Celebrating Women in Music: Ani DiFranco

Sunday, March 8th was International Women's Day, an entire day dedicated to celebrating the achievements of women across the globe. Here at WUMB we are celebrating the contributions of women in music for the entire month of March. Today we highlight American songwriter, singer, poet, and multi-instrumentalist Ani DiFranco. 

Ani DiFranco has been in control  of her career from the earliest days. She is a maverick whose music defies genre and description, but which identifies with the truest spirit of folk music. Her songs are often laced with profanity on topics ranging from abortion and rape, to exploitation and sexuality. She formed a record label when she was 19, and released her first album at 20. Since then, DiFranco has grown a fierce following of fans through constant touring, performing, and recording.

Ani DiFranco was born in Buffalo, New York on September 23, 1970. She learned how to play guitar as a child, and played her first show at age 9. When DiFranco was 15, her mother moved to California. Rather than accompany her, DiFranco petitioned for emancipation and stayed behind in Buffalo, living on her own. By the time she was 18 she had played every bar in Buffalo, and after a year of art classes at college, she decided to move to New York City where she worked as a nude model, kitchen helper and house painter.

In 1990, DiFranco recorded a demo and approached some record companies, but received no interest. Instead she borrowed money from friends and looted her own bank account to finance the release of her debut Ani DiFranco. She produced 500 copies on cassette, which she sold at shows, and Righteous Babe Records was born.

As word of her music spread, DiFranco began to tour extensively around the country, building a grassroots following especially among college aged fans who identified with her ability to tackle personal subjects in her songs.

Throughout the 1990’s she released a number of albums including collaboration with folksinger Utah Phillips, which involved Phillips telling stories and DiFranco laying down music behind him. Like Phillips, DiFranco tooks pride in her independence as an artist, spurning offers from major labels as her popularity grew.

DiFranco maintains that although people often think that owning her own label is about retaining maximum profits, it is really her way of maintaining her artistic freedom and control over her music. Though this may be the case, her royalty rate per album sale is often more than twice the industry standard.

Although DiFranco refers to herself as a folk singer, she's also frequently categorized as belonging to the alternative-rock genre. Her influences are broad, and her songs often incorporate elements from other musical styles, including punk, funk, classical and electronic. Many of DiFranco's songs are drawn from her personal life and experiences, but equally as often, her lyrics are feminist and political. Her music has tackled topics like war, corporate greed, sexual assault and gun control.

Folk Alliance International 2015: Laney Jones and The Lively Spirits

Folk Alliance International is a non-profit organization that sponsors an industry conference for the folk music industry every year, attended by artists, record companies, manufacturers, music publishers, music support services, presenters, managers and agents. This year marks the second year that the conference takes place in Kansas City, Missouri. With a membership of over 2,000 people Folk Alliance is among the top five largest conferences in North America. Thursday, February 19^th, was the second day of the conference and one of the best acts that night was a band called Laney Jones and The Lively Spirits.

                Laney Jones and The Lively Spirits were a band that I stumbled upon completely accidentally. And am I sure glad that I did. Though Jones and her band—Matthew Tonner, Curtis Seligson, and Alex Shames—are from Florida, they are not without local ties. Jones landed at Berklee College of Music in 2013 where she studied until, in typical Berklee fashion, she left to tour with her own band.  Since then she has  been busy touring up and down the East Coast. Recently she made her debut on national TV as part of Great Performances on PBS. She performed her track “Broken Hearts” as part of a masterclass with Alison Krauss. Her style is an even blend of the old and the new, Pop meets Americana, some Brandi Carlile and some Patty Griffin with a little bit of Sara Bareilles thrown in for good measure. She performed a selection of songs from her self-produced 2014 debut Golden Road, as well as from her upcoming new record, due out in 2015.

                Laney Jones and The Lively Spirits will even be making a pit stop in Cambridge at The Lizard Lounge on March 5^th. 

Folk Alliance International 2015: Midwest Music Foundation Showcase

Folk Alliance International is a non-profit organization that sponsors an industry conference for the folk music industry every year, attended by artists, record companies, manufacturers, music publishers, music support services, presenters, managers and agents. This year marks the second year that the conference takes place in Kansas City, Missouri. With a membership of over 2,000 people Folk Alliance is among the top five largest conferences in North America.

                One of the best showcases of the night was that of the Midwest Music Foundation, an educational arts organization that unites performer and audience and fills a health care

gap for Kansas City musicians. Kansas City musicians, Nate Allen and David George, took turns alternating playing songs one at a time rather than each doing separate complete sets, which was an atypical showcasing technique but was successful given the variation in the musicians’ performance styles.

                Nate Allen, a Eugene, Oregon native who has been in Kansas City long enough to “almost call [him]self a local” is one half of the folk-punk duo Destroy Nate Allen. His other half, his wife, Tessa, was not with him on that evening. Allen’s voice has a Ben-Gibbard quality popular with indie kids and teen girls worldwide, combined with quirky lyrics such as, “Green Day changed my life in ‘94” from his 2010 song “Small Town” and his DIY attitude—most of his music has been self-released—and eccentric vibe made for a charming performance overall.

               David George had been playing with John Fogerty since 2012 but left recently to pursue a solo career. He said that while playing for John Fogerty he played him a song, and Fogerty said, “You wrote that song? That’s a great song” and those were the words of encouragement he needed. That song, “Good Man Gone” is about  two-month period of time in which he lived with four women, in their closet, until they kicked him out. Now under the name of David George and A Crooked Mile, George plans to release three singles and a full album by the end of the year.