20. The Spice Girls
For one innocent moment in the 90s, Scary, Sporty, Baby, Ginger & Posh became the archetypes of a new kind of girl power, combining the cartoonish sexuality of teen pop culture with a post-feminist ladette sense of the supremacy of sisterhood. Then we got to know them better, and the bubble burst.
19. Chrissie Hynde
The ultimate rock chick, Chrissie Hynde took all the leather-jacket, snake-hip, guitar-slinging iconography of macho rebel rock posturing and gender-reversed it with fierce intelligence, swaggering commitment and honey tones. She has led her Pretenders with all the complicated sensuality of the illegitimate love child of Mick and Keith.
18. Joni Mitchell
The greatest female singer-songwriter of all time, a woman who can sit at the high table with Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen and Paul Simon. The dense complexity of her poetic lyrics and jazz infused musicality sometimes keeps popular acclaim at bay, but her influence resonates in the thorny brilliance of today’s finest female writers, PJ Harvey and Laura Marling.
17. Dolly Parton
Country music’s big bouffant beauty queen, whose butterfly vocals flutter through songs combining aching femininity with underlying fierceness of spirit, like a steel trap Barbie.
16. Grace Jones
Ebony supermodel disco diva, Grace Jones has been the fiercest Amazonian warrior in pop, blurring the lines between performance art, fashion muse and pop star.
15. Whitney Houston
Tragic Whitney concluded her reverse showbiz fairytale with a desperate final act. Our feelings for her have been complicated by the public squandering of her talent, the terrible tension between girl-next-door charm and drug fuelled lifestyle. But as a gospel soul singing superstar with a dazzling smile and pyrotechnical voice, in her pomp she was a perfect pop princess.
14. Siouxsie Sioux
Goth mistress and original leatherette punk iconoclast, Siouxsie’s fierce, keening vocal, stern painted visage and Boadicean air of uncompromising attack with the Banshees and the Creatures brought into focus a new conception of women in rock: every bit as mysterious and unyielding as the most difficult male of the rock species.
13. Dusty Springfield
Britain’s white soul queen, a peroxide blonde in an evening gown, velvet voice haunted by the torments of a bisexual love life complicated by Catholic guilt. Dusty set standards for understated emotional interpretation of classic love songs that few have ever matched.
12. Beyonce
The sassiest of the new wave of urban pop divas, Beyonce conveys a kind of uber-femininity: sexy, smart, tough, fearless and utterly comfortable in her skin. Mixing Motown soul inflections with gospel powered melismas, hip hop attitude with the hard-grafting instincts of a showbiz trouper, she has a range of skills that leave most pop performers in the shade. Her romantic union with rap godfather Jay Z confirms Beyonce’s regal status in 21st the century pop court.
11. Janis Joplin
Rock’s first female inductee of the 27 Club, brought down in an awful wave of drug and drink related deaths that shattered the naïvely innocent spirit of 60s pop culture, claiming Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Janis. Her elemental blues and soul spirit is a beacon of how women can hold their own in the predominantly macho (and frequently sexist) musical environment of guitar rock.
10. Patti Smith
The white witch of New York, punk poetess Patti Smith has pushed rock towards a revelatory transcendence rarely matched. Although her starting point is something as formal as the written word, her babbling, impassioned, hallucinatory, volatile, semi-improvised three chord rock and roll crashes barriers of perception, and makes listeners feel like anything is possible.
9. Lady Gaga
It is still early days for Stephanie Germanotta, but with the myth-making , self-marketing nous of Madonna, the musical chops of Elton John and the counter-culture boldness of David Bowie, Lady Gaga is on the way to becoming an ultimate pop icon, a 21st century Ms Elvis.
8. Adele
Gaga’s only real rival for total 21st century global pop domination is Britain’s Adele Adkins, our back to basics soul chanteuse, who exposes the shallowness of multi-media digital pop with the pure magic of a big voice and perfectly crafted, highly emotional songs.
7. Amy Winehouse
If Amy Winehouse has the edge over Adele, it is through the terrible myth stirred up by her self-immolation. More than any other contemporary star, the stick thin, tattoo and beehive retro soul singer-songwriter put women with authentic talent right at the centre of modern pop culture. She sang as if it was a matter of life and death. Tragically, it turned out it was.
6. Aretha Franklin
The First Lady of Soul and arguably the greatest singer of the pop era, Aretha has power, range and technique allied with perfect instincts. Not a woman to overdo things, every Aretha vocal sounds just right, whether she’s ripping it up like a Civil Rights warrior on Respect or laying out emotional home truths on Natural Woman. R.E.S.P.E.C.T. is how you spell it.
5. The ABBA girls
Agnetha and Anna-Frid were the ice-cool front guard of pop’s most perfect hit machine. No matter how ridiculous the costumes, and whatever the emotional politics behind the scenes, the ABBA girls stood shoulder to shoulder and voice to voice in a perfect union of deadpan musical sisterhood that has made them the defining female pop stars for generation after generation.
4. Debbie Harry
Rock’s greatest pin-up, the divine Ms Harry combined innate sexiness with punk attitude, making her a star for all genders, as much a feminist role model as pop’s ultimate sex object. Her low, liquid vocal in Blondie’s sleek, new wave setting framed a whole new space for girls in the boys musical zone.
3. Kate Bush
Her florid, elaborate, mysterious recordings may be the most utterly female pop music ever made, elaborate bulletins from across the gender divide. A true one- off, Kate Bush opens windows to her inner world, dropping a needle in the groove of her psyche. This is the musical motherload.
2. Tina Turner
Like a force of nature, Tina Turner overwhelms and overcomes, turning out raw, powerhouse vocals that knock down all obstacles and stand up for that kind of essential spirit that made rock and soul the prime music of our times. She has a kind of primal sexual essence and indomitable female spirit that helped her thrive for decades as a top line female star in a man’s world. From Beyonce to Rihanna, Amy to Florence, today’s hard ass female elite owe Tina more than they probably know.
1. Madonna
Love her or loathe her, it would be hard to deny Madonna’s pole position as the greatest female pop star of our times. Her world-beating, shape-shifting, trend-setting and ground breaking pop music has covered the gamut of female archetypes: virgin, *****, wife, mother, witch, diva, saint, sinner and, in her most recent video incarnation, a cheerleader, and put it all to dance beats and catchy hooks. She might not be the greatest singer, she may not be the finest songwriter, she may favour surface over depth and make music that barely ripples the soul, but
Madonna’s pop genius has carried her on a three decade winning streak that no other star, male or female, can match.
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