By Jae-Ha Kim
Chicago Sun-Times
January 12, 1992
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts 7:30 p.m. Saturday
Cabaret Metro, 3730 N. Clark
Tickets, $15
559-1212
Joan Jett has been a part of the rock ‘n’ roll vocabulary for so long, it’s easy to forget she is just 32. She has been neither a trend-setter nor a follower in her 17-year music career. Even when critics dismissed her as a novelty, one-trick pony or, perhaps worst yet, “girl singer,” the raspy-voiced musician persevered and produced a string of anthemic records that hailed the primal joys of adolescence with rebellious vocal sneers.
“I’ve been around for so long that people think I must be in my 40s or something,” said Jett, who with her band the Blackhearts, will perform Saturday at Cabaret Metro. “I get some surprised stares, like they’re trying to check for wrinkles or signs of a face-lift. But I try to take it all as a compliment. At least that means they remember me from way back when, even if they don’t remember the particulars.”
Her career began in 1975, when she became the rhythm guitarist for the all-girl group the Runaways. At 15, Jett and her jailbait bandmates were touring the world and receiving media hullabaloo. Most of the articles focused on their youth and gender, rather than their budding musicianship, but this was fine with their Svengali-like manager, Kim Fowley. After three years of being Fowley’s pet project, the Runaways ran in different directions.
Jett headed for a solo career and released her American debut LP, “Bad Reputation,” in 1980. But it was the title track from her 1982 album “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll” that became her calling card. The lyrics were brilliant in their idiotic simplicity, and Jett delivered the song in a sexy, droning voice that made it clear exactly why she loved rock ‘n’ roll.
“That song is so true that there was no other way to make it than to be direct about it,” Jett said in a phone interview from her New York home. “I think being an introspective songwriter is great, and some musicians can’t be anything but introspective. I’m that way to a point. But sometimes it’s just refreshing to get to the point without wallowing in a lot of private things that don’t make sense to anyone else.”
Her latest LP, “Notorious,” seems to contradict the leather-clad rebel image she’s cultivated over the past decade. Even the cover depicts her as a pouty-mouthed glamor gal, rather than the androgynous, spiky-haired former punker.
“I wouldn’t say that I’ve necessarily come of age with this album, but I definitely think it contains some of the best work I’ve ever done,” Jett said. “I know everyone says that about their latest records, but I can honestly tell you there isn’t one song on here that I don’t like.”
The LP cut that has received the most notoriety so far is “Backlash,” a song that Jett co-wrote with Replacements’ leader Paul Westerberg. The camera-shy Westerberg, who hated making videos for his own ‘Mats, even agreed to co-star in the accompanying video for “Backlash.”
“Working with Paul was a lot of fun,” Jett said. “I have a reputation for having a mercurial temper, and he has a reputation for being kind of temperamental, too. So everyone thinks I’m going to have these horror stories about how awful it was writing with him and how we fought all the time. But it went very smoothly. As a songwriter, I had always admired his work with the Replacements, so I felt very fortunate when he agreed to work with me. He made collaborating a lot of fun.”
When she started out almost two decades ago, the idea of women slinging around a guitar still was a novelty. Jett said she’s disappointed that while more women have become rockers since then, the sexism hasn’t changed much within the industry.rls who want to make it in rock music? And it’s not just the guys at the record companies that keep it a boys’ club. Turn on a classic-rock station, and I guarantee you’ll hear the (Rolling) Stones, the Who and the Doors. And who do you never hear? Janis Joplin. It may not seem like a big deal, but it all adds up to `keeping women in line.’ ”
And yet Jett, like other successful women in rock such as Tina Turner, has chosen to be the frontwoman for a band full of men.
“I guess by not hiring other women, I am being hypocritical,” Jett said. “But I also didn’t want to start another band that would be compared to the Runaways. I didn’t want it to become `Joan’s other girl group.’ That wouldn’t have been fair to either band or myself.
“It’s funny ’cause back then, we couldn’t get anyone to take us seriously. All people did was make mean jokes about us. Now I find myself defending the quality of my work now, compared to the `cutting edge’ stuff I did with them. It’s a strange circle.”
