Boards
Female Bands
There was a thread a while ago about how female bands get an easier ride than male bands. Here's a resurrection. What you think?
I think this band
http://www.drownedinsound.com/bands/8587
wouldn't have got signed and promoted if they weren't good looking woman.
*braces for massive backlash*
DiS-cuss.
what???
they're letting girls in bands now?
They'll be after the vote next
that's the kind of joke my brother would make :)
Joke?
I saw them the other day at Dublin Caslte
they're not very good. But The Very were very good. Geddit?
Anyway, I knew someone would immediately give it the whole "sexist" thing, but I'm asking a valid question. this means you fullerov
I NEVER answer valid questions.
but yes. Their looks probaby helped them at FIRST.
However talent is needed to go further than initial record company interest...
The Very
the scottish band The Very? I know of them, yeah quite good, apart from that song that sounds like the A-team tune.
The Very
are fucking awful :S
I think some female bands get it hard though
I'm thinking - the pipettes and shimura curves - because they have a big fashion/aesthetics thing going on, they sometimes get mocked. But when franz dance about in suits, no-one raises an eyebrow
yeah, but lets be honest
Shimura curves don't have much going for them (musically)
i was actually surprised this week
that, despite my intial impression, Shimura Curves are like TOTALLY ACE musically.
[...]
i think they make good feedback. So good i thought my SKULL WAS GOING TO CRACK IN HALF.
i like what i've heard on record though (i.e. 'I Captured The Castle')
What?
A lot of people have 'raised an eyebrow' at the Franz aesthetic, saying that they are the epitome of the modern alternative focusing too heavily on look and hence ganing a bigger following. Stupid people, yes, but there are a lot of those in the world. Which is the price you have to pay for being in an 'arty' band i guess.
how many female bands
or musicians do you have in your record collection? Completely dwarfed by you male band/artist collection?
The promotion, to a certain extent may be easier, the longevity less so.
That's because proportionally
there's a lot less girls on bands to begin with than boys
wy do you think that is?
I mean, there's no talent differential based on gender, so why is it?
Dunno
Being in a band is more a stereotypical thing for a bloke to do, so less girls are into it.
I haven't got a clue but it's definately a fact. It's not like girls of 16 try to form a band and everyone says "YOU'RE A JOKE" is it?
Or
it's that the 'girl bands' unless pretty, like you say, don't get taken as a marketable asset, don't get signed, and can't make cds for you to buy.
It's all be supposition, really.
I would post my usual rant
But bones_howe has said everything I would say. Maybe it's initially easier to get signed if you're a pretty girl, but it's a lot harder to get taken seriously in the long term. And if you're an unpretty girl, god help you.
I'm not sure
Dead Disco have been signed..? Not sure though.
Contrarily I think female bands get a harder time than male bands - there's so much focus on the fact that they're girls that the music gets brushed aside a lot of the time.
that girl band on channel 4
- Totally Frank.
and Frank Lampard has called his autobiography Totally Frank
crazy :S
Serious answer
I don't think Female bands get an easier ride than male bands.
I am struggling to think of a current female-band that is succesful, excluding pop bands such as Girls Aloud.
It would seem Prima Facie that this statement is incorrect?
how successful?
madonna?
bjork?
kate bush?
Bands....
humph
shangri-las? though I dont know much about how their success emerged.
sleater-kinney? hey've been going for a while?
Sleater-Kinney have split.
It's sad that we are struggling to think of them
PGMG is one
and really
that's only half a band.
There's men in PGMG
and you'd hardly call them successful.
Any all-girl advance on The Organ?
CHICKS ON SPEED
I WIN
Gah
All the same, though, the next CoS album is hardly going to be stocked in supermarkets, is it? It's an interesting anomoly that girl-fronted 'indie' bands are, while not given that fair a crack of the whip, usually more talked about then their level of success would suggest. Sleeper had a couple of top ten singles but Louise Wener was all over the place, Echobelly had one top 20 single, Kenickie not even that... nowadays your gut reaction answer to the question "name a big shot UK girl fronted indie band" would, unless I'm forgetting someone incredibly obvious, be either the Long Blondes, who didn't get signed for more than two years and whose biggest single peaked at, according to Everyhit, 28, or the Pipettes, who were talked up for a year or so and still ended up on an independent label after, apparently, being told by a major to become an ironic covers act.
The Like
Thas is
A brilliant post
Getting better, yes...
