Courtney Love is the white Azealia Banks – she always has a lot of derogatory sh-t to say about other women, always has tons of “advice” for more-successful women, but ultimately is nothing more than yet another critic who should examine their own sexism and prejudices. Courtney moved to London in 2019 and she’s currently promoting a new eight-part series for BBC Radio 6. The series is called Courtney Love’s Women, where she explores the women in music she actually likes or respects. She won’t include Taylor Swift, Beyonce or Lana del Rey by the sound of it. Love chatted with the Standard and the Swifties have already turned their wrath on her. Some highlights:
She wants to be known as a bitch: ‘People used to say that I was so difficult. They said I was disagreeable. Yes, I am completely disagreeable and I’m never going to apologise for that. I always wanted to be known as a bitch. Being liked was never my thing. Kurt wanted to be liked but not me. He was able to hide behind me, but then I got hated. Then Kurt died, and the hatred towards me reached a completely new level. I did not plan for that. I’m all for taking my wiener out on stage, like Jim Morrison did. If I had a wiener and I was drunk enough, I would have totally taken it out, just like Jim. I had a bitch capacity and I was cool with not being liked. I saw Bob Dylan in Don’t Look Back and he didn’t want to be liked and I thought, yeah, I want to be like that.’
Women are becoming cliched in music: ‘It’s great that there are so many successful women in the music industry, but lots of them are becoming a cliché. Now, every successful woman is cloned, so there is just too much music. They’re all the same. If you play something on Spotify, you get bombarded with a lot of stuff that’s exactly the same. I mean, I like the idea of Beyoncé doing a country record because it’s about Black women going into spaces where previously only white women have been allowed, not that I like it much. As a concept, I love it. I just don’t like her music.’
On Jann Wenner & the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame: ‘Five old white guys, right, who have apparently never heard of Kate Bush. I mean, really? Jann Wenner should be put out to pasture. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is a joke. You know, some guy takes a girl out and tries to kiss her and she doesn’t feel like it, and he gets his whole career ruined. But Jann Wenner is allowed to say that Black people and women weren’t intellectual enough to be included in his book of rock ’n’ roll masters? Eat me, you f***!’
The female artists she actually likes: She sings the praises of Patti Smith (whom she listened to in juvenile hall at the age of 11), Nina Simone, PJ Harvey (‘The first four albums, then I’m done’), Julie London and Joni Mitchell (‘The early albums, not the experimental s***’). She likes Deborah Harry, having listened to her when she was in a foster home. She had to quote scripture in order to get breakfast and she played Blondie’s ‘Call Me’ instead. ‘I wasn’t a superfan, but she was very beautiful.’
Taylor & Lana: Other women don’t come across so well, and she positively hates the idea of Taylor Swift. ‘Taylor is not important. She might be a safe space for girls, and she’s probably the Madonna of now, but she’s not interesting as an artist.’ And she’s even tiring a little of Lana Del Rey: ‘I haven’t liked Lana since she covered a John Denver song, and I think she should really take seven years off. Up until ‘Take Me Home Country Roads’ I thought she was great. When I was recording my new album, I had to stop listening to her as she was influencing me too much.’
On Madonna: ‘I don’t like her and she doesn’t like me. I loved Desperately Seeking Susan, but for the city of New York as much as her.’
Here’s the thing – if I’m being generous, I would say that Love is an adequate music historian and she can talk about the brilliant female artists who created music pre-2000, let’s say. But what’s coming across here is not that Love is some credible truth-teller of modern music, it’s that she’s old and out of touch. People are like, well Courtney Love’s brand is straight-forward, she even says that she’s fine with being mean/bitchy. While that’s part of it, I think the bigger thing is that she doesn’t “get” it. She doesn’t “get” Beyonce, she doesn’t “get” Lana, she doesn’t “get” Taylor Swift. She’s trying to be an edgelord but she’s lost her edge.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.