The Slits were a punk and post-punk band based in London, formed there in 1976 by members of the groups the Flowers of Romance and the Castrators. The group's early line-up consisted of Ari Up and Palmolive, with Viv Albertine and Tessa Pollitt replacing founding members Kate Korus and Suzy Gutsy. Their 1979 debut album, Cut, has been called one of the defining releases of the post-punk era.
Kim Althea Gordon is an American musician, singer and songwriter, best known as the bassist, guitarist, and vocalist of alternative rock band Sonic Youth. Born in Rochester, New York, she was raised in Los Angeles, California, where her father was a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. After graduating from Los Angeles's Otis College of Art and Design, she moved to New York City to begin an art career. There, she formed Sonic Youth with Thurston Moore in 1981. She and Moore married in 1984, and the band released a total of six albums on independent labels before the end of the 1980s. They would subsequently release nine studio albums on the major label DGC Records, beginning with Goo in 1990. Gordon was also a founding member of the musical project Free Kitten, which she formed with Julia Cafritz in 1993.
The Raincoats are a British experimental post-punk band. Ana da Silva and Gina Birch formed the group in 1977 while they were students at Hornsey College of Art in London.
The Flowers of Romance was an early punk band, formed in mid-1976 by Jo Faull and Sarah Hall, girlfriends at the time of Steve Jones and Paul Cook of the Sex Pistols. The band did not release any recordings and, like London SS and Masters of the Backside, are more famed for the number of band members that later became well known, including: Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols, Keith Levene, and Palmolive and Viv Albertine of The Slits. Despite never playing live, they were interviewed by SKUM fanzine in which Sid Vicious proclaimed "I'll just be the yob that I am now".
Shawn Colvin is an American singer-songwriter and musician. While Colvin has been a solo recording artist for decades, she is best known for her 1998 Grammy Award-winning song "Sunny Came Home".
Neneh Mariann Karlsson, better known as Neneh Cherry, is a Swedish singer-songwriter, rapper, occasional DJ and broadcaster. Her musical career started in London in the early 1980s, where she performed in a number of punk and post-punk bands in her youth, including the Slits and Rip Rig + Panic.
The Pop Group are an English rock band formed in Bristol in 1977 by vocalist Mark Stewart, guitarist John Waddington, bassist Simon Underwood, guitarist/saxophonist Gareth Sager, and drummer Bruce Smith. Their work in the late 1970s crossed diverse musical influences including punk, dub, funk, and free jazz with radical politics, helping to pioneer post-punk music.
The pogo is a dance in which the dancers jump up and down, while either remaining on the spot or moving around; the dance takes its name from its resemblance to the use of a pogo stick, especially in a common version of the dance, where one keeps one's torso stiff, one's arms rigid, and one's legs close together. Pogo dancing is most associated with punk rock, and is a precursor to moshing.
Sex was a boutique run by Vivienne Westwood and her then partner Malcolm McLaren at 430 King's Road, London between 1974 and 1976. It specialised in clothing that defined the look of the punk movement.
Cut is the debut studio album by English punk band the Slits, released on 7 September 1979. It was recorded at Ridge Farm Studios in Rusper and produced by Dennis Bovell. The album was praised by later acts such as Kurt Cobain and Massive Attack.
Ariane Daniele Forster, known by her stage name Ari Up, was a German vocalist best known as a member of the English punk rock band the Slits.
Paloma McLardy, known as Palmolive, is a Spanish drummer and songwriter who was a member of influential early punk bands. She founded the Slits toward the end of 1976. After leaving that group in 1978, she joined the Raincoats and performed on their first album, The Raincoats.
"Train in Vain" is a song by the British punk rock band the Clash. It was released as the third and final single from their third studio album, London Calling (1979). The song was not originally listed on the album's track listing, appearing as a hidden track at the end of the album. This was because the track was added to the record at the last minute, when the sleeve was already in production. Some editions include the song in the track listing. It was the first Clash song to reach the United States Top 30 charts and in 2010, the song was ranked number 298 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
Mary Beth Patterson, known by her stage name Beth Ditto, is an American singer and songwriter most notable for her work with the indie rock band Gossip. Her voice has been compared to Etta James, Janis Joplin and Tina Turner. She disbanded Gossip to pursue a career in fashion, and has since started a solo career. In 2022, she portrayed country singer Gigi Roman on the Fox drama series Monarch.
Return of the Giant Slits is the second studio album by English punk band the Slits, released in 1981 by CBS Records on LP and cassette. In comparison with its widely acclaimed predecessor, Cut, released in 1979, it showcases a rhythmic, more experimental sound, inspired by afro-pop. The Slits would disband for the first time months after its release in early 1982.
Exhibition is a 2013 drama film written and directed by Joanna Hogg, starring Viv Albertine, Liam Gillick, and Tom Hiddleston. The film premiered at the Locarno Film Festival in August 2013, and was released in the UK on 25 April 2014.
Jennifer Lee Lindberg is an American musician, singer-songwriter and record producer, best known as the bassist of the indie rock band Warpaint. In 2015, Lindberg released her first solo album, Right On!, under the name "Jennylee".
Women have made significant contributions to punk rock music and its subculture since its inception in the 1970s. In contrast to the rock music and heavy metal scenes of the 1970s, which were dominated by men, the anarchic, counter-cultural mindset of the punk scene in mid-and-late 1970s encouraged women to participate. This participation played a role in the historical development of punk music, especially in the US and UK at that time, and continues to influence and enable future generations. Women have participated in the punk scene as lead singers, instrumentalists, as all-female bands, zine contributors and fashion designers.
Women in rock describes the role of women singers, instrumentalists, record producers and other music professionals in rock music and popular music and the many subgenres and hybrid genres that have emerged from these genres. Women have a high prominence in many popular music styles as singers. However, professional women instrumentalists are uncommon in popular music, especially in rock genres such as heavy metal. "[P]laying in a band is largely a male homosocial activity, that is, learning to play in a band is largely a peer-based... experience, shaped by existing sex-segregated friendship networks. As well, rock music "...is often defined as a form of male rebellion vis-à-vis female bedroom culture."
01-for London was a Thames Television programme broadcast on ITV in South-East England between 1987 and 1992. It was a weekly arts listings programme developed in conjunction with Time Out magazine. The programme was produced by Tom Gutteridge and Mentorn Films. Its presenters includes Richard Jobson, Neil Mullarkey, Mark Webster and Kathy Lette.
