I’d just like to draw everyone’s attention to a grassroots Twitter campaign to compile a Hottest 100 list of songs by female artists in response to the JJJ list that included (at the uppermost) six songs with female band members.
The rules are it needs to be a female muso, a female led band, or a band with at least two female members in it.
It’s actually a really interesting and satisfying process, to go through your collection and realise how many excellent female performed songs you have – and to be cut free of the ‘ten BEST EVER’ which I find pressured and heirarchical – instead I get to say ‘Oh, and THIS song, I love this song’ but not have to bother over which of them is better than the other.
It’s picking up pace – the creator of the twitter account is being interviewed on RRR radio tonight, and has brought the list to the attention of JJJ twitter accounts, and Clare Bowditch – if anyone else has any suggestions for how to get more exposure for this list, I’m all ears (and Tweeting fingers).
I would dearly LOVE for this list to be absolutely everywhere – in the aftermath of the justifications of the lack of women in the JJJ list (oh, it’s 90s heavy, women just don’t rock hard enough, not that many women were involved in music til recently) I would love to give such a lovely, choc full of talent and easy to read lesson in music history to a whole bunch of grumbling defenders.
I’m aware that there’ll be people for whom twitter is a new thing/they can’t be bothered. So if you want to submit songs, you can do it here, and I’ll submit them to the @Hottest100Women twitter account and when the results are published, I’ll pop the list on here.
So get amongst it, have at it, how hard is it to submit it in comments here if you’re not a Twitter person? If you’ve got a beef over the blandness/exclusion of the JJJ list, or simply listen to female musos you wish people listened to more, then what are you waiting for?
Categories: arts & entertainment, gender & feminism, media
Whoops, I forgot to give it a heading – perhaps simply Twitter @Hottest100women?
And ta so much for rescuing me from my technical ineptitude.
Oops, I was so busy finding the link that I forgot about a heading too! Oh well, sorted now.
Woot! This is brill.
I’d also like to point to a Livejournal meme, Female Appreciation Month, also inspired by the Hottest 100 genderfail. Lots of clips and links and terrific posts about women the posters love.
This is the coolest idea ever!
It’s WAY fun and so addictive!
I am not a twitter person, so can I humbly submit some songs here?
kd lang Hallelujah
Tori Amos Professional Widow
Eurythmics Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)
Concrete Blonde Joey
Sleater K inney Jumpers
Wow, now I’ve started I could go on for hours, but that’ll do for now.
YAY! I’ll copy and paste
I’ll humbly submit mine here too. Once I started thinking I couldn’t stop! Maybe I’ll have to submit these in batches of 10 or something. 🙂
Brass In Pocket – Pretenders
Tomorrow Wendy – Concrete Blonde
Oh Bondage, Up Yours – X-Ray Spex
Land … – Patti Smith
Buffalo Stance – Neneh Cherry
Mandinka – Sinead O’Connor
It’s Too Late – Carole King
PJ Harvey – 50 Foot Queenie
Joni Mitchell – The Circle Game
Constant Craving – KD Lang
Hymn to Her – The Pretenders
Professional Widow – Tori Amos
I Kissed A Girl – Jill Sobule
Queer – Garbage
Transylvanian Concubine – Rasputina
See http://search.twitter.com/search?q=hottest100women for some of the responses being sent on Twitter.
Does hottest mean sexiest here, or just best? Not all of my picks would suit the former.
Only Happy When it Rains – Garbage.
Caught a Light Sneeze – Tori Amos.
Crucify – also Tori Amos.
Suddenly I See – KT Tunstall.
You and Ur Hand – Pink.
Never Say Goodbye – Hayley Westenra.
Best…like hottest 100 with jjj was supposed to mean.
My collection’s not very current (but then neither was the TripleJ list, particularly!) “Where is the disco?”, I’m thinking.
