Nobody Ever Asked Me About the Girls: Women, Music and Fame

LOCAL AUTHOR

Lisa Robinson is a music journalist who traveled within the rock ’n roll world and kept up with the boys therein. What stories she must tell. And clearly, in this book, she is fed up with bad boy stories and wishes to bring the focus on the talented and much-overlooked women in music. The book is entertaining without being too gossipy. The author has written about most musicians and is friend to incredible performers/writers like Patti Smith, Cyndi Lauper, and Bette Midler. The book manages to steer away from glorifying the life of a rock journalist while bringing us into the green room scenes and interview settings. While she praises the huge talents of her friends and interviewees like Patti LaBelle, Mavis Staples, and Whitney Houston, she is incredibly hard on Madonna, whom it is clear that she intensely dislikes. The chapters are arranged by the problems women in music must face: touring, hair and makeup, family life and children, and of course, sex, drugs, and rock ’n roll. It is an interesting and well-written book that gives talented female composers and musicians their due.