Sleater-Kinney were together for 11 years. They and the riot grrrl movement from which they sprung definitely made it easier for all-female bands playing rock music of substance to be taken seriously, but I would say that it is still an uphill battle. The fact that S-K never had a radio hit is a travesty. As pop songs, "Oh!" and "Rollercoaster" are as good as anything the Beatles released.
Shangri-Las?
i might as well throw The Supremes into the equation.
All the other are hardly battling at the top of the charts are they? Chicks On Speed? PGMG?
Mainstream and independent
In mainstream manufactured chart music the record labels will sign what they think is sellable and they are just as likely to choose a female band based on qualities other than ability as they are to choose a male band based on such qualities. For example, Westlife and Girls Aloud were not signed because of their talent as singers or songwriters.
For those bands from an independent background who are keen to be signed by a major label I would say that it is an advantage to be male. There exists a lot prejudice within the music industry, remarkably, which extends to thinking that men are, genrally, better musicians. Also, a mob of four scruffy blokes tends to have more immediate appeal to the easily-pleased masses.
Within the independent music business there is no reason why gender should be an issue either way.
JD Traynor is sensible comment shocker
I do agree too!
seconded/thirded/whatevered
unfortunately it is still seen as more 'noble' to be a man in a band, as shown by the worship of one Mr Doherty despite not writing a dedent song for the best part of half a decade, or bands like The Kooks and Razorlight being generally accepted as 'stunning' pop songwriters whilst threads on bands like The Pipettes descend rapidly into discussion about which is the more shaggable. Unfortunately.
That's a good point
(although of course Girls Aloud were signed by default as the members were voted in on "Popstars: The Rivals".
One thing I would add is that I think that, within an independent background, gender is much more an issue than it is for women than it is for men (although, as Traynor rightly says, it shouldn't be).
For example I think there is probably a disproportionate emphasis placed on the Pipettes' gender which I don't think would exist within an all-male band.
It seems
that Girls Aloud are a bad example, yes, as inclusion in that show meant they automatically got the best market-friendly producers/songwriters/stylists etc. and an hour's worth of promotion on primetime ITV every Saturday night for several months.
I think it's a mixed blessing
There is probably an extent to which an all female band is still something of a novelty and will get some opportunities an all male band won't simply 'cos they stand out from the crowd but, at the same time, I think it's harder for women to be respected as musicians and indeed as individausl in their own right rather than simply as 'a female muscician'.
For example, in my frankly limited experience I think I have noted that mainstream female singer-songwriters find it easier to get gigs than male singer-songwriters but it's much harder for them to get gigs once step outside the boundaries of what is expected of a 'female singer-songwriter' and attempt to asser their individuality whereas possibly a male singer-songwriter would be accepted as himself.
"frankly limited experience"
Your comments appear valid from an observational and epoch-dependent perspective but, in the independent part of the music business, views such as those you allude to about the Pipettes are representative of a minority whose input can be ignored. When you discuss attitudes toward women in music you are discussing the attitudes in a small part of independent music, and one which is historically ignorant.
A 2006 perspective is sullied by the prevailing attitudes within society in general, that is, a return to the gender-divisions of several decades ago. A broader perspective, both temporally and musically, will see any gender prejudice in independent music as absurd and worthless. Consider that many of the seminal, a word not meant ironically, practitioners and pioneers of elctronic composition were (and are) women, such as Delia Derbyshire, Daphne Oram and Pauline Oliveros; that some of the most noteworthy protagonists in punk were women, Siouxsie and Poly; that some of the most interesting composers and performers, people who take music onward, around today are female, Ikue Mori, Haco, Ellen Allien, Bjork, Polly Harvey, Marianne Nowottny, Mira Calix, Kaija Saariaho, etc.
I don't agree with your second paragraph because it can be shown to be inaccurate by the success of Bjork, Tori Amos, Kate Bush, Patti Smith and even Madonna.
In the second paragraph as I was referring more to acts starting out now.
All those you allude to started out over a decade ago and what you say is true but I was referring more to new acts trying to get gigs very early in their careers. I'd also point out that many of the examples you give are physically attractive and I wonder if they could have succeded in ploughing their own furrows if this were not the case?
Whilst you are obviously right that gender prejudice in independent music is absurd, worthless and historically ignorant, I still feel that it exists and I am not sure these prejudices can be ignored, espeicially if you are a female musician (and especially singer-songwriter) who wants to make a living from their music.
.
