Women Who Rock Over America

Adele Bertei. Photo by Lucretia Tye Jasmine. Tori Amos artwork by Lindsey Bailey

When I started editing Women Who Rock: Bessie to Beyonce. Girl Groups to Riot Grrrl, I knew we would be honoring a matrilineal history, but I didn’t know we would birth a sisterhood. During the two-year process of producing this book, my 30something contributors and I went through death, birth, divorce, band breakups, and band formations – not to mention the election and tyranny of a misogynist, racist pig. Some of these women I have known as dear friends for decades (love you Jana, Vivien, Ann!). Some I am still meeting. Getting to present with many of these writers during the WWR book tour has been powerful and empowering. We are making alliances and forging friendships.

Evelyn McDonnell. Photo by Solvej Schou

 

The last night of the tour on December 6 brought this all home, literally, to LA. I was honored to be joined by three gifted women at Beyond Baroque in Venice before a full house. I started the evening by reading the words of one of our New York-based sisters, Caryn Rose, who wrote about Beyond Baroque as the place where Exene Cervenka met John Doe, and “the world shifted on its axis.” Solvej Schou followed by talking about PJ Harvey, then belting Harvey’s 1993 song “Man-Size” – and when Solvej belts, you can hear her down the block. She also played her own recent composition, “America.”

Solvej Schou. Photo by Lucretia Tye Jasmine. PJ Harvey artwork by Anne Muntges

 

Thoughtful, funny, personal, philosophical, DJ Lynnee Denise described her odyssey of discovering Bjork: from Crenshaw to Iceland and back. The night closed with a true musical legend. Adele Bertei is one of the original girls who invented punk rock. She began her career working with the doomed, gifted Peter Laughner (Pere Ubu), moved to New York and introduced Brian Eno to the No Wave scene, in which she played as a member of the Contortions. She was in the all-girl, out-dyke band the Bloods before you were born, and her film career includes a starring role in the cult film Born in Flames. Adele read from her WWR essay about Tori Amos, then performed two original songs, including one also called – wait for it – “America.”

DJ Lynnee Denise. Photo by Lucretia Tye Jasmine. Bjork artwork by Winnie T. Frick.

 

Women Who Rock. Making America great again, for real.

Bjork Completes Vulnicura Cycle

Photo by Andrew Thomas Huang

Almost two and a half years ago, Björk spilled her guts to the world. On the album Vulnicura, the often reclusive musician wrote intimately and emotionally about her breakup with the artist Matthew Barney. It was a public purging of a high-profile heartbreak, a direct and exquisitely rendered “fuck you” to a shmuck – long before Beyonce squeezed her lemons into Lemonade. “I am bored of your apocalyptic obsessions,” Björk sang on the thin ice of “Black Lake,” voicing the sentiments of a million millennial women waiting for their men to join them in the 21^st century.

Ms. Gudmundsdottir is finally ending the Vulnicura phase of her astonishing three-decade artistic career. As she told me in an interview for the LA Weekly a few weeks ago, she has begun work on a new album and feels “the Vulnicura cycle is complete.” She delivered her last performance of the album at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles Tuesday night. And what a – shall we say, in deference/reference to her infamous 2010 Oscars outfit — swan-song farewell it was.

Bjork on Digital and Beyonce

Photo by Andrew Thomas Huang

I can never get enough Bjork. I interviewed her recently for LA Weekly and could have talked for hours. I’ve interviewed her several times, including once in Iceland for a cover of Request magazine, and I always admire her intellectual curiosity and open heart. Plus, we both love Beyonce. I’m looking forward to checking out her Digital exhibition that opens at the Magic Box this weekend, and seeing her at the Disney Concert Hall May 30. Enjoy the story!

A Career in Cassettes

 

I’m trying to find a tape of my circa 1990 interview with Ellen Willis. Haven’t found it yet, but here’s some of what I unearthed: interviews with the entire original cast of Rent, Paul Beatty, Patti Smith, Kathleen Hanna, Mary J. Blige, Stephen Trask, Carrie Brownstein, Bjork — the list goes on and on. One cassette is labeled “Missy/Moby.” Is this my legacy?

My She Rocks Playlist

There’s nothing like playing a batch of your favorite records to set your head right. Thanks McAllister and Cass Monster for allowing me to take over She Rocks KXLU last night. Here’s what I played:

 

Bratmobile- Cherry Bomb
The Runaways– Yesterdays Kids
The Runaways- American Nights
Joan Jett- Bad Reputation
Suzi Quatro- 48 Crash
L7- Shove
The Bags- We will bury you
Tribe 8- Manipulate
Fifth Column- Donna
Hole– Softer Softer
Suture- Pretty Is
Björk– Unravel
Jayne Cortez – Sacred Trees
Nina Hagen- Future Is Now

Björk transforms ‘Biophilia’ into a transmedia experience – latimes.com

Bjork is always a treat to interview, and not just because of the Icelandic way she rolls her R’s, which is a song in itself. She’s earnest, inquisitive, unpredictable. I caught up with her again a few weeks ago to talk about Biophilia. To call it an album is just part of the picture. Here, at last, is the story.

 

Björk transforms ‘Biophilia’ into a transmedia experience – latimes.com.