women in rock

Last night I had the pleasure of not just watching The Runaways, not just supporting my local Rock’n’Roll Camp for Girls, but seeing Cherie Currie, lead singer of the first all-female rock band, field questions after a screening of the movie.

                        

A recently revived obsession with Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene’ inspired me to share my fave songs penned with a named woman in mind. But of course, the mix has been done, and quite well. So I got to thinking (yes, in that Carrie Bradshaw kind of way) and wondered what the general feeling was of songs penned by women about men. Conclusion? Unlike the lovelorn narrators of Mandy, Help Me Ronda, and Roxanne, the songs on this BitchTapes deal not only with the kind of love that makes you want to scream another’s name until someone calls the police, but engage also with the other relationships that women can have with men – from concerned anti-drug sister to a pupil of punk rock to the naïve straight girl who just doesn’t get Johnny. Enjoy!