My housemate is in this all-girl band:
www.myspace.com/firebranduk
They did Summer Sundae, probably the heaviest band there. They did this demo with the chap who did the arctic monkeys, I like it.
*cough*
www.thetrousers.co.uk
setting music's gender imbalance to rights!
Please don't take this the wrong way, wearsthetrousers
but in a way I'm not sure how only promoting females in music is any improvement on only promoting males in music.
Surely the point is that it is the music, rather than the gender, that is the key thing?
i won't
it's a fair point and i actually agree with you to some extent, but it's a means to an end. we're not trying to promote women at the expense of men and we always try to focus on the music rather than 'attitude'. sexist comments, in either direction, are a complete no no.
That sounds fair enough.
...
Question: You say you focus on the music, but is there anything on your site concerning the MUSIC? Let me explain what I mean - it’s a source of frustration for me to see a successful male band made up of members who don’t seem to be particularly technically proficient at their instruments. It is doubly so when you see females suffering in the same way because it just gives ammo to those people who opine that women can’t play. The fact is female players occupy a significant proportion of many of the world’s leading orchestras and conservatries and are well represented in many other genres. Then you happen across pop and rock on TV and magazines and the only women you see are singers, dancers, rock acts playing fairly basic forms of the style, or the singer-songwriter who invariably relies on male session musicians to add colour to her musical template. Are you doing enough to ensure you’re giving enough coverage to women in music who express themselves primarily though their instruments, or female bands who purvey more challenging or hell - wanky styles of music? In short, are you dedicating the same diversity of genre and analysis afforded to men in the music community to the women you feature?
Without getting into the whole “is it mysoginist to ask” debate - I would like to read about great female guitarists and drummers talking about their approach to music and those women who ply their trade in less familiar genres - women like Meshell Nedegocello and Terri Lynne Carrington, whose talent deserves to be talked about completely independently of their gender. That would be hot. Hit me back, dude.
Yes
"whose talent deserves to be talked about completely independently of their gender."
That would be the ideal scenario. Such a scenario exists in jazz, blues, improv, classical, experimental music, modern composition, folk. Popular music and the main styles of music appreciated in the likes of DiS and NME, etc. feel the need to emphasise gender.
all the best bands
have male and female members in though-bearsuit, fiery furnaces, belle and sebastian, misty's, zombina and the skeletones, dresden dolls, pretty girls make graves, loads of others that i have forgotten.
maybe all bands should be forced to have members of both sexes in the band. by law
I thnk it's better to do so anyway.
I think all-male (and I'd guess all-female) environments can get a bit much. It's trying to find musicians though - at the moment I'm trying to find a female bassist for my band and they seem quite hard to find.
...
Apart from it being hot - why?
You mean "why do I want a female bassist?"
Basically 'cos I think mixed sex environments tend to be more pleasant and relexed than all male environment and I want to avoid testosterone overkill.
female bassist cliche
poor
Feel free to expand.
I didn't quite follow.
I forgot to mention that backing vocals/potential duets were the other more practical reason I'd like a female musician in the band.
So...
This'll be an all-male band with the pretty girl relegated to the bass, cooing softly in a bid to make your husky tones more appealing.
This sir, is a cliche.
It's unwise to make assumptions about people you've never met
That's not what I'm saying at all. No-one's being "relegated" to the bass - for one thing, I'd have thought a lot of bassists would take issue with the suggestion there's something inferior about bass-playing and, for another, a bassist is the only musician my band doeesn't currently have so of course I'm going to look for someone to od that 'cos that's what I need. I'm not sure why you'd imagine looks to be any kind of factor. I want the right person who's going to fit in with the band and I couldn't give a damn what they look like.
Please don't take this the wrong way Tim but, so far as I'm aware, we've never met or even had a discussion about anything online so I'm slightly confused as to why you feel qualified to tell me what my motives are for looking for band members.
touched a nerve?
I'm not making any assumptions about you or your music, I'm only voicing what most people will think upon seeing your lineup.
You've not touched a nerve with your bizarre conspriacy theory on female bassists
but I do hate being called a cliche.
With regard to "what most people will think", people can think what they'd like. They'd be completely wide of the mark, however.
of course
An all-male band with a token female bassist is a cliche.
What fucking planet are you on?
"An all-male band with a female bassist" is an oxymoron actually
and I don't see how it's a cliche. Certainly no more so than all-male bands or all-female bands, or male bands with a female singer, or male bands with a female keyboard or female bands with a male guitarist or any other combination you choose to name.
