Gender in the music industry : rock, discourse, and girl power

252 Pages·2007·5.288 MB·English

by  Marion Leonard

Gender in the Music industry

Gender in the Music industry
rock, discourse and Girl Power
Marion Leonard
University of Liverpool, UK
First published 2007 by Ashgate Publishing
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
First issued in hardback 2017
Copyright © 2007 Marion Leonard
Marion Leonard has asserted her moral right under the copyright, designs and Patents act,
1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in
any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter
invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or
retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used
only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Leonard, Marion
Gender in the music industry : rock, discourse and girl power. – (ashgate popular and folk
music series)
1. Women rock musicians 2. rock music – history and criticism 3. Women in music
4. Gender identity in music
i. title
781.6'6'082
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Leonard, Marion, 1970–
Gender in the music industry : rock, discourse and girl power / Marion Leonard.
p. cm. – (ashgate popular and folk music series)
includes bibliographical references (p. ) and discography (p. ).
isBn-13: 978-0-7546-3861-2 (hardback : alk. paper)
isBn-13: 978-0-7546-3862-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. alternative rock music – history and criticism. 2. Women rock musicians. 3. riot grrrl
movement. i. title.
ML3534.L456 2007
781.66082–dc22
2006032262
ISBN 978-0-7546-3862-9 (pbk)
ISBN 978-1-138-45968-7 (hbk)
contents
List of figures vii
General Editor’s preface ix
Acknowledgements xi
introduction 1
1 rock and masculinity 23
2 Gender and indie rock music 43
3 Meaning making in the press 65
4 strategies of performance 89
5 the riot grrrl network: grrrl power in indie rock 115
6 the development of riot grrrl: through zines, the internet
and across time 137
7 Ladyfest: online and offline DIY festival promotion 163
conclusion 181
Appendix 1: Zines 183
Appendix 2: Interviews 191
Select discography 199
References 207
Index 229

List of figures
2.1 Members of Kenickie pictured in Birmingham, May 1997. L–r:
emmy-Kate Montrose, Lauren Laverne and Marie du santiago.
Photographer: Marion Leonard. 54
4.1 amelia Fletcher, lead vocalist with oxford-based indie band Marine
research, performing at the reading Festival, 1999.
Photographer: Marion Leonard. 94
5.1 selection of zines published in the uK. Photographer:
Marion Leonard. 119
6.1 selection of us riot grrrl zines published between 1991 and 1994.
Photographer: Marion Leonard. 139
6.2 Louise and Karen performing in Flamingo 50. Photographer:
red chidgey. 152
6.3 Front cover of Riot Grrrl zine, published in Washington, dc, in the
early 1990s. Photographer: Marion Leonard. 156
6.4 Girl Power! zine produced by women in Leeds, Bradford and york in
March 1993. Photographer: Marion Leonard. 157
6.5 spice Girls promotional products and merchandise; the slogan ‘girl
power’ appears on a keyring and as the title of the spice Girls’ book.
Photographer: Marion Leonard. 158
7.1 Festival programmes and flyers from Ladyfest London 2002 and
Ladyfest Manchester 2003. Photographer: Marion Leonard. 165

General editor’s preface
the upheaval that occurred in musicology during the last two decades of the
twentieth century has created a new urgency for the study of popular music alongside
the development of new critical and theoretical models. a relativistic outlook has
replaced the universal perspective of modernism (the international ambitions of
the 12-note style); the grand narrative of the evolution and dissolution of tonality
has been challenged, and emphasis has shifted to cultural context, reception
and subject position. together, these have conspired to eat away at the status of
canonical composers and categories of high and low in music. a need has arisen,
also, to recognize and address the emergence of crossovers, mixed and new genres,
to engage in debates concerning the vexed problem of what constitutes authenticity
in music and to offer a critique of musical practice as the product of free, individual
expression.
Popular musicology is now a vital and exciting area of scholarship, and the
Ashgate Popular and Folk Music Series aims to present the best research in the field.
authors will be concerned with locating musical practices, values and meanings
in cultural context, and may draw upon methodologies and theories developed in
cultural studies, semiotics, poststructuralism, psychology and sociology. the series
will focus on popular musics of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It is designed
to embrace the world’s popular musics from acid Jazz to Zydeco, whether high tech
or low tech, commercial or non-commercial, contemporary or traditional.
Professor derek B. scott
chair of Music
university of salford