The Ballad of Hillary Clinton?

June 10, 2014 5:12 AM

I just discovered the awesomeness that is Amelia Earhart's Last Flight [SLYT]. I'm looking for other songs about women who made an impact, historical or modern - if you know of a tune about Catherine the Great, Margaret Meade, Freya Stark, etc please share!
posted by bunderful to Media & Arts (10 answers total)

The Indigo Girls have Virginia Woolf.
posted by lollusc at 5:31 AM on June 10, 2014

Here's two very different tunes about Ada Lovelace
Philadelphia Freedom is about Bille Jean King.
And then there's Maude.
posted by The 10th Regiment of Foot at 5:40 AM on June 10, 2014

I love this one: I Won't Be Your Yoko Ono
Seneca Falls (camp-song style)
posted by lunasol at 6:36 AM on June 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

Joni Mitchell, of course, has the stunning "Amelia" which uses Earhart as a metaphor for the risks of spending your life unrooted and ungrounded.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 6:46 AM on June 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

Hmm. Maybe Leonard Cohen - Joan of Arc?

By the way, "Amelia Earhart's Last Flight ... women who made an impact"? Be careful how you phrase things.
posted by pracowity at 7:01 AM on June 10, 2014 [3 favorites]

Woody Guthrie's song about Miss Pavlichenko
posted by steinwald at 9:20 AM on June 10, 2014

If you're interested in kitschy disco songs: Anne-Karine Strøm, Mata Hari, the Norwegian entry to the Eurovision Song Contest 1976.
posted by iviken at 9:28 AM on June 10, 2014

Heather Dale, "Joan" (of Arc).
posted by Harvey Kilobit at 10:25 AM on June 10, 2014

Nanci Griffith has a song called Pearl's Eye View (The Life of Dickey Chapelle. Chapelle was a photojournalist who worked as a war correspondent during WWII & Vietnam.
posted by diamondsky at 11:16 AM on June 10, 2014

Valerie Plame by the Decemberists.
posted by BusyBusyBusy at 3:17 AM on June 11, 2014