Jane Wiedlin, the guitarist in the Los Angeles rock group the Go Go’s, has accused the radio DJ and former club owner Rodney Bingenheimer of sexually assaulting her when she was a teenager. In a new Rolling Stone report that includes testimony from four other women, Wiedlin alleges that, when she was about 15 and he was about 27, Bingenheimer isolated her in a back room of his Los Angeles club, Rodney Bingenheimer’s English Disco, and rubbed his crotch against hers until he ejaculated. “I didn’t know what to do; I was pretty much frozen,” Wiedlin told Rolling Stone. “I didn’t say anything; I didn’t try to stop him.” Bingenheimer did not respond to the magazine’s request for comment.
The other women who spoke with Rolling Stone detailed similar experiences; the article follows a lawsuit, filed late last year and still active, in which the Runaways’ Kari Krome accused Bingenheimer and the late Kim Fowley of sexual assaulting her when she was a teenager. (One of the women to come forward in the new article filed a police report to the Los Angeles Police Department in 2018 that did not result in charges, according to Rolling Stone.) Wiedlin said she is coming forward, in part, to show Krome that she is not alone.
Bingenheimer, an influential rock DJ who hosted a show on KROQ from 1976 to 2017, still hosts a weekly radio show on SiriusXM’s Underground Garage channel. In the Rolling Stone article, Wiedlin added that she has mixed feelings about Bingenheimer’s role as an early champion of the Go-Go’s. “The guy’s a fucking monster, but then he also helped us,” she said, adding, “the Go-Go’s got our first exposure because of Rodney.”
Belinda Carlisle insists The Go-Gos are 'done'
Belinda she would love to collaborate with Brandi Carlisle as they both think it is hilarious that people confuse them for each other.
The 64-year-old singer was the lead singer of the renowned rock group before going on to achieve a string of hits in her own right in the 1980s and Belinda says the group are finished, having gone out on top with a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 2021.
She told Variety: "It’s done. It has to be done at some point, you know. I think bands can go on too long, and without naming names, there are a few. And singers as well. I always tell my manager, 'I hope you’re gonna tell me when it’s time.' I don’t think that he’s gonna have to, because I probably will have pretty much felt like it’s time for me. I think I have a good sense of that. But, I mean, we did it all. I think that the Rock Hall induction was a really wonderful way to cement the legacy of the band. There’s something to be said for leaving at the top."
