But it’s worth noting that her first song to get notice came through another singer’s cover, “Who Knows Where the Time Goes” by Judy Collins. But before pegging her for strictly topical songs, we’d direct you to “Consummation,” from the Silk & Soul album, a love song of mystical power.īoth with Fairport Convention and as a solo artist, Sandy Denny was such a fine vocalist that her songwriting tends to get overlooked. “Mississippi Goddam” and “To Be Young, Gifted And Black” remain remarkably strong wake-up calls, and her rewrite of “Revolution” upped the ante on The Beatles’ original version. As it was, she wrote only when there was something she needed to say, and she said it forcefully and artfully. If Nina Simone had been a more prolific writer, she might be remembered as one of the all-time best female songwriters of all time. Then there’s her wonderfully twisted sense of humor: “Silver Spoon,” from 1970’s Sunfighter, has to be the loveliest song ever written about cannibalism, a feat only pulled off by one of the best female songwriters of her generation. At her best (“Lather,” “Eskimo Blue Day”) she worked in a haunting cabaret vein that was unique for its time.
While her bandmates were documenting the psychedelic experience, her songs were mind-expanding in their own right, and she snuck the most lysergic of them, “White Rabbit,” onto AM radio for all the impressionable kids to hear. Along with writing albums like her breakthrough Speak Now and her crossover album Red, she’s also penned hits for other artists, including Little Big Town’s “Better Man,” “You’ll Always Find Your Way Back Home’ by Miley Cyrus, and “This Is What You Came For” by Calvin Harris.ĭuring her tenure with Jefferson Airplane, Grace Slick was a truly psychedelic songwriter. While most pop songs are known for their universality, Swift very much follows in the confessional singer-songwriter tradition of artists like James Taylorand Carole King, making each song distinctly her own. At the age of 16, she released her self-titled debutwith songwriting credits on every track and continued to hone her skills over the next decade. It’s easy to forget Taylor Swift’s songwriting pedigree since it seems like she’s always been the-larger-than-life pop star she’s known as today, but Swift is steeped in the Nashville songwriter tradition.
Apparently, Sill wasn’t embraced by the industry because she was difficult to get along with, to which we all join hands and say, “Who cares?” 20: Taylor Swift All three of her albums have songs like that, among them “Lady-O,” a gorgeous Turtles single that featured only Sill’s tune and one acoustic guitar.
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In Judee Sill’s case, it wasn’t a TV commercial that did it it was the viral video (originally a BBC broadcast) of her at the piano singing “The Kiss,” a piece of otherworldly beauty. And for traditional tastes, there’s a killer power-pop song, the Marshall Crenshaw collaboration “All I Ever Wanted.”Ĭall her the female equivalent of Nick Drake: a late 60s/early 70s artist who got discovered long after the fact. Her masterpiece, Electric Landlady, includes touches of hip-hop, Celtic, and Tropicália. MacColl got far more adventurous afterward, in a career that was sadly cut off with her accidental death in 2000. Her first success, “They Don’t Know” (a UK hit for Tracey Ullman), was one of the better girl-grouphomages of its time and her first album, Desperate Character, ranks as one of the great lost Rockpile-style albums. Like many progressive songwriters, Kirsty MacColl started out doing retro-styled pop. We’re not claiming that it’s comprehensive, but this list of the best female songwriters spans many genres and stretches back a good 100 years. Women have been at the songwriting frontlines for decades – longer, if you count the many anonymous ballads clearly written from a female perspective, starting with “House Of The Rising Sun.” So, in putting together a list of the best female songwriters of all time, we’re effectively choosing between half of the great songwriters who have ever been.
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