Ani Difranco
Ani DiFranco is a quote machine. Like something out of a Philip K. Dick
sci-fi novel, she stands erect (I imagine) at a rehearsal in Binghamton,
N.Y., phone held tight to her ear beneath the wild hair, her big-booted
feet planted firmly on the building floor (for grounding purposes), waiting
for me to push buttons so she can spew out answers. The only evidence
that the petite DiFranco is a creation of flesh-and-blood is the "ya
knows," "umms" and warm, hoarse laughs that punctuate her
speech- and, of course, her own admissions. "I've kind of invented
this job for myself," says the folkie icon, who turns 30 this month,
"that has to do with using myself and my experience and my joys and
my sorrows as metaphors, as material, you know, for ideas, hopefully some
of which end up being bigger than myself.
One could argue that DiFranco is definately part of something larger than herself. Releasing her first album in 1989, on her own label Righteous Babe, she was a major component of the female singer-songwriter explosion that took place in the early 90s. Alongside Liz Phair, PJ Harvey, and, later, Alanis Morissette and her radio-ready ilk, DiFranco was a rabble-rousing, fiercely independent piece of a confessional pie that won the hearts of music fans of all stripes, serving as a significant portion of the decade's self-conscious, alternative rock feast. The decidedly feminine art of unbosoming found its way into the literary world, eventually, with books like Bridget Jones's Diary and, lately, with the popularity of more male-centric works by Dave Eggers and Martin Amis.
But DiFranco is unaware of these literary developments; she traffics almost exclusively in the things she knows- herself, her politics and the art of the independent. "Are you weary as water," she sings on "Swing," the latest single from 1999's To the Teeth, "in a faucet left dripping/ with an incessant sadness/ like a sad record skipping/ and an ugly and ornery/ and shadowy dread/ lurking like a troll under the bridge/ between your heart and your head." Such sentiments point to a less hopeful person than the Ani DiFranco on her 10 prior studio releases (one a year, all on Righteous Babe). Whereas a song like the title track to her breakthrough album, 1998's Little Plastic Castle, pokes quite a bit of fun at the artist's very public image, the songs on To the Teeth reflect a woman who's grown a little tired of the world's opinions, both of her and of itself.
Yeah, I am probably a more weary person than I was a few years ago," she admits. "I've been a little busy, and there's a lot going on in my life...a song like 'Little Plastic Castle' is also a somewhat displeased, unimpressed and distraught song, but it has that kind of upbeat, ska feel so it may fool you into thinking it's a more optimistic song."
Still, lines like "I wish they could see us now/ in leather bras and rubber shorts/ like some ridiculous team uniform for some ridiculous new sport/ quick someone call the girl police/ and file a report" belie a certain humor on DiFranco's part, unlike the title track from To the Teeth, a scathing commentary on gun violence in the United States. Though that song takes no prisoners, ending with an entreaty to "open fire" on big business and government, DiFranco insists it's not meant strictly in the negative, but rather in a metaphorical, free-speech sense. "Even a song like that kind of culminates in the end with a proposal," she says. "It may be a solution or just my own solution in my own head. I think that most of my songs, just even for my own sanity, I think I try and find my way out of every hole by the time the song is over. But it's not always the case. Sometimes the hole is just too deep, and the most honest thing to say is 'I'm down here.'"
From "down here," DiFranco and Righteous Babe Records have managed to give voice to some interesting projects. Steadfastly refusing to become a part of the major label system, RBR has only recently begun to put out records by folks other than DiFranco herself, including Arto Lindsay, Kurt Swinghammer, a star-studded tribute to Woody Guthrie (featuring, among others, the Indigo Girls and Tim Robbins) and a pair of collaborations between DiFranco and her 65-year-old kindred spirit, Utah Phillips.
RBR's most recent release is DiFranco's Swing Set EP, featuring a radio remix of "Swing" (sans Corey Parker's rap, but with Maceo Parker's sax work intact), the album version of the same song, a "shootout remix" of "To the Teeth," a live version of Guthrie's "Do Re Me," a heartbusting, acoustic cover of Phil Ochs' "When I'm Gone" (to be included on the soundtrack to the forthcoming Abbie Hoffman biopic, Steal This Movie) and a full-band interpretation of Bob Dylan's "Hurricane." That last one was left out of last year's Denzel Washington flick of the same name, spawning an Internet feeding frenzy by rabid DiFranco fans, a trend which the artist finds offensive. "It's just so wrong on so many levels," she says, speaking of Napster, specifically. And here, I think, I'm gonna just let the quote machine go.
It's just really funny to me, the people that are buying into the whole Napster-as-a-way-of-sticking-it-to-the-major-labels (concept) because obviously, the presupposition in that perspective is that the only music that exists is major label music. ...Those piddling sales are so important to independent musicians and labels, little folk labels, little blues labels and world music, all of that obscure shit, where every dollar does count. And you know, the other thing, being an artist, it's intensely violating."
