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The bitch is back
from: lvcitylife.com
by Jeff Inman
IT'S GONE -- AT LEAST THE SINGING PART. JOAN JETT's voice has always had a healthy rasp, making her sound equal parts Marilyn Monroe and revving monster truck. But now it's just a whimper. She talks in hushed tones. On stage she tries to power through -- and it works most of the time. Fans expect Jett to sing like a biker bitch ready to throw down. And she can still pull that off. But there's always been a subtle seductress side to Jett -- the bad girl you want to follow to hell. That, for the moment, has vanished.
"In the last week my voice has just disappeared," she says in a gargled whisper. "I just don't know what happened."
Part of it has to be her current schedule. Jett is in the middle of a massive push, the kind she hasn't seen in more than a decade. Every day she's on a plane. Last night she was in San Francisco, took the red eye home to New York to check on the friends and the financial folks, and soon will be back on a plane to L.A. It's enough to decimate anyone's vocal cords -- even without the daily regiment of singing/screaming.
But it's what Jett has to do. She just released SINNER, her first record of original material in 12 years. And while she didn't disappear during that decade -- she was always on the road, did the acclaimed Gits tribute project Evil Stig, and dropped a live album and a greatest hits package -- most folks thought she was long gone. She hadn't scored a hit since the late '80s, and unlike other proto-punks, never turned up on a bad VH-1 show. So she's out to remind people she's more than a snarl from the past. And to do that she has to dart cross-country, do 10,000 interviews and play every show she can, including headlining this summer's Warped Tour. And even then, it's no guarantee that people will pay attention.
"It's hard to get the industry behind a woman," says KENNY LAGUNA, Jett's longtime manager/producer/keyboard player. "Back in 1993, when Joan was getting ready to release Pure and Simple, we knew we were going to have trouble. Chrissie Hynde was releasing a record, too, and the industry can't handle two black-haired women who play guitar at once. Now it's even harder, because she's not classic rock, it's still hard for rock women to get on the radio, and she was gone for so long. It's hard to find a place for her."
But it would be a shame if SINNER doesn't get the attention it deserves. Gritty, honest, and at times shocking, like on the raunchy "Fetish" -- Jett actually admits she "gets off having rough sex" -- the disc rivals anything she's ever released. She bangs out fist-pumping anthems ("Tube Talkin'") and Social D-inspired confessionals ("Naked"). She takes on neocons (the Rumsfeld-sampling "Riddles") and throws out a call to arms ("Change the World"). And there's a moment in every track where it seems entirely possible Jett will crawl out of your speakers and personally slap you around for a second.
"There was just a lot I wanted to say after so long," Jett says. "Like 'Riddles.' Politics is new territory for me. I've never touched on it before. But the Bush administration spends millions of dollars on lies. The language they use, like the Healthy Forests Initiative, sounds good, but it really just covers up their real intent. So you have to start questioning, 'What is a lie?' In this world, up is down. I had to write about that."
And even with her voice aching, Jett makes sure to sing it every night as well. "I think these are things people should discuss," she says. "We can't bottle anything up anymore."
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