I Will Survive – Gloria Gaynor
I Love Rock n Roll – Joan Jett & the Blackhearts
Knock on Wood – Amii Stewart
Love Shack and Roam – B-52s
Island Home – Christine Anu
Torn – Natalie Imbruglia
Preacher Man – Dusty Springfield
Kate Bush – Wuthering Heights
Nancy Sinatra – These Boots Are Made For Walking
Killing Me Softly – Fugees
Carly Simon – You’re So Vain
Divinyls – Science Fiction
Nothing Compares to You – Sinead O’Connor
Sheryl Crow – All I Wanna Do
k.d. lang – Constant Craving and Hallelujah
Blondie – Heart of Glass
Kim Wilde – Kids in America
Summertime – Billie Holliday
Why do Fools Fall in Love – Diana Ross
Madonna – Like a Prayer, Into the Groove
Roxette – The Look
Me & Bobby McGee – Janis Joplin
Mr Sandman – the Chordettes
La Vie en Rose – Edith Piaf
Think & Respect – Aretha Franklin
Always Something There to Remind Me – Rebecca’s Empire
The Lady is a Tramp – Ella Fitzgerald
Linger- Cranberries
Straight Life – Black Box Recorder
Mother of Pearl – Nellie McKay
Cyndi Lauper – Time After Time, True Colors
Pat Benatar – We Belong
Bring Me Some Water – Melissa Etheridge
Michelle Branch – Goodbye To You
Drop The Pilot – Joan Armatrading
Eurythmics – Sweet Dreams
HOW DID I FORGET ME AND BOBBY MCGEE AHHHHH
Fee B Squared, breakfasters presenter on Triple R in Melbourne did an entire hottest 100 female artists and songs playlist/broadcast on blip.fm a couple of days after the JJJ poll came out, which generated huge buzz on twitter, with tonnes of people following. You can find her on blip here: <a href="http://blip.fm/feebsquaredhttp://blip.fm/feebsquared</a>
Done, up to comment 14, keep them coming!
Hi all, I have only recently discovered this great website so this is my first comment 🙂
Here are my top 10;
Standing in the Way of Control- The Gossip
Cry Baby- Janis Joplin
Cornflake Girl- Tori Amos
Pass the Dutch- Missy Elliot
Malibu- Hole
I Love Rock n Roll- Joan Jett
Why- The Eurythmics
California Dreaming- The Mamas & The Papas
Hand in my Pocket- Alannis Morrisette
Mandika- Sinead O’Connor
There are so many wonderfully talanted female artists out there- I think JJJ should do another countdown for female artists- I mean we’ve pretty much just had one for the males!
R.E.S.P.E.C.T – Aretha Franklin
Gloria – Patti Smith
Femme Fatale – The Velvet Underground & Nico
Diamonds and Rust – Joan Baez
Cannonball – Breeders
Los Angeles – X
I Get Out – Lauryn Hill
Supernova – Liz Phair
Foolish Games – Jewel
Songbird – Eva Cassidy
Waterfalls – TLC
You’re No Good – Linda Ronstadt
Human Behaviour – Bjork
Running Up That Hill – Kate Bush
Doll Parts – Hole
Juice – Headless Chickens
Pretend We’re Dead – L7
Cross Bones Style – Cat Power
Jolene – Dolly Parton
Hot Stuff – Donna Summer
Alone – Heart
Alive and Brilliant – Deborah Conway
Pain In My Heart – Babes in Toyland
The Sound of White – Missy Higgins
What You Waiting For? – Gwen Stefani
Ain’t No Mountain High Enough – The Supremes
ABBA – Dancing Queen 🙂
How could I forget Dolly Parton? 9 to 5 FTW!
I’m so glad someone still remembers Bring Me Some Water, I thought it had disappeared forever. I promise to get a list up today (though it is likely to duplicate Lauredhel’s in many areas).
Well that’s a good thing, your fav songs will have more ppl voting for them! I love that, that everyone has a slightly different bent and you can see the overlaps and the differences. I have absolutely no idea what’s in the top five now though.
Just an update that from around 350 votes the other day, it’s up to 1905 (or something like that) now. Two weeks left of voting. All votes on this thread so far have been plugged in – NE doing a sensational job.
