About A Girl
About A Girl is a scripted narrative anthology series about women whose stories have long been eclipsed by the legends of their famous partners. Bowie, Elvis, 2Pac, Prince, Miles, Biggie. Each of these icons created some of the most celebrated and enduring music of the modern age. But there's more to their stories than you know. About A Girl brings focus to the many women without whom the landscape of popular music might be very different.
Episodes
February 23, 2024 • 2 mins
Welcome to DISGRACELAND in 2024. Jake Brennan will continue to bring you the most insane stories about rock stars getting away with murder and behaving very badly ... and will also tell other stories about icons from beyond the world of music who possess dangerously compelling rock 'n roll hearts. Like Anthony Bourdain. Andy Warhol. Hunter S. Thompson. Kobe Bryant. Garth Brooks. Public Enemy. Van Halen. And so many more. Get the sc...
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January 12, 2024 • 40 mins
Marjorie was the right hand of dance icon Martha Graham when she met Woody Guthrie. She took loving care of both as they each moved toward self-destruction, and especially of Woody, even after their divorce, while he succumbed to Huntington’s Disease.
Sources:
Woody Guthrie: A Life by Joe Klein
MarjorieGuthrie.com
https://www.nytimes.com/1983/03/14/obituaries/marjorie-guthrie-singer-s-widow-65.html
The Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of ...
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December 29, 2023 • 33 mins
The gospel-fed daughter of one of Ray Charles’s Raelettes had no idea who this Bob Dylan character was when she was called to audition for his band. Within a few years, she would be his wife and mother to his daughter—both of them hidden from the public, as Dylan converted to Christianity and tried to find his identity as a man and as an artist.
Sources:
A Look Back At Bob Dylan's First Album
Carolyn Dennis: The Secret Wife of Bob ...
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December 22, 2023 • 43 mins
The mysterious woman on the cover of the breakthrough album ‘The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan’ was a major influence on the legendary musician’s development, just as he was becoming “Bob Dylan.” He assimilated her art, influences, and politics into his persona and his songs, so many of which were written about or for her. They were intensely in love at a very young age in a time of social upheaval, all in the cauldron of Greenwich Villag...
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December 15, 2023 • 38 mins
The daughter of a blues pioneer falls in love with two brilliant musicians. Sly Stone takes her out of her quiet life, but almost drags her into the dark world of his own demons. Then she meets Carlos Santana, a long partnership built on a mutual search for transcendence.
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December 8, 2023 • 43 mins
Linda Keith was so determined to make Jimi Hendrix a star that she dumped Keith Richards. She got Hendrix a manager and a record deal, but then felt compelled to let him go, even if he was never able to really let go of her.
Sources:
'How I helped to make Jimi Hendrix a rock'n'roll star'
Jimi Hendrix: Electric Gypsy by Harry Shapiro
For behind the scenes info and news on this episode, follow:
Instagram:@DoubleElvis @Aboutagirlpod @...
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December 1, 2023 • 43 mins
One of the most significant songwriters since the late 1950s, Jackie DeShannon was responsible for writing dozens of hit songs, but struggled to make her own mark as a performer. Her early singles attracted the attention of the Beatles, who brought her on their first North American tour, but it would be a few years before she broke through with a pair of epic songs and a brilliant album. Meanwhile she crossed paths with significant...
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November 17, 2023 • 37 mins
A beautiful English girl drifts into pop stardom and the inner circle of the Rolling Stones in 1960s London. As the girlfriend of Stones frontman Mick Jagger, the glare of public attention and personal misadventures take their toll on her mental health. She withdraws from her life, descending into addiction and hitting bottom before returning with a new voice (figuratively and literally) and an artistic triumph.
Sources for this ep...
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November 10, 2023 • 41 mins
One of the ‘IT’ girls of Swinging London reconnects with her high school classmate, a talented drummer, striving to succeed. But his all-consuming obsession with his band and inability to communicate with Jenny makes for a difficult and unhealthy relationship. Once Fleetwood Mac finally hits big and Mick slides into fame and drugs, Jenny has to confront her own patterns of codependency.
Sources:
Jennifer Jupiter: A Journey Beyond t...
