She Bop

Revised and updated edition of a seminal text widely praised as ‘a contemporary classic’ and ‘a must for any serious muso’s bookshelf’.

She Bop has always bridged the academic and popular market, and is now a university set text in the UK, Europe, and the USA, so there will be additional promotion in the academic market.

Drawing on more than 270 original interviews with female artists and women working behind the scenes in A&R, marketing, music publishing, and production, She Bop presents a feminist history of women in popular music, from 1920s blues to the present day. Talking to iconic artists from Eartha Kitt and Nina Simone to Debbie Harry and Beyoncé, acclaimed author Lucy O’Brien charts how women have negotiated ‘old boy’ power networks to be seen and to get their music heard.

This revised edition updates that story through many fresh interviews and new perspectives. Since She Bop was first published in 1995, digital downloading has transformed the music landscape. But has the issue of gender inequality changed too? In a new introduction and closing chapter, O’Brien celebrates the rise of unique women such as Lizzo and Billie Eilish, who are bursting through and creating new possibilities for female artists, while also looking at the struggles of artists like Kesha, and wondering whether the pop industry has had its #MeToo moment yet.

Published to celebrate the original book’s 25^th anniversary – and in a year that also marks 50 years of Women’s Liberation – this new She Bop will appeal to a huge cross-section of readers, from music fans to the LGBT audience and women of all generations.

About The Author:

Lucy O’Brien is a writer, academic, and broadcaster. She co-wrote It Takes Blood And Guts, the new memoir by Skin, lead singer of rock band Skunk Anansie, and is also the author of Dusty: The Classic Biography, Annie Lennox, and Madonna: Like An Icon, which has been translated into 13 languages. She has contributed to Q, Mojo, The Guardian, The Sunday Times. She played in all-girl band The Catholic Girls and is currently working on a memoir about punk and feminism.