Shortly after groups such as the Supremes and the Ronettes released their best work, British bands such as the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, the Kinks and the Who released albums in the U.S. Compared to the material that had previously dominated the American pop charts, the rhythm and blues-influenced music of the British Invasion groups sounded fresh, aggressive, radical and masculine. The musical climate of the country changed quickly and it further cemented a generational divide between the kids who embraced this new rock music and their older siblings and parents who found it repellant. The British Invasion hinted at pop culture’s future; girl groups, teen idols and doo wop invoked its past. Girl groups began performing poorly on the pop charts and quickly fell out of favor.
Musically, the girl groups of the early 1960s were pure ear candy but the upbeat moony sound betrayed a sometimes dark reality. Though many of the era’s hits were written by female songwriters such as Carole King, Ellie Greenwich and Cynthia Weil, the lyrics painted a disturbing portrait of women’s roles in pre-Second Wave society. Take, for example, the Crystal’s single, “He’s a Rebel.” The song is infectious but a closer reading of the lyrics depicts a protagonist who happily describes her cretinous boyfriend, who will “never be any good” before gleefully adding, “but that’s no reason why I can’t give him all my love.” The Shangri-Las hit “Leader of the Pack” told a similar story of a girl who fell in love with a man who was bad for her and yet, she loves him unconditionally (even after he meets his untimely end in a rainy motorcycle crash). “Chapel of Love” by the Dixie Cups is a well-known and much-loved pop song, but it is almost the musical equivalent of a stack of bridal magazines and groan-inducing female stereotypes. That theme of female helplessness and unerring devotion to a deadbeat boyfriend was a mainstay of the genre and occasionally, it could take an even more unsettling turn.
In 1962, Gerry Goffin and Carole King wrote a handful of songs for Phil Spector’s group, the Crystals. One of the songs that became a single was “He Hit Me (And it Felt Like a Kiss).” The song was inspired by the real life circumstances of the singer Little Eva. Eva’s boyfriend regularly beat her and when Goffin and King discovered this, they wrote a song that attempted to justify her boyfriend’s behavior the way an abuse victim might. Had the song been released a few decades later or sung by someone like Billie Holiday, it probably would have conveyed a deep sense of appreciation for the severity and depravity of the subject matter. In Spector’s hands, however, the song is given the Wall of Sound treatment and translated literally. To call the result tone-deaf is insufficient and in light of what we know about Spector now, it comes across as especially disquieting.6
In the years to come, several artists would find inspiration in the genre, including Dolly Parton, whose early single “Don’t Drop Out” was clearly derivative of the girl group sound. Subsequent artists such as Bananarama, Destiny’s Child, TLC, the Weather Girls, the Pointer Sisters, En Vogue and the Spice Girls borrowed heavily from the girl groups’ sound, style and choreography. Some female artists, such as Beyoncé, Amy Winehouse and Adele have been more forthcoming in their devotion to the works of Spector’s girl groups by dressing like Ronnie Spector and covering Brill Building songs. Additionally, the influence of girl groups can be found in uncommon places, such as rock groups like Sleater-Kinney and Hole (listen to the interplay between the vocals of Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker or Courtney Love and Melissa Auf der Maur and you can hear the distinct echo of the Ronettes and the Marvelettes) and dance punk by the likes of St. Etienne and Le Tigre.
But despite their continued influence on contemporary pop stars, few music journalists bother to document their impact on the music world. Even the mausoleum-like Rolling Stone, which breathlessly covers the careers of Eric Clapton and Rod Stewart, even as their relevance diminishes and they continually churn out dull, mediocre albums, ignores the works of these women and the songwriters behind them. This poses an interesting question: Why? Why are these artists being passed over, dropped from oldies playlists and forgotten by all but a few hipsters and retro-lovers, such as the Dum Dum Girls?
The answer is, in essence, who the girl groups were and who they catered to–black women and teenage girls, respectively. American Bandstand may have integrated in 1957 but American culture was hardly integrated (and largely is not to this day). In 2007, Patti LaBelle caused a minor controversy when she stated that her career and those of her peers had been adversely affected by racism, which she contended is prevalent throughout the music industry. LaBelle began her career as the centerpiece of the Blue Belles and argued that covers of her songs sold better than the originals because white artists received more support from their labels and thus, more air play.
