Then it must be May Day!

Hazel Dickens is a longtime union supporter and feminist folksinger. She comes from a family of miners in West Virginia, and has lent her voice to the cause of workers’ rights - especially women workers - countless times. She appears in Barbara Kopple’s incredible documentary Harlan Country USA, about a miners’ strike that ended in tragedy, and some of her most powerful songs are collected on the amazing album Coal Mining Women, and are a potent reminder that women have ALWAYS been part of the fight for safe working conditions, shorter hours and decent pay. She also, I should mention, has a voice that could raise the dead (and invariably makes me cry like a babe). Plus, in an industry (the music one, I mean) where youth is god and death may as well occur at 30, it’s really important to remember that there are people out there who have been doing it and doing it well since before you were born, you little pischer. So, as she says in Woman Coal Miner Blues, if you can’t stand by her, don’t stand in her way.

A mystery person (thank you, whoever you are!) has created this fan video featuring Dickens singing union organizer Joe Hill’s song Rebel Girl. It opens with a speech by feminist labour leader Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, and the images are all of women involved with the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World, or Wobblies). It’s really worth checking out the video’s original source for brief bios of all the women pictured. Powerful stuff. What? No no, I just have something in my eye, that’s all.

I’ve also posted the first half of a video biography of Hazel Dickens after the cut. Happy May Day!
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In my years as a community-radio DJ, I’ve received many a promotional CD for a female artist with that most backhanded of compliments in its promo material: “Not your usual female singer-songwriter”. Okay, I take most music journalism about as seriously as I take Stephen Colbert’s presidential campaign, but this is annoying for so many reasons. What is “your usual female singer-songwriter”, and what’s so bad about that? Did Joni Mitchell really traumatize so many children of baby-boomers that we can no longer conceive of the (extremely broad!) category of female singer-songwriters as anything but derivative and banal? Humph. (Not that I think Joni is derivate and banal. But admittedly she did spawn a legion of copycats who occasionally make me want to poke my ears out.)

Okay. Now that I have that off my chest, here’s my recommendation for this week: Finders Keepers has released a compilation of female singer-songwriters called Bearded Ladies that is anything but banal, gooey, or involving songs about menstruation. What’s nice about this comp is that it seems to have no driving theme other than the unusual and the awesome - the songs date from the 1970s to last year, and the artists are from the USA, France, Turkey, and elsewhere. All the songs could be roughly categorized as folk(ish), but they all decidedly push the boundaries of what can be done with a guitar and a single voice. For instance, Peachtree, the contribution from Lispector (which you can listen to on the Finders Keepers site) is from 2007 but could have come from decades ago, with its 4-track warmth and meandering style.

Other contributors include Turkish protest singer Selda, Wendy & Bonnie, Speck Mountain, and the indescribable Brigitte Fontaine. In fact, I’m not even going to try to describe her. Just watch the video below the cut. Laurie Anderson, eat your heart out.
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To me, nothing says First Day Of Summer (okay, not officially, but have you been outside today?) like Cannonball by The Breeders. Oh, the Deal sisters and their greasy hair. Oh, 1993. Fifteen years and this song still makes me grin like a maniac. This video, incidentally, was directed by Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon, along with Spike Jonze.

Very excited about Toronto’s Crystal Castles’ debut self-titled album - I was surprised to hear it was their first full-length release, since I’ve been hearing about this band for a while and nodding furiously along with various songs on their Myspace page. One reviewer described it (somewhat derisively) as “like being high on LSD and playing an old school video game”, a description with which I concur (but without the derision. Acid and Supermario, yeah). But it goes beyond gimmick - in particular, I like how they mostly reject standard song structures and, heck, lyrics in general, with singer Alice Glass warbling what sounds like a made-up language - much like some of my other favorite bands, Gang Gang Dance and Les Georges Leningrad.

Airwar is my top pick right now, and while there’s no official band video, the grab-bag that is YouTube has provided us with this fan video so we will have something to do with our eyes while we listen to the song. Hope you like ballroom dancing.

*apparently the band name is a reference to the home of She-Ra, the self-styled cartoon Princess of Power (were she and He-Man dating, or were they just friends?).

In other news, Montreal noise monsters Aids Wolf play tonight at La Sala Rossa, 4848 St. Laurent, with Black Feelings, Japanther, and Sightings. Be prepared for a serious blistering. I swear, sometimes I think singer Chloe Lum is channelling Yoko Ono. Video for Spit Tastes Like Metal after the cut.

