2013-06-03 08:23:34
While female artists rule the pop charts, many still conform to long-held music
industry stereotypes. Miranda Sawyer asks if change is on its way.
This is an era where female performers dominate music as never before: I give
you Beyonc , Rihanna, Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez,
Jessie J, Adele, Florence and her Machine not to mention poor, sad Britney
and the never-ending saga that is Madonna. These are women whose music tops
charts across the world, whose dollar sales are well into seven figures and,
perhaps most importantly, who understand that a music career can amount to more
than just singing songs. Rihanna, for instance, shifts perfume like she s a
department store saleswoman. Jennifer Lopez acts in major films and appears on
American Idol. Jessie J is a judge on British TV talent show The Voice. And all
of them help sell whichever publication puts them on its cover.
But and this may seem a silly question why now? Why are there so many women
artists around? After all, in the early days of this millenium, female singers
weren t the thing: music was about the white boy rock band. Coldplay, Maroon 5,
Green Day all were having their moment in the sunshine. Still, consumers are
quickly bored, and so the major labels A&R departments began to look
elsewhere. And when, in 2006, Amy Winehouse (and Lily Allen in the UK) suddenly
flooded public consciousness like a drug we never knew we wanted, they thought
they d discovered the answer. An A&R guy, then at Sony, told me that labels
were actively looking to sign young female solo singers because, according to
him, they were less expensive (only one of them) and easier to manipulate (no
support from the rest of the band, plus, you know, they re just girls). Poor
guy. Put him in a room with Beyonc et al, and he d be whimpering as they
force-fed him those words.
Change the record
Given that for many years the majority of A&R people have been straight males,
it s interesting to consider what kind of woman gets a record deal. Shows like
American Idol demonstrate that there are more than enough talented vocalists
out there. There are hundreds, thousands, ready to sing their hearts out and
shake up the world (or at least the world s Saturday night TV). But only a few
will make it and when it comes to women, for decades only the good-looking
got through the door. Thus many of the most powerful female musicians in the
industry are stone cold foxes, gorgeous women whose looks would dazzle you into
submission before they even let loose their voices.
Why is this? Despite its reputation as a rebellious outsider, rock and roll has
long been dominated by convention and archetypes. Serious-minded indie boys,
sexy r n b chicks, tougher-than-thou hip-hoppers, all singing-all-dancing boy
bands: it can seem as though music is on an endless loop of clich . Each artist
slots into a ready-made box. It can make a music fan rather depressed, being
presented with yet another new sensation that is exactly like an old one, but
with a more contemporary haircut.
And the music business standard for a solo woman singer is that she has to be
pretty. Sure, there are those artists who operate on the outside, alternative
females, from Siouxsie Sioux, to Peaches, from PJ Harvey to Deep Vally. They
like to play with their looks, use their sexuality to challenge or illustrate a
particular idea. But if you re aiming for conventional chart success then you d
better scrub up well. Think of Celine Dion, an ordinary-looking woman with an
extraordinary voice. Discovered young, her husband/manager removed her from the
limelight whilst she had her teeth fixed, her hair straightened and worked on
her English: all image upgrades deemed necessary before she smashed into the
mainstream.
Going Gaga
Of the top ten biggest selling female artists of all time, only Lady Gaga
completely confounds this stereotype. Gaga uses her appearance as a statement:
her choice of clothing, make-up and shoes are all designed to provoke a
reaction other than, ooh, doesn t she look nice . By dressing herself up as an
artwork, she prevents us from judging her by tedious contemporary conventions
of beauty. She is the living embodiment of how alternative, anti-establishment
attitudes - treating gay people the same as straights; women using their bodies
as they wish have come into the mainstream. But she is the exception.
Still, considering their obsession with trends, does this mean that when A&R
departments get bored once more, that solo female artists might not be so
prominent? I wonder. The digital age has made the music business less sure of
itself and its know-it-all taste. Consumers have more freedom to discover music
than ever before: they don t wait to hear a track on the radio, they stumble
across artists on YouTube, via music sites or blogs. Artists themselves don t
wait to be signed before releasing their work: Tinie Tempah, amongst others,
released his own, very successful, mix-tapes before being signed by Sony. This
means that major labels have been forced to become more open-minded when it
comes to their signing policies. Even a decade ago, an out-there act such as
James Blake would not have been signed by a major: but he has his own label,
put out via Universal.
Realising that music fans are more open-minded than they assumed has forced the
major labels to shake up their pre-conceptions and perhaps with them, those
clich d rules about solo female artists. Well, hooray to that. It s rather nice
to think of labels having to re-jig their attitudes towards female singers.
Quirkier characters such as Lianne LeHavas, Laura Marling, Savages and Haim are
slipping into the limelight. They are all lovely but don t sell themselves on
their looks. And Lady Gaga and Lagerfeld-baiting Adele, smash successes both,
seem to disprove the old theories. It doesn t look as though pop s infatuation
with women is over yet.