So I can safely say that in our case it’s a balancing act that stops things going off into some wank-fest tangent.

Some of the greatest music ever came from male/female duos and I think there’s a good reason for it. It can work.

That isn’t to say that guys don’t dominate music journalism. They do, and they run in packs.

And it seems none of them can agree whether we’re new country, new folk or country folk techno anyway. They love to categorise the acts they want to ignore!

Fuck gender. Fuck roll models. Fuck boy verse girl. I have spent 20 years working in the indie music industry, spent nearly as long playing in bands, and for some reason thought it was a good idea once upon a time to spend almost 2 years reviewing Pitchfork music reviews at my own music blog Tuningfork (RIP). I never once thought damn - men at PFM suck, in fact the sex of the writers never crossed my mind at all. I wanted to discuss music and the quality of writing, not if the person pissing me off at Pitchfork had a penis or not.

I never wake up in the morning and think crap -I am female, how am I going to go about my day or how will I be taken seriously because I have a vagina? I just do what I do and hopefully by knowing a thing or two about music and after having two decades of experience - a few people might take my words, actions, or body of writing seriously. I have never worried about my cred level because I wear a bra or feared a lesser place in the music industry (or world) because of it. Day to day I am focused on getting things done in my own world. The more I accomplish the better and if I happen to be a woman accomplishing these things, than so be it. If someone gives me less credit because I have girl parts then that is their problem. I want my knowledge and performance to speak for itself when it comes to music (playing and or writing)- not my gender.

I can’t believe in this day and age that anyone would have to stick up for the woman or women in their lives who know music to the geek extreme or that anyone would have to go out of their way to prove that we exist in the first place. Trust me. We are out there and we probably own more records than you do. So there.

Also, if you read a fair amount of pop music crit on the web, you’ll see that most of it is a mixed bag. I wouldn’t say that p4k invented pretentious music writing, because as you budding music critics know the real godfathers of this are people like Lester Bangs, Greil Marcus @ Rolling Stone and Robert Christgau at VV. p4k just repackaged it for a whole new generation, and ended up replicating some of gonzo’s less tolerable excesses. But there are a few genuinely good writers out there, only a handful, and there are probably IMO as many good women who are critics as men. Which means, that despite the plethora of males you see on the new sites like p4k that none of them are too great. Perhaps with the exception of Mark Richardson, Chris Dahlen, and Rob Mitchum. Xgau can be great too. A

But I can’t recommend Jessica Hopper enough. And Popmatters is a great site to a diverse group of cultural writers trying to find their voices.

[And in case there’s a “why are there no female movie critics” blog post I’ll volunteer some more names: Manohla Dargis, Carina Chocano, Stephanie Zacharek, Dana Stevens, Cynthia Fuchs (again), Kim Morgan, Kathleen Murphy, Jessica Winter, Kristi Mitsuda]

For the record I’m both a geek and an insufferable music snob, neither of which has anything to do with the fact that I’m a woman. I’ll happily declare your taste crap if I think it’s crap, and shove a whole bunch of boring, but complicated music in your face.

Amy Phillips and Amanda Petrusich of P4K, but also of the Village Voice.

Fangirl

Sarah Zupko, founder and editor-in-chief of Popmatters

Cynthia Fuchs, Editor @ Popmatters

Worth a read: http://www.aquariusrecords.org

but what i really wanted to make note of was that i would say a good 50 to 60% of the bands or musicians i consider the “greatest ever” are women or include women, and furthermore, a good 50 to 60% of the good music (by males, females, or both) that i have been “hipped” to, i learned about from female acquaintances, among them my lovely wife. if not for my wife, i wouldn’t have ever heard citizen cope, for example. and if you haven’t at least HEARD citizen cope your music snob certificate gets automatically revoked.

music snobbery being a he-man wimmin haterz club is merely a reflection of the fact that pretty much everything is. particularly knowledge-based hobbies of any sort where trivia collecting and name cataloguing is key. the interesting thing though is that while i have more music stored on my hard drive than my wife does on hers, she actually LISTENS to more music in the course of her daily life than i do. so maybe it’s just that women live more in the real, social world outside of their heads than men do. at least that’s how it often seems to me.

Only if you have pretensions of becoming an IMS. Moreover, any band beloved by more than 5 IMSs instantly becomes mainstrean and therefore despised. Thus, tread carefully.

Tread carefully? You fool! I shall introduce these bands to millions of young fans, denying IMSs their precious little joys! And no one can stop me! Muahahahahahahahaha!

(Besides, if you want to keep them discovering bands, you have to shoo them away from the bands they like now.)

And I’m damn proud to be a female IMS!

I dunno. My best critic is my wife. If she’s not that excited by a song my band writes, chances are not too many others will be either. But whatever.

I really like that the first things I read here when I come back after a bit is an IMS column, then Pam’s Jena 6 one. I’ve missed the panda.