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The Lesbians on Ecstasy want you to dance. Not only that, they want you to dance to classic lezzie tunes revamped into club hits - discerning ears can pick out references to Melissa Etheridge, Tracy Chapman, the Indigo Girls, and other members of the queer canon in their songs. Nevertheless, they are 100% original, and one of my favorite bands to shake it to (and also interview). This video is very much in the spirit of 1970s lesbian feminist activism, but it’s not satirical or ironic - a reminder that feminism isn’t/wasn’t (only) about wearing ponchos and brandishing the lady-symbol but also about “yo, look around you, it’s awesome we’ve found each other.”

In celebration of spring (fingers crossed), enjoy this video. Who knows, it may inspire you to go for a walk in the forest and check out some tree vulvas too.

If it’s true that punk is an explosive reaction against an oppressive regime, then it’s no surprise that the punkest thing I’ve seen in ages is coming out of Afghanistan.

The Burka Band is a group of three women who, with the help of some German music producers, created this video, and a three-song EP, and a bit of an international reputation - one which, sadly, they can’t really enjoy, as they have to remain anonymous in their home town of Kabul. According to sources, only about ten people in all of Afghanistan know who these women actually are.

The video was released in 2003, and there was initially some doubt as to its authenticity - were these hipsters in bedsheets? Russian pop-stars riding the cutting edge? But it seems to be confirmed as the real deal: an Afghani girl group singing about how they feel about wearing burkas and being women in a highly segregated society. And why not? If the West has anything useful to offer the rest of the world, it’s that social critique often goes well with power chords and four-four beats. I don’t assume that the Burka Band speaks for all Afghani women, just like I don’t assume Yoko Ono speaks for all Japanese women, or Madonna for all American gals. But this is one of those strange and kind of amazing examples of how musical forms can bounce around the globe, mix together, influence and mutate, and just maybe make the world a little bigger. I can only hope.

The main songwriter, Nargiz, says of the project: It was a lot of fun, but also very scary. Afghanistan is still a very dangerous place for modern women, and when we shot the video we had to do it very discretely because no one could know that we were playing music. Of course it was a joke to sing in the burkas, but it was also necessary to wear them. If people in Afghanistan knew who the members of the Burka Band were, we could be attacked or killed because there are still a lot of religious fanatics here.

The single was released on the German label Ata Tak, and you can read more about it (and buy it) here. More Burka Band articles here and here.

… and I’m not talking about I’m OK, You’re OK.

In honour of Valentine’s Week (yes, I know I’m late, it’s been a busy week, okay), I’m posting for your enjoyment this video for one of my favorite songs about, yes indeed, female masturbation. While debates rage on, Cyndi Lauper is busy, well, getting busy.

I also appreciate the grammer lesson in this song: “She bop, he bop-a we bop, I bop, you bop-a they bop…” Everybody now!

A few more for the self-service playlist:
Missy Elliott - Toyz
Liz Phair - Turning Japanese (covering The Vapours)
The Divinyls - I Touch Myself (duh)

Okay, so it’s the time of year when everyone lets their hidden fantasy loose, their inner demon out, their freak flag fly, however you want to put it. And the next day we wipe off the eyeliner and fake blood and shaving cream and go back to our lives as usual. But for some people, every day is Halloween, and being what other people might call “freaks” is just a part of who they are. I suspect the dearly departed Les Georges Leningrad are some such people. The band broke up not too long ago, but their spirit lives on… on the internet (spooky). So for your Halloween enjoyment, here is a clip of them playing live in Detroit.

Other additions to the Halloween mixtape:

The Cramps - Human Fly
Thee Headcoatees - Strychnine
The 5678’s - Teenage Witch
Faun Fables - Catch Me
Anything by Diamanda Galas

Happy We’en-ing!

It’s a frenzy of media democracy this weekend here in Montreal. CKUT 90.3 FM (campus community radio) is hosting a conference on media democracy and community radio. Unlike many academic conferences, where you have to pay to attend and the tone is, shall we say, occasionally a little bit exclusive, this event is free and geared toward members of the community. Plus, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! is giving the keynote address. Booyeah.

Especially of note is Saturday’s panel discussion on women in community radio - one of my Venus co-hosts will be talking about our experiences hosting a women’s music show, and other panelists will be covering anti-oppression community activism, grassroots feminism, and… women and air-guitar performances! I can’t wait to hear what this is all about. Anyway, now’s your chance to show up and ask what “women’s music” is, whether or not women need an exclusive space on the air, and why we never play Sarah McLachlan.

Then, once you’re totally pumped on the power of community radio, you can start building your own low-watt radio transmitter in one of the workshops offered at the station!

And when your brain is full, head down to Le Cagibi (5490 St. Laurent) on Saturday night for a bootyshaker of a party, DJ’ed by yours truly and the rest of the Venus collective.

Check out the full schedule here.