In a recent chat with ABC News, Nancy and Ann Wilson from Heart opened up about their struggles against sexism in the ’70s and ’80s. While discussing how music has changed over the last fifty years, Ann said it’s changed them so much that they hardly recognize themselves now:
“Well, the music industry has changed as to be unrecognizable to what it was then. Music is now pigeonholed into a million little places where you can just check out only the kind of music you wanna hear. Whereas back in those other days, there was a radio station that played it all.”
Nancy added:
“Terrestrial radio was really a connector, a connecting point for everybody, unanimously to kind of hear the same stuff and go to the same shows and hear about stuff on the radio. And now it’s all on your phone and stuff.”
Sexism Inspired A Hit Song
In a chat with Billboard, Katherine Yeske Taylor shared snippets of interviews from her book ‘She’s A Badass,’ including a story featuring Ann Wilson. Together, the two talked about dealing with sexism in the music industry. Ann then shared a memory about someone once suggesting she and Nancy were more than ‘just siblings’:
“A guy who came up to me in the dressing room after our set said to me, ‘Hey, how’s your lover doing?’ I said, ‘He’s fine; he’s right over there.’ And then the guy went, ‘No, no, no—I meant you and your sister. You and your sister are lovers, right?’ I had this strange bunch of emotions that hit me right after he said that. At first it was like, ‘Wow, huh.’ And then it was like, ‘God damn it, this is a sleazy business after all. What was I thinking?’”
This irritated Ann and her sister, and fueled them to write ‘Barracuda.’
You can watch the recent interview below.