Why I'm not into music by men anymore by Eleanor Robertson - 26/02/15, 11:45 PM

Why not try an all-women playlist once in a while? (Image posed by model not related to story) Photo: Stocksy

At this stage of my life, I listen to music written and performed by women about 80% of the time. I didn't do it on purpose; I used to have a much more even gender split in my tastes, but as I've gotten older I've developed a sort of creeping allergy to hearing the same male feelings set to music over and over again. Don't get me wrong, there's a time for male feelings. That time is almost the entire history of music, and thank heck it's over now.

We probably can't know who the first man was to pick up a lute or whatever and complain that his girlfriend left him, or that he can't get a girlfriend, or a girl had a wrong opinion, or was crazy. Or celebrate a hot girl he saw in the club. Or on the train. Or on a peaty moor in Scotland in 1802. But we can know one thing: he should've put down the lute and kept it to himself, maybe written it on a piece of paper and thrown it into the ocean. Had he set that kind of fine example for all the men who followed him, I might not have had to wait this long for women to get a bloody foothold in the noise industry.


Music has been so heavily male-dominated for so long that chicks are still a bit of a novelty. Things are definitely improving: I noticed during last year that I was voluntarily listening to Triple J, for instance, whereas in times gone past I would've turned it off after the fifth song in a row that could've been titled 'A Man Offers His Assessment of Women's Behaviour'. Ooh, what did this man think of women's appearance and conduct? How has something a woman did affected his life?! I'm on the edge of my seat here, boys! What's going on inside those male noggins of yours? It's not like I could get direct access to those thoughts and feelings just by standing around in public minding my own business, is it?

Oh wait, yes, that's exactly what it's like. Most of the time I don't even need to leave my house, I can just post literally anything on Twitter and wait for the deluge of male opinions. I can turn on the telly and get a constant stream of male consciousness without even getting into some pants. The world is is saturated with What A Man Thinks, so why would I voluntarily pump that into my ears? Most genres of popular music are just Men's Feelings Set To Slightly Different Backing Instruments, and when you listen to them that way the whole enterprise sounds a bit samey. It's a bit like if you went to a buffet, but every single dish contained the same main ingredient, let's say chicken, in a different sauce. Do I want lemon chicken or roast chicken? What if I branched out and had chicken on rice?! My God, aren't we spoiled for choice!

Possibly this view makes me sound like a bit of a philistine, and I don't really have a defence against that except to say that I came by my philistinism honestly. Sometime around the year of our Lord two thousand and ten, I was listening to a song by a man that I had, up until that point, quite enjoyed. Around about the fourth listen I felt a cool chill wash over me, like I'd just been doused in Men's Body Wash With Sea Minerals And Manly Menthol (why do all men's bathroom products contain sea minerals, are you guys too good for land minerals or what?). I took off my headphones to check if I'd just started my period, or else had absentmindedly walked into a swimming pool. Nope, I was just sick of listening to men sing about their boners. I changed the track to Beyonce and I've never looked back (except if you count my current obsession with amazing and borderline-disgraceful Aussie synthpop duo Client Liaison).

To everyone who is skeptical of this tack: give it a burl, just for a week. Make a playlist of your favourite music by chicks, any chicks. Many of the songs will be about men and their boners, but at least you'll be orienting yourself toward the male boner from a differing perspective. Some songs by women are even complaints about men and their boners, or women singing about other women! Whoa! There's so much to choose from in Music by Chicks these days, why wouldn't you? Music by men isn't going anywhere, but at this late stage in the game the only way for women in music to go is up.