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  BARKING BARDS
(The craft,
discipline, & obsession of songwriting in the
Pacific Northwest)
by Sheryl Diane
Rockrgrl 2000
The Rockrgrl Conference sneaked up on
a lot of Seattleites, even the literate. My first
reaction to it was apprehension. Being a fringe
conference, will it simply reinforce the dreaded
marginalization of women artists? Will even the most
liberated men feel excluded? Had I not been
influenced by the younger generation, I might
have missed the whole darn thing. But a call came
in late one evening, from one Christine
Darling, her show the All- Gurlesque
was coming to town from Portland. She informed me
that she'd gotten into the conference and also
had just played CMJ in New York, so I asked
where she would be playing. "Gibson's!"
her enthusiasm percolated over the line but my
ornery self spoke up. "Oh, geez, you know
that's kind of a dive up here?"
"Yes," she still sounded so blazing
happy, "but, well, it's really sooo much
better than Starbucks!" Initially her
assigned venue. She warned the conference
aficionados she was going to be playing a loud
electric guitar . . . . and have a drummer, so
they got her a different place to play. Well,
that was tragic for Starbucks’ customers, I
must say, as Christine plays the most infectious
sing-a long pop that has been raised from a
jangling guitar since 1961, a decade before her
birth. And alas, when her drummer was not able to
come, Starbucks, hmm, well, could it have been
the better stage? Sooo Gibson's, expecting an
incurable seedy, raucous and desperately needy
crowd, I decided this was the show I couldn't
miss.
Christine
Darling arrived by train, in a baby doll
dress, tights, and tennis shoes. Her winter coat
was demure beige suede with a lioness fringe
around her neck and cuffs. She carried her own
guitar and bags from the station, to the taxi, to
the hotel, to the gig. She borrowed somebody's
cellular phone and left me a kind message
explaining how she was here at Gibson’s,
fumbled for the address, but then directed me to The
Stranger, but then found the address. I
found the place up the hill from 1st,
near the Moore, probably a great place for
starting the night before a Moore show, say back
in 1964! Christine recognizes me and warmly
directs me to her table. She sadly informed me
that she had to play first and I thought grrreat,
I’ll be outta here in less than an hour.
She got two drink tickets for performing and gave
one generously to the Media. Very soon after my
arrival, she was directed to the stage and
started to play, basically, a window show. All
open glass behind her, the street moved with
nervous melancholy, going somewhere, why am I not
already there, painted on hurried faces. Faces
that paused to rubberneck at the jangle, jangle,
of guitar strings, I am remembered back to pay
attention as she tangled with the sound system.
Christine's music comes to the ear aged like
Swiss cheese in a very polka dot way. Born 1971,
why is she so 1962? She plays fabled tunes like Roger
McGuinn and knows his name used to be Jim
and that he played in The Byrds. As she
introduced the song as inspired by one of those
bands that would have played L.A.'s Whiskey
A-GO-GO; an old seadog moved to the front of
the room and sat down, giving out a grizzled
holler, "I was there!" We all laugh
spasmodically. The gig continued with an
occasional inappropriate rant, the stanky, stale
cigarette butt air wafting up from the floor
while Christine maintained the aura of a rose and
kept handling the banter with sweet, coy replies
that readily diffused each moody regular. She
sounds retro-mod, looks divine, like a painted
angel strangely misplaced in a vampires castle.
Applause at first tentative became abundant and
street gawkers kept up the rubber-necking through
the window to see why we were having so much fun
in there. The most evident thing about Christine
is that she has an attitude and most certainly a
long lost style that's terribly refreshing since
all of her songs are so brand groovy new.
Christine's
favorite place, and she wrote a tune about it,
she informs her audience, is a Vespa club called Hell's
Belles in Portland, where she is from
temporarily. Temporarily, I say, because she has
many dreams, long ago one was Portland, but now
it is a graduate degree that will eventually take
her traveling the globe, I suspect. As the
offspring of collegiate profs, traveling became
an early and treasured part of family bonding.
The road was for extra-curricular edification.
Christine has a rare, intriguing personality
because of this, at once saddened from reality
but vigorously curious, idealistic and
well-educated. Her trippy vocabulary and her
ability to put a spin on the knowledge she's
carrying around in that bright imagination of
hers, make for a terrifically humorous and
authentic personality. Her lack of concern for
commercial success is honest and surprising. I
despair and told her she rates high in that area,
if The Cardigans can have a hit why not Christine
Darling!? As her set progressed that evening
one song that hung in my ears was The Queen
of The Scene which included the catchiest
"do do do" line since The Police’s
Zenyatta Mondatta.
