Nobody Ever Asked Me about the Girls

July 6, 2020
Music journalist and Vanity Fair contributing editor Robinson (There Goes Gravity) highlights the challenges of being a woman in the music business in these passionate, insightful essays. Here she shares excerpts from 5,000 hours of taped conversations she conducted from the 1970s to the present with female musicians including Beyoncé, Katy Perry, and Patti Smith. Revealing interviews include Adele talking about juggling music-making and motherhood; Sheryl Crow expounding on fame and aging; and Mary J. Blige and Bonnie Raitt discussing substance abuse. Throughout, Robinson inserts observations about the artists she admires, such as Lady Gaga (an “exception in candor” who spoke openly with Robinson about the drugs she took in the years before she was famous) and Joni Mitchell (“a true artist”); she also mentions artists she doesn’t care for, like Taylor Swift, an “overtly ambitious musician” who, when she learned that Robinson worked for Vanity Fair, “lasered in on me like something out of The Exorcist.” The blocks of interview quotes sometimes overwhelm the narrative, but Robinson keeps things moving with her sharp takes and witty asides. (“With social media and all that butt-baring and body shaming going on, it’s a miracle that any female has the guts to make a record,” she says.) This entertaining highlight reel of music interviews crackles with energy.

August 1, 2020

The life of a musician may include sex, drugs, and rock and roll, along with stage fright, sober rooms, and financial surprises. Robinson (contributing editor, Vanity Fair; There Goes Gravity: A Life in Rock and Roll) tells the story from women rock and rollers' perspective, with tales from 1967's summer of love through the present, from artists such as Tina Turner, Joan Jett, Taylor Swift, and Adele. In these accounts culled from more than 5,000 hours of interviews over four decades, readers learn tidbits that Robinson feels slipped under the radar. Sometimes stars were unwilling to talk, sometimes no one thought to ask, and sometimes no one was listening. Robinson, a sympathetic ear to many, groups hundreds of intimate, often astute recollections into chapters including "Hair & Makeup," "Fame," "Abuse," "Motherhood," "Sex," and "Age." The author had access backstage and in recording studios, and moves with women through MTV and into Instagram and streaming. VERDICT An intriguing (and occasionally snarky) look at the lives, loves, and off-stage personas of well-known women soloists and band members. With the increased visibility of women in entertainment generally, and music specifically, this title will find an audience in most libraries.--Maggie Knapp, Trinity Valley Sch., Fort Worth, TX

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from October 15, 2020
During her 40 years of interviewing and writing about musicians, there is one thing that stood out for Robinson: Nobody ever asked me about the girls. Nobody ever asked her what Joni was like, or Janis, or Stevie. It was always about Mick or Michael J. or Jay-Z. In this fascinating, opinionated, and often insightful look back at her career, Robinson reflects on the deep-seated misogyny, sexism, and ageism in the music industry. She writes about the talented women she met and their hopes, dreams, and ambitions; their views of fame, motherhood, sex, drugs, and family; and their reactions to stage fright and bad reviews. When a man becomes successful and famous, he gets more of everything. When a women gets successful and famous, she loses something, notes Robinson. Some of the women shared personal and harrowing tales of abuse. It's shocking to learn how many famous women were raped (Tori Amos, Lady Gaga, Madonna) or beaten (Tina Turner, Carole King). Another sensitive topic is appearance. With a few exceptions, even today most female musicians conform to the stereotype of feminine beauty and dress. It's not all bleak, though. Robinson finds hope in the #MeToo movement and other cultural shifts. Change is coming; conditions for women have improved. Not enough, she writes. But better. Women in Focus: The 19th in 2020(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)

November 1, 2020
A longtime music writer empties her files. Vanity Fair contributing editor Robinson has sorted through decades of interviews with scores of female artists and divided their quotes and anecdotes into chapters entitled "Hair and Makeup," "Fame," Abuse," "Motherhood," "Sex," "Drugs," "Business," "Age," etc. The premise of the book--that nobody has been interested in stories of stars like Janis Joplin, Joni Mitchell, Patti Smith, Beyonc�, Rihanna, or Courtney Love until now--lacks evidence-based support and fails to justify this stitched-together jumble of retreads and outtakes. Though Robinson makes the point that she was never a critic, rather an interviewer, an editor of fan magazines, and a writer of "chatty columns," she does have her likes and dislikes. She credits Madonna with "ruining the culture" in the 1980s, and she is particularly enraged by Taylor Swift, whom she met as "a fledgling country music singer with buck teeth. The second she heard I was from Vanity Fair, she grabbed my hand with such force that I thought she might break it, and her eyes lasered on me like something out of The Exorcist....The idea that she, or anyone, thought she could play Joni Mitchell in the still unmade 'Ladies of the Canyon' movie is laughable. (Joni told me she put a stop to that.)" Even the stars Robinson admires don't come off well in these pages: Lady Gaga confides, "I feel like if I sleep with someone they're going to take my creativity from me through my vagina." Sheryl Crow reports that Stevie Nicks told her, "if you ever have kids you'll never write a great rock song again." The author also quotes Adele's maunderings about motherhood at numbing length. One might conclude that decades-old gossip isn't that interesting, but Ben Widdicombe's recent stylishly written memoir, Gatecrasher, suggests that isn't the problem. For devoted Robinson fans only.

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