Girls With Guitars Need Not Apply: Dirty No. 2

"We've always been a wild card, being girls and being rock 'n' roll. But now, if people don't buy our record, we'll at least know we did what we wanted." Brett Anderson, The Donnas
Sometimes I think I was born in a different time period. People love to ask me the question "who is your favorite singer?" My answer doesn't even contain a pause: Carly Simon.
Then come the strange looks. The "what the hell is the matter with you?" looks. You've gotten them. Maybe from your mother when you put those pink and blue stripes in your hair in high school...or when you were 35.
Now I'm not speaking about bands...or my answer might be deemed a little bit more acceptable: The Donnas...and they remind me of Carly Simon.
But truthfully, what do The Donnas and Carly Simon really have in common?
Much more than you might think.
I think Carly Simon's songwriting skills are self-evident. Penning such classics as "You're So Vain," to "Legend in Your Own Time," to "Let the River Run" from the movie Working Girl, for which Simon won an Oscar.
Though "You're So Vain" is often her most remembered (and most sampled, just look at Janet Jackson and Missy Elliot), one of her best songs is "That's the Way I Always Heard it Should Be" in some ways a song about women's liberation. Carly helped to liberate the women of her era-by picking up her guitar and simply playing.
But recently, as in about eight years ago--with the release of her album The Bedroom Tapes-that we find how Ms. Simon and the hard-rockin' Donnas have more in common with women in the music business than you might think.
Arista Records released the Bedroom Tapes, just after Clive Davis, a real champion for Simon, was fired. According to Carly (and many others in the music business), Arista was turning into a more "urban" label, and Carly Simon-one of the greatest of all time-didn't really fit into that equation. The man in charge of Arista now was L.A. Reid-and apparently he really didn't care all too much about Carly.
From Carly's Web site:
One of the reasons I knew they didn't care at all is that I was scheduled to go on a Radio tour during the summer of 2000 in a Winnebago, where Entertainment Tonight and other big TV promotional camera crews could fit in. It was to be glistening with tinsel and space and glamour and leis. The day the Winnebago arrived to pick up myself and Michael Lockwood (who just got married to Lisa Marie Presley a few days ago!!!) and Jim, my husband, we laughed. The Winnebago was like a Potemkin mini car. Like a drawing of a Winnebago. The three of us could hardly fit in much less any single camera man. I got the picture. Oh yes, the man who took over at Arista was called L. A. Reid - I had almost forgotten.
Carly soon thereafter bought the rights to The Bedroom Tapes from Arista. Since then, Carly has worked with several record companies including Rhino Records and Columbia, the label of her latest release, Into White. She has expressed her ability to have more creative freedom, and do what she feels is good.
The Donnas seemingly were in a similar predicament with their last record label, Atlantic. Spend the Night had sold more than 400,000 copies, and Gold Medal, Atlantic hoped would sell even more...but in order to sell, you need to promote. With personnel constantly changing at major record labels, it's hard to stay with one person from the beginning of the project to the finish of it.
Especially if you don't see eye-to-eye creatively.
In a great interview with Billboard magazine, Torry Castellano said, "If you join a major, a few months later it'll be like a new company."
So now we see The Donnas on their own label-Purple Feather-where they have their own creative freedom, and received more profits.
I won't go over the whole story of The Donnas and their split with Atlantic, it's been written before. I'm sure the die-hards know it well.
Even though they might be generations apart, the business of rock 'n' roll is still the same. It doesn't matter if you are considered one of the greatest singer-songwriters of all-time, or if you are working your way there.
The music business is just tough, clouded in a pop-music, candy-coated single world....

Girls With Guitars Need Not Apply: No. 1

The concept goes back to the late 1800's. Though some historians see it as a myth, to many Irish-Americans the discrimination was real: Irish Need Not Apply. Now, this concept, in its modern form transgresses over to music. More specifically, it crosses over into the women rock category.

Why?

Simple. The mainstream music industry does not feel that guitar-carrying women have the selling power of let's say ... one Ms. Britney Spears. The lure of Lilith Fair is now gone, replaced by "Booty-shaking, scantily-clad" pre-teens, who are on the front rack of your local Wal-Mart music section.

Judging by Britney's 2007 MTV Video Music Awards performance, that last paragraph might be in some need of editing. Maybe a [insert your favorite bubble gum pop semi-diva of non-drinking age name here].

This is not to say that some aren't good. Rihanna, in my opinion, is one hell of an artist. Her sound is different, touching of rock-n-roll, pop, dance...and she is able to do most of it flawlessly. Some may not agree, but the respect for Rihanna is well above the respect for...Jessica Simpson. Anyone who can break a bone in her foot but CONTINUE to tour and not cancel any shows...well that has to count for something.

Alicia Keys. Now she really isn't pre-teen, but her sound is so unique and can't be matched by anyone out there. She's had mainstream success, and hasn't given in to what MTV (do they play videos anymore!?) thinks will generate ad revenue and sales.

But there is ALWAYS room for a girl with a guitar. Take the most recent surprise...Colbie Caillat. Guitar in hand, she rose from the indie scene (primarily MySpace), and has scored her first big hit, "Bubbly."

Now maybe this isn't hard rock or glam rock, but it still shows commercial success for women with guitars (or a piano in Alicia Keys' case).

But in editorials in the following weeks, I'll be looking at some of the issues in the music business, mainstream media and anything else my rockin' Gloria Steinem-esque heart can think of. However, I also want to hear from you. Send me YOUR comments and YOUR feedback. I'd love to hear what YOU'RE thinking...and I might even touch on what you say for a future blog.