To honor the recently celebrated International Women’s Day, I’d like to take this opportunity to solely focus on the ladies currently releasing music. Therefore, this month’s mixtape exclusively features tracks by female singers, girl groups, producers, dj’s, composers, instrumentalist and lyricist of various genres, with different backgrounds and at different stages of their careers. Female imagination, perspective and voice find their outlet in music as much any other art form.

Female artists often speak out about objectification and sexism in the music industry. Making music independently not only means taking back their voice and control of their own image, but also discussing important issues such as women rights, pay and gender gap, sexual and domestic abuse, refugee crisis to name few. The recent scandals surrounding sexual misconduct in Hollywood and #metoo movement have put the spotlight on women but this time for rather important reasons.

To shed some light on issue of gender gap, Spotify has teamed up with Smirnoff and HONEY DIJON, an Afro-American transgender DJ, to prepare a very useful tool called Smirnoff Equalizer. It allows Spotify users to get some insight into the gender balance of their daily listening habits. Follow the link and the instructions here [http://smirnoffequalizer.com].

               As per usual, the selection features some of the biggest names in the business such as SADE, TRACEY THORN, KYLIE MINOGUE and LANA DEL REY. The legendary soul singer, SADE, premiered her first new song in 8 years earlier this month.  “Flower Of The Universe” will be featured on the upcoming Disney movie “A Wrinkle In Time” starring Oprah Winfrey. Everything But The Girl’s TRACY THORN made a career-defining comeback with a new album entitled simply “Record” and invited sisters SHURA and CORRINE BAILEY REA as guests. LANA DEL REY covered Madonna’s performance from the musical “Evita” on “You Must Love Me”. And KYLIE MINOGUE, who is preparing her next pop excursion, shared “Stop Me From Falling”.

On the other side of the musical spectrum, in the more experimental domain, women have also been among the pioneers. Names such as Björk, Delia Derbyshire, Laurie Anderson shouldn’t need any introduction, but their progressive input into music’s development is often underestimated. Currently, younger artists such as GROUPER, YEAJI, ASTRID SONNE, FEVER RAY, SMERZ, SOPHIE are the ones pushing the musical boundaries and venturing into uncharted territories.

Folk music is another domain where women made special impact and could more freely express themselves. Legendary artist such as Joan Baez, Vashti Bunyan, PJ Harvey, Emmylou Harris, Joni Mitchell used their music to contribute to the social and the political debates of their times as well as inspiring a legion of young songstresses. COURTNEY BARNETT, FRANKIE COSMOS, ALELA DIANE, along with LAURA VEIRS and NEKO CASE continue this great songwriting tradition.

The idea behind the mixtape has always been to be as inclusive and eclectic as possible by covering various genres and moods. This special selection collects everything from the sensual, intimate soul ballads by LION BABE, SHAY LIA, RAVEENA to the punk manifestos of DREAM WIFE, WOLF ALICE, SOCCER MUM or ANGEL OLSEN. From club bangers of PEGGY GOU, LITTLE BOOTS, to delicate indie pop by NATALIE PRASS, MT. SI, LITTLE DRAGON and CLAIRO.

The whole thing wouldn’t be complete without our strong Polish section. There always has been a strong presence of female artists in the mainstream entertainment in Poland. Especially since the 90’s.  Here we’ve got KAYAH, one of the stars since that time, with her new single. She’s leading a nice collective of fresh, young Polish talents featured this month (i.e. BOKKA, FFRANCIS, SONAR, JULIA PIETRUCHA).

             So here’s to women who make the noise! And what a beautiful noise it is! Celebrate them and support their vision and creativity all year long, not just on that one day in March.

Yours truly,

Piotrek | NoSnobsAllowed