While admittedly it can be difficult to prove LaBelle’s claims in retrospect, there does appear to be some truth to that argument. Consider again the content of Rolling Stone. Artists like Jack White and Eric Clapton have built their careers around their desire to play music like that of their (black) heroes–Leadbelly, Robert Johnson, Chuck Berry, Otis Redding–and yet, how frequently are those inspirations written about? Why don’t their boxed sets, reissues and compilations warrant spilled ink?
Further, while the entertainment industry loves teen girls’ disposable income and love of pop culture, it does not tend to take them seriously as an audience. Pop fluff is for girls and “serious music” is for men and the “cool” women who chose to embrace it. The music world has a long history of dismissing female artists and only accepting those who demonstrate male traits and male tastes. Janis Joplin, Chrissie Hynde and Joan Jett are taken seriously because they dress in unfeminine ways, could drink most people under the table and look like they could knock the biggest guy in the room into next week if he looked at them the wrong way. But feminine girls? The ones you could name, like Debbie Harry, are the exception, not the rule.7
It’s a shame, really because when all the pros and cons are tallied, those girl groups sang some fucking amazing songs.
My Girl Group Play List:
- The Crystals, “He’s a Rebel”
- The Marvelettes, “Please Mr. Postman”
- The Cookies, “Don’t Say Nothin’ Bad (About my Baby)”
- The Ronettes, “Be My Baby”
- The Teen Queens, “Eddie My Love”
- The Supremes, “Baby Love”
- The Shirelles, “Tonight’s the Night”
- The Shangri-Las, “Leader of the Pack”
- Martha & the Vandellas, “(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave”
- Dolly Parton, “Don’t Drop Out”
- The Crystals, “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)”
- The Blossoms, “That’s When the Tears Start”
- The Supremes, “Stop! In the Name of Love”
- Martha & the Vandellas, “Dancing in the Streets”
- The Ronettes, “Walking in the Rain”
- Patti La Belle & Her Bluebelles, “You’ll Never Walk Alone”
- The Shirelles, “Will You Love Me Tomorrow”
- The Supremes, “You Keep Me Hangin’ On”
Bonus: We have all heard the Supremes’ hit “Stop In the Name of Love” but there is an a capella version floating around online that seriously deserves a lesson. With the orchestrations stripped away, you can really get a sense of the immense talent and vocal power the three Supremes possessed. The harmonies are flawless; their voices bob and weave in and out of each other creating a lush sound that quite frankly, is obscured by the ornate backing music.
6. Aside from being convicted of murder, Phil Spector’s ex-wife Ronnie Spector (lead singer of the Ronettes) disclosed that her marriage to the producer was an unhappy one. Immediately after marrying her, Spector became abusive and domineering toward Ronnie. She contends that he completely cut her off from her friends and family and went so far as to keep her prisoner in their Los Angeles home, sabotage her career and deny her royalties.
7. Women as diverse as Liz Phair, Ann Wilson, Gwen Stefani, Kira Roessler, Cyndi Lauper, Pink, Amanda Palmer, Robyn, Lily Allen, Pat Benatar and Lita Ford (yes, I am serious) have spoken about the pressure they have endured by bandmates, video directors and label executives to tart up their images. In the music industry, it appears that there are two acceptable archetypes for women: the tomboy who plays with the boys and the sex object whose talent is a secondary concern to her material. Though these models have existed since the advent of modern media, they were codified in the 1980s and appear to be getting progressively worse. The blame for this development lies squarely on the shoulders of MTV and Madonna, in my opinion. MTV radically changed the music industry and proved that sex and female exploitation translated to massive revenues. (Compare a video from MTV’s early 1980s programming to one from the mid-’80s. You will notice a drastic change in production values and a massive difference in the amount of lingering shots of mostly naked women.) Madonna, for her part, openly embraced this relationship between selling one’s sexuality and commercial profit. With each successive video, she upped the ante and whether it was David Fincher having her crawl on the floor on all fours and lick milk from a saucer or posing naked in explicit photos with Vanilla Ice, she did it. Her massive success created more pressure for other female artists to follow in suit. Now, many people will argue that she was empowering herself and other women through these tactics. I remain unconvinced. Women who have managed to straddle those two molds are far and few between and often, it was not until after a female artist’s career took off that she was able to dictate the terms of her image.
