to me how much of a rarity it was until I went to music college and I was like, ‘Oh, there’s nobody else!’”

Lee’s experience was different: “There was a lot of gendered transcension going on in ’70s rock,” she says of the decade that fascinated her. “I was watching men in big platform heels, women’s shirts and long hair; so I always saw myself as being able to fit in.”

Lee was studying in Newcastle, 100 miles away, when Venus Grrrls was formed by Barraclough and Kelly and two other musicians. But the project soon ground to a halt for multiple reasons. “March 2020: lockdown one,” Kelly says. “First gig back: September 2021. Then I get my diagnosis in July 2022.”

Suffering from acute myeloid leukemia (AML), she had to undergo chemotherapy at 24 years old. Understandably, the experience has changed her. “I recognize that I can't write all our songs about cancer,” she says. “But before being ill, I would have been scared of writing about something so intense.”

Last year’s single Lidocaine features an artful analogy about the local anesthetic used during her treatment. Barraclough notes: “Unless you know Grace’s story, it sounds like a love song.”

“I'm only a year and a bit out of chemo,” Kelly says. “I’m still building up my strength. It's not a linear process – some days are better than others.”

Lidocaine was the first track to include Lee, who composed her part in the studio after hearing the song for the first time the previous day. “As a slightly self-indulgent lead guitar player, I love spending time at the 12th fret and upwards – that's my happy zone,” she admits.

Comparing Venus Grrrls with Crowley, the Newcastle occult rockers she was already touring with, she says: “It’s a good challenge because it’s more textual. There might be time for noodles – but not yet!”

“It’s being purposeful with your noodles,” Kelly tells her. “Like in Divine; what you do is such a good balance.”

With a recording method in place, how do they translate their hard rock edge to the stage? “I use a million guitar tones in a show,” Lee says. “When we soundcheck, I’m like, ‘How much time you got?’” She argues a Kemper Profiler is the best setup for the group. “I’d love to be a valve purist with a ’70s Plexi… but I’ll wait until there’s someone to carry it up the stairs for me!”

She continues: “I have quite a few tones that are just noises. The one in Hex is labeled ‘Ew’ on the pedalboard. There’s the one that sounds like a whale song – we were going for a narwhal with big, sparkly, weird cloud delays.”

Her PRS SE in vintage cherry cuts through over Kelly’s more streamlined Fender Vista Venus, which was designed by Squier and Courtney Love in 1997. “It's got that real grungy, ’90s authentic sound to it,” the frontwoman explains.

“And it’s so light because Love hated really heavy guitars. As a singer, you need to be able to stand proud. Even a Telecaster is a tad too heavy for me and it brings me down.”

Barraclough proudly plays a Diamond Anniversary Fender Jazz bass, after falling for its maple neck. “I love how smooth it is,” she explains. “I can transition way more easily.” She credits her live sound to a precise pedal mix. “I predominantly use a Boss DS-1 Distortion, a Boss CH-1 Super Chorus, and the MXR M84 Bass Fuzz Deluxe – if I blend them all just right, it’s ideal.”

• Venus Grrrls head out on their first headline tour across the UK on September 5.