The Gits

The Gits were formed at Antioch College, Yellow Springs in 1985, and played their first gig about a week after they began rehearsing. Mia missed the first few rehearsals as she was holidaying with her family in Disneyland, and a number of male vocalists were rehearsed, but it was really a no contest when she returned. The band was provisionally called White Picket Fence which became The Snivelling Little Ratfaced Gits after one concert, and was then shortened to The Gits. Mia left Antioch College without completing her degree.

Mia Katherine Zapata was born in Louisville, Kentucky. Like its most famous child, Muhammad Ali, she came from a good family. She was the second daughter and youngest of three siblings born to Richard and Donna Zapata, and a distant relative of the Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata (1879-1919). Mia was dyslexic, a disability that did not inhibit her chosen career as vocalist and lyricist for The Gits. Although she never played instruments with the band she was also a guitarist and apparently an excellent pianist. She did though perform solo a few times including with acoustic guitar. According to her father, the extrovert performer Mia would become was the mirror image of his daughter, who was actually rather introverted and quite shy.

Initially, the core of the band Andy Kessler, Matt Dresdner and Mia moved to San Francisco where they worked at The Farm, an unorthodox community center. After recording and playing in Ohio and the Midwest, they relocated to Seattle in 1988, a city that was to soon to host a burgeoning punk scene. Here, The Gits got their first gig around Halloween 1990 and soon gained a local following. By a lucky introduction, the band ended up doing a European tour, after which they returned to Seattle. Their debut album Frenching The Bully was released in 1992. They were just about to break through when in the small hours of July 7, 1993, Mia left the Comet Tavern to walk home alone, and never made it. The band split up on her death although it was later reformed. It took nearly a decade to bring her killer to book.