The Need is a queercore band that originated in Olympia, Washington in the late 1990s.

Formed by Rachel Carns, drums and vocals, and Radio Sloan, guitar and bass guitar, both were veterans of other indie rock bands. Rachel was previously in Kicking Giant, The Fakes, Witchypoo, Slant 6 and Ce Be Barns Band, which Radio had been a member of as well. They made their debut in Olympia, Washington, and, in the summer of 1996, they played at the Dirty Bird Queercore Festival in San Francisco, CA.

The band's first project was Margie Ruskin Stops Time, released in 1996 by Kill Rock Stars, on which The Need provided the music to accompany the words and vocals of Miranda July. Ms. July also performed with the band at the Dirty Bird Festival.

Their music has been described by one critic as "...post structuralist, deconstructive punk rock..." Certainly the band had its own aesthetic, made more apparent by its distinctive art work and posters, created by Rachel, and a willingness to experiment. This, perhaps, lead to their best known creation, The Transfused. In collaboration with Nomy Lamm, the band took the long discarded notion of the rock opera and breathed new life into it. In true DIY style, friends and neighbours helped build sets and audition for parts and The Transfused was mounted at The Capitol Theatre in Olympia in 2000, and eventually travelled to many other cities. If nothing else, the band had managed to revitalize a form of musical presentation no one had taken seriously for decades.

Their last album, recorded in 2000 was prophetically titled The Need is Dead. On this recording they further expanded their range of instrumentation with the addition of synthesizer and samples contributed by Joe Preston of The Melvins, and theremin, played by producer Mike Lastra of Smegma.

After this the band parted ways and Rachel Carns now performs in the band Twin, formally called King Cobra, while Radio Sloan has been in the bands The Circuit Side, Fact or Fiction and Courtney Love's recent all-female backing band The Chelsea. As well, she did a guest stint with LA band Scarling., and played guitar on Le Tigre's 2005 album Le Tigre. *Bio from Wikipedia.*