Princewill Pius
Being a lesbian in the music business has been complicated for Melissa Etheridge at times, but the truth is, even if she was straight, she would have still been at a huge disadvantage. Female rockers were seen as a novelty when she first started out, especially solo acts. “When I started we were taking my first record around to radio stations, they’d say ‘Oh, I’m sorry, we can’t play her, we’re already playing a woman,'” Etheridge recalled during a 2019 interview with InFocusVisions. “But, y’know, it’s still difficult. You have to work really, really hard. It’s one of those last men’s businesses, especially rock ‘n’ roll.” It’s not just the music industry that she wants to see change, either.
In 2007, Melissa Etheridge won an Oscar for her song “I Need To Wake Up,” featured in Al Gore’s global warming documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. She started working with Women in Film’s New Music Committee when she realized that a woman winning an Academy Award in her field was a rarity. “It’s ridiculous that of the top 500 films of last year, one percent had female composers,” she told Hamptons in 2019. “It’s just a part of the American culture, the American art, that has a blindside; that it doesn’t even know that it’s a boy’s club.” She’s always happy to mentor young female musicians, but Etheridge believes that change has to come from the top — the singer-songwriter wants more execs to take chances on young women.
Written by: Nicki