It’s interesting with a list like this, there are artists like PJ Harvey who I play all the time, and ones like Tina Turner who I don’t actually play (dig it every time I hear someone else play it) but I think her influence and talent puts her in my ‘all time’ list. These songs were not deliberately put in any order but I think I started ‘going back’ more, in my mind, towards the end of the list. So in some spots I kind of feel like I’m dipping into memories of the things that Mum and Dad played that I liked and seem to have stood out over the years. There are so many more so I need to just post this list and stop thinking about it or I’ll never get it posted …
PJ Harvey – Angeline
PJ Harvey – The Devil
PJ Harvey – White Chalk
Cat Power – Metal heart
Fiona Apple – Paper bag
Feist – My Moon my man
Portishead – Wandering star
Tori Amos – Crucify
Tori Amos – Professional widow
Sinead O’Connor – Nothing compares to you
Divynls – I touch myself
Kate Bush – Babushka
Kate Bush – Running up that hill
The Pretenders – Brass in pocket
Veruca Salt – Seether
Skunk Anansie – Hedonism
Goldfrapp – Pilots
Golfrapp – Strict Machine
Tracey Chapman – Fast car
Kaki King – Pull me out alive
Kate Miller Heidke – words
Garbage – Queer
Lamb – Goreki
Zero 7- Destiny
The Audreys – Lay Me Down
Bjork – Human Behaviour
Madonna – Just like a prayer
Cyndi Lauper – Time After Time
Joni Mitchell – Big yellow taxi
Seekers – Carnival is over
Tina Turner – What’s love got to do with it
Eurythmics – here comes the rain again
Marianne Faithfull – Broken English
Sam Fox – Touch me
Randy Crawford – One day I’ll fly away
Sam Brown – Stop
Blondie – call me
Joan Jett – I love Rock n Roll
Carole King – It’s too late
Carole King – You’re so vain
Linda Ronstadt – You’re No Good
Roberta Flack – Killing me softly with his song
Dusty Springfield – Son of a preacher man
Bonnie Tyler – Total eclipse of the heart
Suzie Quatro – devil gate drive
Janis Joplin – Mercedes Benz
Billie Holliday – Summertime
Shirley Bassey – Goldfinger
Aretha Franklin – Respect
Marlene Dietrich – Lily Marlene
Edith Piaf – Non, je ne regrette rien
Nancy Sinatra – These Boots Are Made For Walking
Roads – Portishead.
Why? – Annie Lennox.
More votes please!! Ta for the last two. There have now been over 3100 votes, and there’s still a week/a week and a half left? The aim is for 7000 votes, so if anyone can think of ways to advertise the list/ask friends to submit their votes etc that would really be appreciated.
Landslide – Fleetwood Mac
My Sister – Juliana Hatfield
Man Overboard – Do Re Mi
Let My Children Be – Ruby Hunter
Silent All These Years – Tori Amos
The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face – Roberta Flack
Fighter – Christina Aguilera
Lock It – Falling Joys
Echo Beach – Martha & The Muffins
Fade Into You – Mazzy Star
Language Is A Virus – Laurie Anderson
Ain’t Nuthin’ But A She Thing – Salt ‘n Pepa
The Valley – Issa (formerly Jane Siberry)
Dirty Jeans – Magic Dirt
Mercedes Benz – Janis Joplin
What’s Going On? – Linda Perry
A New England – Kirsty MacColl
No Doubt – Just A Girl
Left of Centre – Suzanne Vega
Janis Ian – Society’s Child
Devil Gate Drive – Suzi Quatro
ESP- Shonen Knife
What I Am – Edie Brickell & The New Bohemians
Crazy Mary – Victoria Williams
Broken English – Marianne Faithfull
Baby Can I Hold You? – Tracey Chapman
California Dreaming – The Mamas and The Papas
The Leader of the Pack – The Shangri-Las
Kool Thing – Sonic Youth
Superstar – The Carpenters
Thanks, FP, for taking charge of transmitting the votes for the twitless among us.
Order a bit random:
Sway – Bic Runga
Cornflake Girl, Crucify – Tori Amos
Strange Fruit, Satin Doll – Billie Holliday
Summertime – Sarah Vaughn
Piece of My Heart – Erma Franklin
Never Loved a Man – Aretha Franklin
Alive and Brilliant – Deborah Conway
Stretched on Your Grave – Sinead O’Connor
Wuthering Heights, Cloudbursting – Kate Bush
Bring me Some Water – Melissa Etheridge
Fast Car – Tracey Chapman
In These Shoes? – Kirsty MacColl
Queer – Garbage
Stop – Sam Brown
Baby’s Coming Back – Eurythmics
I Go Off – Diana Ah Naid
Big Yellow Taxi, A Case of You – Joni Mitchell
Hymn to Her – the Pretenders
Groovin’, Ain’t Y’ Mutha – Tina Harrod with the Grandmasters
AND: PJ Harvey’s version of Ship Song.