I don't actually know anyone who's in a band with a female bassist for one thing. And for another thing your views are, as kittyboo points out, pretty demeaning to bass-playing women.
Trying to think of one
LLama Farmers but that was a brother/sister thing.
That god awful band who sound a bit like the Llama Farmers.
That god awful band who had a feud with Crashland
I've always though of female-bassist as a bit of a cliche but perhaps it's not and it was just a bit of a phase indie went through when I was younger. I think the 70s were the decade of the female keyboardist.
Kim Deal! I knew there was someone obvious I was forgetting. Kim Deal is obviosuly great though and is probably the inspiration for a lot of women who play bass.
Now I think of it JJ72 had one.
But I hardly think JJ72 inspired a generation.
I'm honestly puzzled at why Tim thinks it so unreasonable for me not to want to be in an all-male band simply 'cos I don't like Testosterone-addled environments.
Yes
A very boring one.
To put this in some perspective, I'm in a three-piece with a female guitarist and drummer. At no point have we made an issue of this (except very recently when attempting to gain some coverage from Wears The Trousers - see above!)
I'm not saying there aren't some great bands with three guys and a girl on bass. There are. It is one of the oldest cliches in rock, however.
"AT no point have we made an issue of this"
but you are making an issue out of gender in music?
If you scroll up a bit you'll see that I mentioned in passing that I don't really like being an all-male environment and, as we have a vacancy in our band for a bassist, I'd ideally like a female to fill it so as not to be in an all-male environment.
You then jumped on it and tried to turn it into some kind of issue I still don't understand because you decided there was some bizarre conspiracy (rather than me not having a bassist at the moment and having a guitarist and drummer) that was informng my decision.
I still don't know who these masses of male bands with female bassists are. I honestly cannot currently think of any off the top of my head.
Given that you've essentially tried to imply that the combination of my desire to not be in an all-male environment and my currently needing a new bassist (rather than, say, a guitarist or drummer) is somehow significant, I fail to see how you can claim to not be making an issue out of gender in music.
Aw now you're just protesting a bit too much
because you know I'm right.
Did you read my post?
I assume not 'cos your reply shows no relation to what I said.
Yes that's right
Just because I have an opinion which differs from yours and am tired of seeing girls in bands in menial roles (bass, backing vocals, triangle) you see fit to resort to playground insults.
I still don't understand why you think bass is a menial role.
The right bassist is one of the most essential things in a band.
...
I wouldn't pay it any heed. I thought about giving this Tim a piece of my mind regarding the role of bassists in bands - but then I realised that if his views on bassplaying extends to his own music, then it's in all likelihood complete garbage. This gives me intense satisfaction.
triangle
haha I thought you'd like that.
i've not read all of this but
i'm afraid timhulio has a point about rock cliches. Just because the prejudice exists doesn't mean that it's true, and just because he is pointing it out doesn't mean that he necessarily believes it.
There is a cliche of sorts that if you got someone in the industry to design a 'perfect' band in terms of aethetic appeal then their would be an all-male band with a female plaing bass. This is because, as Traynor pointd out, there is still shocking belief in the usic industry that girls are not as talented, insightful or generally good at writing songs, playing complicated music and so on. And yes, it does bring in prejudice about bass guitar too, suggesting that it is relatively easy to master that it can even be played by - gasp! - a girl. So why include the girl? Because the industry thrives greatly off comforting aesthetics and a female musician is more likely to provide the eye candy.
i remember this argument coming up a few years ago when i alluded in an article to the replacement of Ikara Colt's old bass player, a male, to a female rock chic who was (is) undeniably very attractive. i wasn't cynically saying that they had planned it that way, or that the band were at all trying to market their music, or that her only pupose there was to make the live set-up look prettier (Tracey continues to be a great musician). But with one comment about her looks i was instantly accused of being part of a male-orientated music industry that values women in bands only as wank fodder and not as noble and worthwhile inclusions in the current musical landscape.
This only occured because problems of sexism still exist within the music industry, particularly in the rock and indie scenes, and a lot of people are aware of it - which, regrettably, means that everybody has to be on their guard about people not willing to look beyond the 'look' of girls in groups.
You make many valid points
What really annoyed me with Tim was that he leapt on my comment about wanting a female in my band (which I shall stress again, although I'm not sure why I should, has far more to do with a dislike of all-male environments than any aesthetic consideration) and decided to tell me the 'real' reason I had made that decision, despite the fact he doesn't know me and therefore isn't really qualified to tell me my motivation.
