Potty Mouth is a Western Massachusetts pop-punk band that formed in 2011 at Smith College. The band's original lineup was Ally Einbinder (bass guitar), Phoebe Harris (guitar), Abby Weems (guitar, lead vocals), and Victoria Mandanas (drums). Following Harris's departure, Potty Mouth has continued as a three-piece, with occasional guest guitarists at live performances.
Einbinder and Weems have expressed disapproval of the labeling of the band as riot grrrl. Einbinder stated that "Slapping the riot grrrl label on us just because we happen to be women playing a type of music that happens to be reminiscent of another era in time seems like a lazy conflation". Weems speculated that the association may have been due to the low fidelity of their early recordings.
In a Pitchfork review of Hell Bent, Jenn Pelly described Weems's vocals as a "Liz Phair-style monotone", delivering "deceptively simple lyrics". Writing for the Toronto Star, Ben Rayner wrote that Weems "sounds like she's perpetually rolling her eyes at everything and everyone in scorn". Jenn Pelly and Liz Pelly also compare the band's sound to pop-punk and post-punk with vestiges of surf music.