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A Consumer Guide to Recent Women's Rock
Enough of the pseudo-analysis. The real question is, are these albums any good?

Hall of Femmes

A completely subjective and incomplete list of the women who have mattered in rock 'n' roll. (Arranged more or less chronologically.)

Bessie Smith—Godmother of the blues. The first female pop superstar of the century. Lived it like she sang it.

Ruth Brown—"Miss Rhythm" dominated the R&B charts in the 1950s. Soulful, sassy, and brash, she was nobody's fool.

Carole King—Working with partner Gerry Goffin, she was the first great female songwriter of the rock 'n' roll era. A decade later, she was a superstar in her own right.

Diana Ross—The most versatile of the girl-group singers. Anyone could have turned those Holland-Dozier-Holland songs into hits, but Diana made them classics.

Aretha Franklin—Do we really need to tell you? R-E-S-P-E-C-T.

Janis Joplin—Apart from Bob Dylan, she was the greatest white blues singer. She never knew when to say when.

Mo Tucker—The Velvet Underground drummer played with as much muscle as Keith Moon. Lou Reed wrote and sang the songs, but Tucker propelled them. On "After Hours," her only lead vocal track, she invented a whole new way of singing.

Joni Mitchell—A genius. What else can you say? Influenced Prince, Elvis Costello, Neil Young...hell, she influenced everybody. Directly responsible for at least half of the Lilith Fair artists.

Patti Smith—"I don't fuck much with the past but I fuck plenty with the future," Smith sang, declaring all the rules and mores that successful female musicians had had to follow null and void. Plus, she recorded some of the best music of her time.

Stevie Nicks—She'll be your gypsy, your sorceress, your belladonna. At her fragile best, she was breathtaking.

Kate Bush—Borderline cuckoo visionary. Proved art-rock wasn't just for guys. Responsible for the other half of Lilith Fair.

Poly Styrene (X-Ray Spex)—She was the female Johnny Rotten. Except her lyrics were better.

The Raincoats—These artsy Brits laced their music with atonal strings and sang about falling in love in grocery stores, but their sound was not tame. It still scares most people, and music has yet to catch up.

Debbie Harry—Dreaming is free.

Chrissie Hynde—Wielding a guitar and fronting one of the great rock 'n' roll bands of all time, she beat the guys at their own game, and broke the hearts of tattooed love boys every where.

Joan Jett—Not much of a songwriter, but she embodies the idea of rock 'n' roll every bit as much as Bruce Springsteen or Mick Jagger.

Go-Gos—The first all-gal band to top the charts. Great songs, lotsa attitude.

Madonna—She still hasn't made a really great album, but her power and longevity are unparalleled and unprecedented. Invented the whole idea of woman-as-corporation.

Roxanne Shanté—"The Real Roxanne" staked women's claim in rap.

Salt 'n' Pepa—Proved women rappers could go platinum with the baddest of the brothers. They say they're talking about sex, but they're really talking about equality.

Janet Jackson—Oh, you nasty boys! She recorded some of the best dance music of the past decade, and never lost her edge, even as she grew more serious.

Throwing Muses— Lead by Kristin Hersh—and including Tanya Donelly, who later formed Belly—the Muses kicked off a wave of indie girl groups that has yet to subside. Their songs outshine most of what they inspired.

Sinead O'Connor—The Joan of Arc of modern pop. Except she burned herself at the stake. Brilliant and weird and completely uncompromised.

Bonnie Raitt—Notable for her bottleneck guitar playing and her song craft, Raitt recorded her first album in 1971 but remained pretty obscure for almost 20 years. She plodded along, recording great music and inspiring scores along the way.

Lucinda Williams—She belongs here for her songs alone, but also because she's created a more realistic portrait of women in pop culture.

Bikini Kill— With songs like "Suck My Left One" and "Reject All American," this standout of the Riot Grrl movement had so much attitude that it didn't matter they couldn't play their instruments—they were the scariest thing in rock.

Ani DiFranco— At her best, this punk folkie from Buffalo is devastating—and maybe the most righteous musician alive. And she's shown how obsolete greedy music companies can be.

Courtney Love—She will forever be known as Kurt Cobain's crazy widow, but she has just as much fire and maybe more to say.

PJ Harvey—Hey, she's the king of the world, you ought to hear her song, you come on measure her, she's 20 inches long.

Sleater-Kinney—At every step of the way, this trio mocks and condemns the bloated, ugly, sexist, consumerist beast rock 'n' roll has become. And yet their hooks are so catchy, their singing so gripping, their lyrics so insightful that you jump around and revel in the power of this thing called rock 'n' roll and the liberation a three-minute song can deliver.

Honor Roll:

Memphis Minnie, Laverne Baker, Etta James, Koko Taylor, The Shirelles, Darlene Love, Lesley Gore, Joan Baez, Grace Slick, Mama Cass/Michelle Phillips, Dusty Springfield, Marianne Faithful, Nico, Yoko Ono, Tina Turner, Gladys Knight, Chaka Khan, Bobbi Gentry, Carly Simon, The Roches, Christine McVie, Ann and Nancy Wilson (Heart), Donna Summer, Laurie Anderson, Pat Benatar, Siouxsie Sioux, The Slits, The Au Pairs, Exene Cervenka (X), Lene Lovich, Lydia Lunch, Tina Weymouth (Talking Heads), Cyndi Lauper, Bangles, Kim Gordon (Sonic Youth), Kim Deal (The Breeders, Pixies), Tracy Chapman, Suzanne Vega, Queen Latifah, Neneh Cherry, Natalie Merchant, Mary Margaret O'Hara, Bjork, L7, Tsunami, Tori Amos, Team Dresch, Bratmobile, Sheryl Crow, Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott, Sarah McLachlan, Aimee Mann, Liz Phair, Lauryn Hill, Alanis Morrisette, Carla Bozulich (Geraldine Fibbers, Ethyl Meatplow)