She pauses here, her voice lowering and growing a bit hoarse. "Because you know on the computer now is available live recordings, tapes that I made when I was 18, that I made 60 of that I have not chosen to release worldwide myself. I don't want to, but now I don't- it's like, I've structured my whole life just to have some sort of choice, some sort of say over my music, over my career, and what happens to it. And now all of that power, all of that choice is taken away from me. But it's not by a major label; it's by a computer company. And the thing is, you know, it's not anarchy. It's a paradigm shift."
One could argue that DiFranco is definately part of something larger than herself. Releasing her first album in 1989, on her own label Righteous Babe, she was a major component of the female singer-songwriter explosion that took place in the early 90s. Alongside Liz Phair, PJ Harvey, and, later, Alanis Morissette and her radio-ready ilk, DiFranco was a rabble-rousing, fiercely independent piece of a confessional pie that won the hearts of music fans of all stripes, serving as a significant portion of the decade's self-conscious, alternative rock feast. The decidedly feminine art of unbosoming found its way into the literary world, eventually, with books like Bridget Jones's Diary and, lately, with the popularity of more male-centric works by Dave Eggers and Martin Amis.
But DiFranco is unaware of these literary developments; she traffics almost exclusively in the things she knows- herself, her politics and the art of the independent. "Are you weary as water," she sings on "Swing," the latest single from 1999's To the Teeth, "in a faucet left dripping/ with an incessant sadness/ like a sad record skipping/ and an ugly and ornery/ and shadowy dread/ lurking like a troll under the bridge/ between your heart and your head." Such sentiments point to a less hopeful person than the Ani DiFranco on her 10 prior studio releases (one a year, all on Righteous Babe). Whereas a song like the title track to her breakthrough album, 1998's Little Plastic Castle, pokes quite a bit of fun at the artist's very public image, the songs on To the Teeth reflect a woman who's grown a little tired of the world's opinions, both of her and of itself.
Yeah, I am probably a more weary person than I was a few years ago," she admits. "I've been a little busy, and there's a lot going on in my life...a song like 'Little Plastic Castle' is also a somewhat displeased, unimpressed and distraught song, but it has that kind of upbeat, ska feel so it may fool you into thinking it's a more optimistic song."
Still, lines like "I wish they could see us now/ in leather bras and rubber shorts/ like some ridiculous team uniform for some ridiculous new sport/ quick someone call the girl police/ and file a report" belie a certain humor on DiFranco's part, unlike the title track from To the Teeth, a scathing commentary on gun violence in the United States. Though that song takes no prisoners, ending with an entreaty to "open fire" on big business and government, DiFranco insists it's not meant strictly in the negative, but rather in a metaphorical, free-speech sense. "Even a song like that kind of culminates in the end with a proposal," she says. "It may be a solution or just my own solution in my own head. I think that most of my songs, just even for my own sanity, I think I try and find my way out of every hole by the time the song is over. But it's not always the case. Sometimes the hole is just too deep, and the most honest thing to say is 'I'm down here.'"
From "down here," DiFranco and Righteous Babe Records have managed to give voice to some interesting projects. Steadfastly refusing to become a part of the major label system, RBR has only recently begun to put out records by folks other than DiFranco herself, including Arto Lindsay, Kurt Swinghammer, a star-studded tribute to Woody Guthrie (featuring, among others, the Indigo Girls and Tim Robbins) and a pair of collaborations between DiFranco and her 65-year-old kindred spirit, Utah Phillips.
RBR's most recent release is DiFranco's Swing Set EP, featuring a radio remix of "Swing" (sans Corey Parker's rap, but with Maceo Parker's sax work intact), the album version of the same song, a "shootout remix" of "To the Teeth," a live version of Guthrie's "Do Re Me," a heartbusting, acoustic cover of Phil Ochs' "When I'm Gone" (to be included on the soundtrack to the forthcoming Abbie Hoffman biopic, Steal This Movie) and a full-band interpretation of Bob Dylan's "Hurricane." That last one was left out of last year's Denzel Washington flick of the same name, spawning an Internet feeding frenzy by rabid DiFranco fans, a trend which the artist finds offensive. "It's just so wrong on so many levels," she says, speaking of Napster, specifically. And here, I think, I'm gonna just let the quote machine go.
It's just really funny to me, the people that are buying into the whole Napster-as-a-way-of-sticking-it-to-the-major-labels (concept) because obviously, the presupposition in that perspective is that the only music that exists is major label music. ...Those piddling sales are so important to independent musicians and labels, little folk labels, little blues labels and world music, all of that obscure shit, where every dollar does count. And you know, the other thing, being an artist, it's intensely violating."
She pauses here, her voice lowering and growing a bit hoarse. "Because you know on the computer now is available live recordings, tapes that I made when I was 18, that I made 60 of that I have not chosen to release worldwide myself. I don't want to, but now I don't- it's like, I've structured my whole life just to have some sort of choice, some sort of say over my music, over my career, and what happens to it. And now all of that power, all of that choice is taken away from me. But it's not by a major label; it's by a computer company. And the thing is, you know, it's not anarchy. It's a paradigm shift."