Once offstage,
we listened as politely as possible to the next
loud rockin' girl guitar player that pranced in
an Aerosmith ballet, and who, actually fit the
grunge setting. The obvious problem: how
incredibly wrong conferences are about which
artists they line-up together. Why don't they put
a D J in charge of that, who
would have an ear for segways! This was a classic
example of a line-up gone wrong. And Christine
bemoaned the stage, and wondered, would Starbucks
have been better? I could only sagely remind her,
that a setting like this tests an artist like no
other, if you survive it and keep playing live
that is. Crowd control is but one of many hard
performance lessons you will never get playing
alone at home or in nice settings.
Therefore, Christine had just earned her first
crusty star.
Incase you're
wondering how I got into Rockrgrl, I can't divulge my
sources, however, there was a keyboardist the
next day masquerading about with a drummer's tag
around her neck. I always wanted to be a drummer.
One of the obvious things about Rockrgrl was that the men that
bravely came were eating it up like tapioca
pudding. They sat quietly when women ranted
about MEN and heard things like Phil was a
sadistic control freak and Ronnie Specter
has a large settlement to prove it. Mostly the
women that were involved with the panels were
variations of old pro and adventurous
entrepreneurs. This was the cool mentoring thing
that coulda-woulda-shoulda come out of Lilith
Fair, had dear Sarah had a real vision minus the
commercialization of chick rock. Anyway, that is
what I heard through the performers'
grapevine--Lilith seriously lacked sisterhood and
bonding. Rockrgrl was like a nunfest in
comparison. I was amazed at the miles some women
had come to attend the event either in the
capacity of an expert panelist or as a performer.
An old friend from college spied me in the ranks
and nearly blew my cover, saying how did you get
in. "Uh, I sat in, I roadied, how bout
you?" She was a volunteer. She reported how
incredible the whole thing was by the virtue of
how many volunteers had enlisted and of course
were the workhorses for a well-executed
conference weekend. Being resolutely lesbian, she
honestly kept gaping sideways like a veritable
fem Casanova, which gave Rockrgrl another whole unexpected
potential for girl romance!
I decided early
to attend the technical side of things that day.
Managed to blow-off the songwriters forum
featuring Ann Wilson, and the groupie seminar,
which sticks a burr right under the saddle of
every woman wedded to a musician and to all women
musicians, because frankly, women are nauseated
at being perceived and treated like a groupie
when they’re trying to gain access to a male
dominated industry. I decided to get hip to the
engineer side of the world instead. Are women bad
at math? There were only a handful of us that
showed up for the renowned sound engineer's
interview. That engineer was Leslie Ann Jones,
Director of Skywalker Sound, yes, connected to
the world of George Lucas. Her life story was
completely fascinating. A life of confidence,
smart moves, a childhood surrounded by those that
believed strongly in her abilities, and her own
adult risk-taking, which for her was simply
raising her hand at the right time for the
unexpected opportunity that were eventually
realized as historic projects. She is also now
the Chair for the Recording Academy. She touched
on the question of math and girls not having the
same opportunities, perhaps mostly a result of
socialization. I didn't have the chance then, but
will point out now, that girls take on math
during a difficult time, puberty. They are
suddenly forced into a system that is almost
exclusively reserved for male teachers; middle
school and high school math. The
self-consciousness of that period exacts an
exaggerated sense of inwardness and awkwardness
for most girls. And then there's the math
teacher, who is a demanding testosterone guy. A
complete opposite. What's up with that? Why do
girls turn-off from math? Or is it far more
complex as to what they are turning off from?
Christine
Darling and I hooked up once again at the
demo-derby, and the leaders of this were the
A&R rep, a guy from Starbucks and a
songwriter that presumably has bought her house
from royalties. I found this to be rather dreary
because of its commercial bent. The cleaner the
recording, the measured intro, anticipated
repetition, the better the song. And those songs
were frequently boring in my book. They did have
some valid tips, but I found myself nay-saying a
lot in the back row. Why not put a poet, a D J
and an indie label A& R rep on this panel
next time, just to stir things up a bit. I just
remember, I liked the girl with the raspberry
hair, and I hope she rerecords that song she
played for us. And if she’s reading this,
hey, don't worry like they said to worry about
having occasional flat notes--for crying out
loud, have you ever heard of Courtney Love?
She's done quite well with being out of tune, (Bob
Dylan too) and Courtney’s proved you can
always go on to movies. I also missed the Q &
A by Courtney at 6, which was added that morning.
That could have been some last minute posturing,
but in my heart, when I looked at the Rockrgrl website, my sense was
this--"Where is Courtney." I for
one am glad she made it. It helps this conference
speak loudly and boldly that this was no Lilith
Fair.
Email Sheryl Diane
Visit Sheryl
Diane's Website
Barking Bards #2
- Paul Hinklin
BARKING BARDS #1 - j r
The
craft, discipline, & obsession of songwriting
in the Pacific Northwest, a new column by Sheryl Diane
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