Bif Naked loves herself today.

That wasn't always the case, as the punk diva documents with graphic clarity in tonight's Edgefest II gig with Simple Plan and Flashlight Brown at the SuperEx Civic Centre.

The breakdown of her relationship, recording her new emotionally bracing album Purge and the spiritual epiphany of turning 30, the last couple years have been a hellish, harrowing time for Naked.

"It was a very blue time," she recalls from her home base in Vancouver's trendy shopping district. "Purge came out of personal upheaval that ultimately proved empowering and rewarding."

SEX AND THE SARDONIC

Somehow, you just know by simply looking at her that when Naked says it was a rough time, she really means it. The Anne Rice combination of sex and the sardonic cut a path for Naked through pop charts congested with in-tune, spiritually empowered women such as Sarah MacLaughlan, Alanis Morissette and Celine Dion.

Naked was more a role-model for the heavily mascaraed wunderkid Avril Lavigne, who played the SuperEx last night.

Recorded in the midst of all this sexual, spiritual and emotional fallout, Purge proved a healthy creative outlet for her anger and frustration.

"That's the point of (her single) I Love Myself Today," she says. "Be yourself. Be an exhibitionist. Repression makes people really sick."

At 33, Naked's at a happier stage in her life.

"I'm proud to be in my dirty 30s, when women reach their pinnacle," she boasts. "Women have a lot of crap to get rid of. So many women hate women, hate having the social skills of an adolescent, all heartbreak and suffering. I want women to shed their negative self-images.

"Many of us felt we had to prove ourselves in the 1980s and 1990s by being tougher than men," she admits. "Screw that. I just want to be myself.

"I want to bring back femininity. If that means wearing pearls and pinning your mother's cameo on your boobs, you should do it without feeling guilty."

It's slightly ironic that Naked, a grrrl known for her multiple body piercings and torso blanketed in tattoos, is embracing this 1960s throwback to a kinder, gentler femininity.

"People change," she says. "When I was young, I was an obnoxious exhibitionist. Now, I'm wearing pink and shopping for shoes and thinking about going to medical school when I'm 50."