I've decided to make a collective list of all of my favourite women in the world of music. Partly because I love music but mostly because women are awesome and I'm a sucker for an angry girl band. I've decided that because listing yr fave womenz is such an over-done thing, that I'll try to keep it away from "OMG BEYONCE" and explore different genres of music or artists, who just... aren't Beyonce.
Every week I'll choose a woman I really adore and basically explain why she is the pretty much the bomb.
#1 in my list of angsty feminist goodness is Poly Styrene from X Ray Spex. X Ray Spex are one of the first punk bands of the 70's to be fronted by a woman, to actually be pretty good and to hold a really important sentiment within their music.
Upon hearing the cataclysmic introduction of "Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard but I think... Oh Bondage! Up Yours!" you know something is about to erupt. Tiny Poly Styrene thunders around the stage adorned in braces, Doc Martens and a Dayglo wardrobe. She was a devastating contrast to the images of women that 1970's had created before her. She even refused to conform to what punk had dictated a woman must look like. She wasn't there to be a pretty punk veneer to her band, she wasn't going to sing in tune. Once a trained classical singer, she inverted her talents to create a completely unique sound. That alongside her Ska influences, she wailed and it worked so well because even despite so many punk bands coming before her, none could emulate that voice.
The acceleration of punk music in the UK and America gave women like Poly Styrene and many others the chance not to be beautiful. It allowed them to be ugly for themselves and for no one else. Interest was not on beauty but on the idea of inventing and creating and that's what Poly Styrene did.
In the mini-documentary Who Is Poly Styrene? she explains she chose her name because popstars at the time were disposable and replaceable. It only emphasised her open hatred for how disposable we believe the world around us to be, which features heavily on Germ Free Adolescent, an album with heavy eco-socialist, anti-commercial and consumerist under-tones. At the age of 19, she was breaking down barriers and exploring topics that many people don't reach until it's far too late. She was, in every sense of the phrase, ahead of her time.
From the age of 11, she has been the queen of my world. Poly Styrene is the epitome of the Do It Yourself punk-feminist mentality that was seen in bands like Bratmobile and Bikini Kill except she was doing it over in the UK instead of across the ocean and much, much earlier. She saw the Sex Pistols and had the epiphany that anyone could do it if they could, and she wouldn't be at a loss because she was female. Ultimately, this is why she gets me. She harnesses the things that could be seen as weaknesses and makes them strengths, while inverting her strengths to create uniqueness.
Due to the most unfortunate circumstances, Poly Styrene passed away in 2011 at 53 from breast cancer that had spread to her lungs. But even in death, she is a living icon. I don't really believe you should have heroes, but if anyone should be awarded that title, it would definitely be Poly Styrene. She's more than admirable for her ability as a singer, a front woman and an opinionated woman who sought out change but really what makes her worthy of being considered one of the most tremendous women in the world is because she created her own space as a woman of colour in a very hostile, punk environment. Lena Dunham said something in her second BS Report which really resonated with me; "it's a specific personality that says 'I see no room for me and I'm going for it'." Whether it was as a teenager, a woman, the lead singer of X Ray Spex or as Marianne Joan Elliott-Said, Poly Styrene sought out her space and fucking claimed it every time.
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