Women's Music CHAT THREAD

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I've been nattering away off-topic on Stewie's excellent thread asking for suggestions for her International Women's Day CD...so thought I would start an ongoing thread for anyone who, like me particularly enjoys music by female artists and female-fronted bands.

I'm not looking for lists of recommendations - there are two threads called Music By Women which have dozens of brilliant suggestions of artists to check out.

This is more about sharing a recent discovery (artist doesn't have to be new, though!) - a song, album, band, singer/songwriter etc. etc. that have inspired or excited you and you want to share. Or to chew the cud about anything related to women's music that catches your interest. Please join in!

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IC's Tune For The Day:

For all insomniacs (plus breast-feeders, those with restless children, noisy neighbours etc. etc.)

A lovely song from the singer/songwriter Devon Sproule:

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Not yet!
Feel free to add your own tune recs, the more the merrier

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Ah yes, we talked about it further upthread - the title track especially is a humdinger.

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IC's Tune For The Day

More whimsical, layered female vocals (but what the hell do the lyrics mean? Who cares!), this time with indie stylings. It's a group that consisted of two men and a woman, but the woman's incomparable voice is what defined their sound and made them unique. She's Elizabeth Fraser and this is from their gorgeous album, Treasure.

[lambethlil]

Random factoid I heard on Capital yesterday... there were only 2 mothers in the top 40.

I'm not sure of its significance, singers tend to young I guess, and maybe that was an unusual week...

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Yep, like that one Stewie!

Interesting lamb. Generally speaking, female artists who get in the charts tend to be at the younger end of the scale. But you raise an interesting point.

How many female artists can break into the music biz if they already have children? There are quite a few examples of established female musicians having children and carrying on (Kate Bush, Madonna spring to mind) but not so many who managed to get a music career going as a newish mother (well, not many that I can think of, anyway! I'm ready and willing to be corrected).

Bjork is probably one of the few who managed it, having her son in 1986 while she was still in The Sugar Cubes. And Sinead O'Connor, whose oldest son was about three when she first found fame. Those who carried on once they had children had to be very established I suspect, I can think of a lot of female artists who had children then more or less disappeared from the music scene afterward.
Kate from This Is The Kit has a daughter who is now about four and she (Kate) has probably found her greatest success since her DD was born.

It clearly can be done!

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IC's Tune For Today:

If you like a nice slab of shoegaze to see you through an evening, then School Of Seven Bells are definitely worth checking out. They've just released a new album called Ghostory but this one is probably my fave from their 2009 offering, Alpinisms

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Aw, SGM, that whole business utterly sucks.
Bless you for hanging on to the music lists...!

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You are a proper solid MN-er and no mistake, SGM

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[BenderBendingRodriguez]

Great thread. I plan to go through and listen to everything later this week :) And great to see that you haven't deregged as I had started to fear, SGM. Don't let the non-gender-specific bastards grind you down

I caught most of Sinead O'Connor's interview on 6Music the other day and was really drawn in by her warmth, verve and good humour. Just goes to show how pervasive negative press can be - so strong is the media portrayal of her as a total wacko, I was surprised to hear her sound like a normal, intelligent woman :(

Anyway, here's one of my favourite things:

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Woah, that's some a capella arrangement Bender..!! I sing in an a capella group myself, so I can imagine how much work went into that. Impressive stuff! I'm intrigued as to why she decided to change her name from Kristin to Kevin, though..!!
Think I'll check out some more of her stuff and maybe nick some of her ideas

Here's IC's Tune For Today:
Who knew a 'cello could be so chock-full of attitude?
This is an ace track by

[BenderBendingRodriguez]

I don't know anything about her really, but I fucking love that video

Can't resist posting a couple of links to this awesome MC:

Ignore the depressing comments below, obv

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Ooh good to hear a female MC keeping her end up in an incredibly male-dominated part of the music business, thanks Bender.

IC's Tune For Today:

I've been rather enjoying otherwise known as Elisabeth Esselink, an Amsterdam heroine of electronica. Not as ethereal in style as Grimes, but if you like her stuff, this may well be up your strasse too...

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Arf! Not surprised that one appealed to you, Stewie! Nice find.

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Anyone feeling angry?

This is the perfect track to get your feelings out.

IC's Tune For Today comes from one of Kristen Hersh's most recent incarnations:

Thrashy guitar, interesting lyrics and some great melodic hooks - delivered with attitude mixed with cool. Can't fault it, personally.

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IC's Tune For Today:

If you haven't checked out Laura Veirs yet and you like a bit of alt. folk, then waste no more time! She's released some corking albums in the course of her career, with a voice that has a really compelling quality, despite not being what you might call technically beautiful. Her songwriting is also unusual in that she takes a lot of themes and ideas from science. And finally, she's an artist who doesn't pander to the be-lipsticked, coiffed and styled image that so many others do - she wears very little make-up, makes no apologies for her thick-rimmed glasses and doesn't do anything fancy with her hair. In short, she lets the music speak for itself and it's pretty special.

This is from her Year Of Meteors album