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November 3, 2023 • 38 mins
Linda Eastman was born a free spirit, but she was also the daughter of a strict and demanding father, a poor Jewish boy who became a wealthy lawyer and rebranded himself as a WASP. Linda fought her own nature to try and please him, and then her first husband, before finally breaking free to find success as a freelance photographer in Manhattan. Shooting and hobnobbing with ‘60s pop stars led her to Swinging London.
Sources for this...
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October 27, 2023 • 43 mins
Pattie Boyd is one of the best known rock star partners, having married both Beatle George Harrison and then Harrison’s close friend Eric Clapton. She famously inspired the Beatles’ “Something” and Clapton’s “Layla.”. But less publicized is the infidelity and turmoil that infected both marriages. Find out how she responded and finally emerged from it all.
Sources:
Wonderful Tonight by Pattie Boyd
George Harrison: Behind the Locked...
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October 20, 2023 • 2 mins
Host Nikki Lynette returns with a new season of About A Girl, a show about women in music history. Stay tuned for a new episode on October 27, wherever you get your podcasts.
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September 26, 2023 • 43 mins
Before there was Queen Latifah the actress, there was Queen Latifah the hip-hop star. She ascended to royal status in rap at a time when the genre revolved around putting women down – and keeping them down. Thanks to her reign, a generation of hip-hop heads learned that women could rule just as well as any man. But Queen Latifah’s legacy as one of the loudest, proudest voices in the game often gets buried by her pile of film awards...
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September 21, 2023 • 34 mins
Eudoxie thought she was escaping torment and horror when she emigrated from Gabon to the United States as a young girl. But even through her marriage to a huge star, even with her beautiful children, all of her joy, the dark shadow of her childhood continued to loom.
Mother’s Day w/Angela Simmons, Nina Westbrook, and Eudoxie Bridges
Eudoxie Bridges speaks out to help abuse victims at event Saturday
Atlanta Plugged In interview
Eu...
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September 19, 2023 • 48 mins
Few musicians are as inescapable as the Beyoncé. But even if you’ve kept up with her immeasurable press coverage and airplay over the decades, this story reveals the things you don’t know about Beyoncé Giselle Knowles. As it turns out, men aren’t the only thing that can overshadow a women’s story and success; sometimes, their own larger-than-life fame is just as much to blame.
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September 12, 2023 • 36 mins
Kelis’s musical light was undeniable from the start, but it was still a struggle to shine as brightly as knew she could. She did get there, but little did she know that the same people she thought were on her side were really just out for themselves. Between that and a messy first marriage she tried to keep private, it would only take one more straw to break her silence.
Nas: 5 Things You (Probably) Didn't Know About God's Son
Un...
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September 7, 2023 • 38 mins
Tashera loved Earl Simmons from the moment she first saw him when they were kids. They reconnected as adults, but Earl’s transformation into DMX and, worse, his alter ego ‘X,’ pulled her back into the cycle of emotional abuse and neglect she’d endured while growing up.
Sources:
Tashera’s speech at DMX’s memorial
People Magazine Podcast interview
You Think You Know But You Have No Idea by Tashera Simmons
See omnystudio.com/listener ...
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August 31, 2023 • 35 mins
Shante Broadus steered her husband Snoop Dogg from hapless criminal to cultural icon long before she established herself as his official manager. The woman Snoop referred to as Boss Lady almost from day one truly ended up running the empire.
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August 22, 2023 • 31 mins
Los Angeles, the mid 1990s. Tupac Shakur is one of the biggest emcees in the world, a lyric poet of a rapper. Kidada Jones is the daughter of music legend Quincy Jones. With her mother acting again, her younger sister Rashida headed to Harvard, and her father as active as ever, twenty-one year old Kidada was left to search for her place in the world. She would find it in Tupac, ironically after he’d blasted her interracial family i...
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August 16, 2023 • 35 mins
Faith Evans met and married Christopher Wallace in 1994. Within a year, they both became stars. The new marriage suffered under their grueling work schedules, but their connection remained strong, despite external drama and pressure. Just as Biggie was looking forward to the next stage of his life, though, it all caught up with them.
Sources for this episode can be found on our website.
For more info on About a Girl and other great...
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