Doing some meditation on music lately ... in highschool, I came out, so I started redefining my life, finding things that were relevant to me. My music tastes changed; I was so bored with what was on the radio but didn't know where or how to look for something that would speak to me. First site I stumbled upon was AfterEllen.com, which introduced me to so many artists: Tegan and Sara, Sleater Kinney, LP, Le Tigre, Scream Club, Chris Pureka ... so many others. Every week, I'd scower the web for new perspectives, new beats, shit that meant something. I got rid of so much "music" that was engineered, regurgitated, said the same thing as twelve million other songs, just with a different voice of someone who sounded similar to someone else.
What I hated about female mainstream (especially pop) music, was that it all said the same thing; woman in question was at the mercy of a man who didn't love her. All sung at the same unnatural, super tweaked, breathy pitch. I didn't like it; it wasn't me, that's not what I wanted in my music. All the dude music didn't seem to pertain to me, either. It was nicer to listen to, and had a broader range of vocals, but the more I thought about it, I wondered why more women couldn't sing like this, write like this and be respected. Surely not every woman in the world has love and men primarily and squarely on her mind. That cant be her whole worth.
During highschool, I wiped about 70% of my music library from my computer. Re-played radio trash was gone, stuff I liked but for the wrong reasons was gone, stuff with great beats but terrible lyrics was gone, though with some foot-dragging. As I started getting more into Riot Grrrl and Indie, I realized that women rocked just as hard as men, and their lyrics were just as kick-ass. Now, presently, an article from TigerBeatdown brought this whole amazing revamp of my life back to the surface. Not surprisingly, I'm not alone in my musical woes:
Being a feminist who is into music and cares about feminism and women in music is a giant pain in the ass, because music is the greatest haven of all time for ITSJUSTMYOPINION-ism. Because, you see? Music is art. Which means if you try to criticize someone’s personal taste, especially if you are suggesting that they don’t like woman-made music because THEY HATE WOMEN, you will get nowhere. There is almost no argument you can make that will have any effect whatsoever, because it’s just my opinion, man. And people believe, they believe with all their hearts, that they are entitled to their opinions when it comes to art, even if those opinions are stupid.
My personal favorite is “I just don’t like women’s voices.” Have you ever heard, in the history of time, anyone declare that they just don’t like men’s voices? No? That’s because there are so many different kinds of men’s voices, guys! Duh! Guys screaming, and guys shouting, tenors and baritones and bass, guys yodeling, guys crooning, guys singing slightly-out-of-tune, guys rapping, guys singing in that weird Pearl Jam voice and I know you know what I’m talking about. But women? Women’s voices. I don’t like them. They are high and whiny. I put them in the box of things I automatically don’t like.
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