By Jimmy Draper

'THERE'S AN ENTIRE country of people out there who've never heard of Northern State, and when they do, their first response is gonna be, 'Oh, whatever!' " Guinea Love concedes.

Speaking over the phone from her apartment in Brooklyn, Love (née Correne Spero) readily acknowledges that, as one-third of a white, all-women hip-hop group originally from Long Island, she constantly struggles against the novelty tag. By participating in a genre commonly defined in terms of black-male machismo and inner-city authenticity, she's learned all too well that despite progress made by acts such as Luscious Jackson and Princess Superstar, Northern State – Love, Hesta Prynn (Julie Goodman), and DJ Sprout (Robyn Goodmark) – have a lot to prove to the legions who believe white women, particularly suburban-born, liberal arts-educated white women, have no right to rap.

"Because of who we are, everything we do needs to exceed people's expectations," Love continues. "We do not have the luxury to be anything other than exceptional, and we're completely aware of that at all times."

The feminist, multi-instrumentalist twentysomethings of Northern State, however, refuse to let others' preconceived notions of hip-hop – and, by extension, gender, race, and class – deter them. So while they endure the sort of ridicule familiar to all women who've made inroads into any cock-clique culture – such as being derided as "suburban brats playing with Ghetto Barbies," as one dolt snorted on music Web site Pitchfork, and having to fast-talk their way into their own shows when doormen dismiss them as groupies – Love sees the opposition as confirmation of her group's importance and as inspiration to do better.

"It's so hard for people to conceive of us doing the things that we do in this environment and being in control of those situations," she says of reactions that countless people, from concertgoers to sound guys, have had. "Like, 'Not only are we here [to put on a show], but we're the boss! It's time for you to actually take instructions from me, and that might be a little hard for you.' But we don't ever get caught up in the negative side of it, like, 'We're gonna show them, man!' We just always try to let it motivate us to work harder."

Political and proud

Of course, since forming in 2000 – when Love, Prynn, and Sprout's dance parties evolved into an old school-informed hip-hop group with proudly political, pro-estro rhetoric – Northern State have garnered their fair share of support as well. Without so much as a full-length album, record contract, or national tour to their credit, they landed in high-profile glossies such as URB and Entertainment Weekly. De La Soul and Le Tigre invited them to share the stage. Listeners from Alaska to the U.K., where they toured with the Roots, have sent fan mail. They even sparked a major-label bidding war that resulted in a recent deal with Columbia Records.

Not bad for a group that rose to prominence on little more than a high-energy live show and a DIY demo limited to a measly 3,000 copies. Self-released last year, the four-song Hip-Hop You Haven't Heard quickly sold out through word-of-mouth and, much to the group's surprise, received a four-star rating in Rolling Stone. "We thought, 'God! Now all these people are looking at us, and all we have to show them is this demo that we did in three days on a shoestring budget,' " Love says of the increased attention that resulted from the review. "We wanted to show people that we could do even better, that we're not just a flash in the pan."

Returning to the studio to rerecord three of the demo's songs and lay down five new tracks, Northern State emerged with this summer's smartest party-starter, Dying in Stereo (StarTime International). Introducing a wider audience to their roof- and consciousness-raising songs, the mini-album is an exhilarating rush of deceptively simple beats and samples, triple-tag-team MC duties, and witty lyrical references to everything from The Bell Jar and Dorothy Parker to Beverly Hills 90210 and the bombing of Baghdad. While retaining the ladies' irrepressible spirit and originality, it also infectiously and impressively recalls the Yeastie Girlz, MC Paul Barman, the Coup, and Le Tigre.

For all of their eclectic influences, however, Love, Prynn, and Sprout are most often compared to – and dismissed as imitations of – the early Beastie Boys. But even if the trios share similarly switched-up, distinct vocal styles and an appreciation for the fine art of partying, the women of Northern State are no mere Beasties-with-boobies. As conscientious, self-proclaimed feminists who take their moniker from a road in their hometown, they're more akin to a hip-hop Sleater-Kinney than to the frat-party pranksters who wanted to name an album Don't Be a Faggot. They suffer no fools who cast them as knockoffs of their male peers, either. On the unreleased "Attaché Case," the gloriously sassy, smart-assy Prynn snaps, "I am not no Beastie Boy / I am not my boyfriend's toy."

Happy together

Through all the ear-exploding hubbub – both positive and negative – surrounding Northern State, however, it's the group's unbridled, unabashed optimism that rings loudest and clearest. While much of today's music is steeped in suffocating cynicism or indifference at best, the defiantly nonjaded Love, Prynn, and Sprout leap out of the speakers with a refreshing lust for life, boasting of ways to make change and find hope in a world that often seems devoid of joy. As the tirelessly enthusiastic Love raps on "A Thousand Words," they "bring the optimism and the opportunity / So you can feel the power of possibility."

Not too cool to care or show compassion, they candidly and poignantly tackle such heady subject matter as police brutality, street harassment, and history's vicious cycles without getting bogged down in the militant anger and preachiness often associated, however questionably, with music's more politically minded wordsmiths. "All we can do is try to speak for the people who haven't any voices / And feel for the women who haven't any choices," Sprout raps on the heartbreakingly earnest "All the Same," laying out what could be considered the group's unofficial M.O.

It's a songwriting approach, Love says, that's informed as much by their sense of personal responsibility in the world as by the feminist credo that everything occurring in the personal sphere has larger, political ramifications. "When we get together to write, we're like, 'What do we want to talk about? What are we thinking about?' Our personal lives are very tied into our social location as white women doing hip-hop and living in an urban environment, and you can't separate your day-to-day experiences from how you're located socially and politically in relation to everything else that's going on around you," she explains.

It's impossible to know if the politico-party vibe on Dying in Stereo or the group's first full-length, tentatively due next spring, will earn Love, Prynn, and Sprout the widespread hip-hop cred and commercial success that's long eluded white-female rappers. Still, it's exciting that they'll be offering the mainstream something it doesn't often hear, regardless of race, gender, and genre: feminism that flips today's typical music scripts by refusing to equate empowerment with sexual exhibitionism and pro-logo consumerism. And, to hear Love tell it, having that opportunity is far more important to Northern State than keeping platinum pace with today's 50 Cents and Eminems.

"We're just lucky to have this amazing forum," Love gushes, "to have this amazing platform – hip-hop – on which to stand and speak our minds."