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Some Girls Just Feel
It
Former
Blake Babies Juliana Hatfield and Freda Love reunite,
redefining women who rock the pop world
Sept 10,
2003They're a
rock band. A raw, groovy, rockin' power trio and they
just happen to be chicks. Think Avril Lavigne meets The
Rolling Stones, or the older, purer, "I don't have to
wear a see-through miniskirt to sell records" Liz Phair.
The
group, Some Girls, grew out of a lasting relationship
between former Blake Babies members Freda Love Smith
and Juliana Hatfield. The Blake Babies, the indie rock band
notorious in the post-punk scene of the 80s, split in
1991. And although the band members remained friends, they
didn't work together for nearly a decade.
Hatfield,
a graduate of the Berklee College of Music, went solo with
Mammoth Records after the break in 1992 and managed to
become one of the most popular women in rock. Love kept on
keepin' on as well, playing drums for the critically
acclaimed bands Antenna and the Mysteries of Life with
bandmate and husband Jake Smith (Mysteries of Life frontman
and bassist for The Vulgar Boatmen) who produced Some Girls'
debut album, Feel It,
released Sept. 9.
Brought
together again in March of 2001 to release God
Bless the Blake Babies, the reunion of the cult-favorite
sparked the beginning of Some Girls, named after The Rolling
Stones album. While in the studio, the engineering
technician said their songs sounded "very Some
Girl." The girls, who were still looking for a name at
the time, dug it.
"It
was just kind of a moment of inspiration. I don't think it's
so much a tribute as just a moment of inspiration,"
Love says. "It wasn't something so consciously like,
'We're trying to be like The Rolling Stones.' It just seemed
to fit."
The name
clicked and so did the girls.
Love, a
native of Bloomington and current yoga instructor at IU and the YMCA, collaborated
with Boston-based Hatfield by sending lyrics and music
through the mail.
"It
was very collaborative, and for both of us it was kind of a
first. I've been playing songs for many years, but haven't
written much," Love says.
Hatfield,
often associated with Evan Dando of the Lemonheads, had
toyed with the idea of reuniting with Love to see what they
could come up with post-Blake Babies. What they came up with
was more than they could've imagined.
"It's
really just the way that the songs turn out that's a
surprise," Hatfield says. "When I do my own music
I usually kind of know how I want them to sound. But with
Freda it's exciting to see how the arrangements come
out."
But
there's a third wheel to this story, one that Love calls
"multi-talented." Heidi Gluck, bassist of the
Indianapolis band The Pieces, was asked to join Love and Hatfield out of
the blue.
"We
thought it would be fun to get somebody to come in and play
bass just so we could kind of have the live band feeling.
And I knew of Heidi and I'm a fan of her band and I knew
that she was a very, very talented person and that she would
be an asset in the studio," Love remembers.
Gluck,
Love says, is the "young-genius one," the fresh
face. Hatfield fills the artistic shoes as the creative one
and Love says she's the details girl, the organized one.
The trio
"just clicked" and signed a contract with Koch
Records, an independent label, for two albums.
Smith,
working on his doctorate in communication and culture,
teaches the history of recording and a debut song writing
class in the school of music.
"In
today's music scene there's a lot of women artists, but so
much of it, so much of what is presented, is Britney and Christina Aguilera," Smith says. "And that stuff is
fine for what it is, but you know that's why Some Girls is
great because they're real, they're a real rock band."
But
commercialization of the industry has managed to evade the
souls of these particular songbirds, as Hatfield especially
has received recognition from the critics, but not the
consumers. And although the band says they love their new
11-track compilation, they have realistic expectations about
how well it will fare in the market.
Hatfield,
who says her motivation for making the album was simply for
the fun of it, doesn't anticipate huge sales.
"It
would be great to make some money, but I'm really not
expecting it," she says. "In the climate of today
there is no chance it will sell. That's not why we did
it."
Love
agrees, noting that although she's proud of all the records
she's put out, her biggest success came just recently when
Disney used the song "Nothing Ever Happens" from
the Blake Babies reunion album in the movie Freaky
Friday.
"I
have realistic expectations just based on my experience,
that's all," Love says. "I know that it costs a
million dollars just to get a song on the radio because
that's the way things are structured in the music business.
My record label isn't going to spend that much money,"
she explains.
And as
far as downloading music, the girls say they can't blame the
downloaders; it's the recording industry that's at fault.
"It's
not a money thing with me. I don't really care how people
get my records," Hatfield says. "As long as people
get my music, I'm happy."
But she
does take issue when people trade music that the artist
hasn't approved.
"There
have been recordings of mine that somehow got out and I
didn't want them to be out," she says.
Hatfield,
who is still working on her solo career separate from Some
Girls, says she expects to release another album in early
2004. As for Feel It, she says she wants people to have open minds when listening
to the record so they can have original responses.
"We
aren't the Blake Babies anymore," she says. "I
don't know why anyone would expect that."
As for
lyrical inspiration, Love and Hatfield work from two
different worlds literally. Writing is a bit like
role-playing for Love, the 36-year-old mother of two.
"I
feel like if I try to write really, really directly about my
own experience, it's like too personal and too difficult and
you can end up writing something that's like a journal
entry," she says.
The song
on the album Love says she had the most fun writing was
"The Getaway," a fictional story about lost love
and promises that has absolutely nothing to do with her real
life.
Conversely,
Hatfield takes issue with consumerism and issues in her
personal life.
"Robot
City," Hatfield says, was inspired by American culture.
"Everything
comes down to buying and selling even the political
system," she says. Track nine, "On My Back,"
describes her standard point of view on life, which she
admits is generally always conflicted.
"It's
about my life and really enjoying the solitude in my life
... about how being alone isn't necessarily a bad
thing," she says.
And after
the release of Feel It
this week, the three prepare for a nationwide tour starting
at Rhino's Sunday, Sept. 14 at 8 p.m.
The five-week tour will wrap up in mid-October, but not
before the girls hit both coasts, playing with Gluck's The
Pieces on the West Coast and The Unbusted, young guys from
Martha's Vineyard, on the East. For tour dates and more information about
Some Girls, check out www.some-girls.com.
Meghan
Dwyer
Reprinted from the Indiana Digital Student |