There does seem to be this cynical assumption that women are only 'allowed' in bands to serve as 'wank fodder for indie boys' which is frankly idiotic.
Unfortunately, while I do to an extent understand what Tim is trying to say, I think his own tendency to assume himself that the aesthetic is the only reason somebody would want a female in a band (despite him being in a band with 2 women himself) continues to perpetuate gender myths rather than move past them.
Obviously there probably are bands that do take on female members for aesthetic reasons and obviously that's not a helpful attitude but I think a witchunt against anyone who happens to be female bassist (which is what Tim seems to advociate) worsens the problem and places more emphasis on the gender of band members, which shouldn't be that important at all.
I dare anyone to read this
And not hate this awful, awful band:
http://tinyurl.com/psfon
not easier at all
i think your comment about them being "good looking women" says it all!
Thinking about it
a lot of the bands that i have adored most this year have a lot of female presence to them - Bearsuit, Pipettes, Hot Puppies, Misty's, Retro Spankees etc. Plus i believe that Regina Spektor has made her greatest musical statement to relatively little fanfare this year, and that a lot of highly influential female-led bands - Slits, Cocteaus, Banshees etc. - are, in rock and indie terms, brushed aside when listing useful reference points in favour of the more macho likes of Gang Of Four or The Clash.
It is in muic as it is in visual art, as far as i see it. i have studied the rudimentary beginnings of theory for the inclusion of females in the history of art and there are striking parallels between the two mediums. Not only do both mediums generally airbrush female pioneers from their history books, but in recent times when women have started to be gradually accepted into the art/music world it is only really a case of the female artist being embraced by the industry/media/public when they adhere to certain strict terms. For instance, the female as a slightly 'witchy' presence, a rather otherwordly sense of the spiritual rather than an actual real person with real feelings - art has Sam Taylor-Wood and Yoko Ono (herself shadowed phenominally by one of the males in her life, how many interviews with her, despite the context, ask about her work?), music has Kate Bush, Bjork, Tori Amos, Joanna Newsom, Vashti Bunyan and so on.
But also, both mediums only really tend to only celebrate women in their respective fields when their work actually concerns *being* a woman, as if to suggest that men can make the grand statements about life and art and love and other subjects of a higher philosophical plain, leaving women to make art/write songs about how difficult it is being a women and having to adhere to a male-orientated culture/society. Art has Tracey Emin, Fridha Carlo, Sarah Lucas and just about all other recent successful artists who create work about the male gaze. It might also explain how the most successful female-orientated movement in music for the past few decades, Riot Grrrl, included many bands with songs that made a large statement that, yes, we're girls with guitars, we bait boys, we can rock too etc. See also successful female singer songwriters like Dido, Katie Melua, Anastasia, etc who sing about how dfficult it is being without a man/how empowering it is not being with one. So it is unlikely that female bands will be taken as seriously as male bands when tackling issues other than being female.
Hmm. Sorry about the essay...
This whole thread has been hijacked
by Timhulio ranting on about what is effectively his own weird opinions on music becuase it suits him at the moment. He gets a girl drummer in his band then proceeds to be smarmy about it. Girl on guitar too? Well then THAT'S SO COOL.
HOW CAN HAVING PEOPLE IN A BAND BE A CLICHE. Sorry to say this but isn't it about the music not "look! girl bassist. What a cliche."
Who gives a fuck.
hypocrite
you've no idea how embarassed I am at having to trawl around camden bars with you interviewing prospective female bassists based solely on appearance in a shameless bid to make a band more aesthetically appealing a couple of years back. Sure people might rave on about gender balance and adding backing vocals (hey for all I know theguywith...'s motives might be pure) but I can't help seeing a predominantly male band adding a female bassist as anything other than a cynical marketting move.
How am I a hyprocrite when I think that
there's nothing wrong with women in bands? Secondly, don't try to re-write history. You did that, you designed the flyers and I completely see it is a much better way of meeting people when they show an interest, fit or not fit. The reason why we were after a bassist is we had the rest of the band. What do you want, two fucking drummers?
If you wanna give yourself some new art-house image, go peddle your flavour-of-the-month opinions on the jagstang message board rather than crashing DiS every now and again to bad mouth me.
Break it up you two
there's girls in the room...
LOLZ
...
No, let them. Someone might get a female bassist out of it.
Chyah,
what a cliche.
For shame Stealthy, FOR SHAME.