“As Canada’s first female major market radio rock DJ, I may have busted through that glass ceiling, but I didn’t really feel part of a community—until Connie’s Rubymusic show debuted on CFRO. With this timely book, Connie frames music by women through the past century through a feminist lens, rekindles so many memories, and delivers just the book I didn’t know I needed to put it all in perspective.”
—Ellie O'Day, Vancouver arts administrator, broadcaster and writer (retired)
“I was too young for the ‘Feminist Soundtrack.’ When I came into the women’s movement in 1981, ‘women’s music’ was already old hat. I was a fan of punk rock, not Meg Christian and Holly Near. But I was lucky. I worked at a feminist newspaper, Kinesis, and our best move was hiring Connie Kuhns to write a column about women in music called ‘Rubymusic.’ Connie showed me you can have a soundtrack for feminism that claims Joni Mitchell, Yoko Ono, Aretha Franklin and The Slits. I listened to the records and thanked my lucky stars.
In this book, Connie has created the ultimate feminist musical comprehensive reference. Tag along with her as she visits the unstoppable forces of feminist music, delighting in interviews with the likes of k.d. lang, Ellen McIlwaine, and Elizabeth Fischer. I didn’t get to all the concerts, but Connie did, and this is a gift.”
—Emma Kivisild, aka Lizard Jones, writer, activist, former editor of Kinesis
“Reading Rubymusic is like walking downtown, arm-in-arm with a dear friend as she gestures toward the city around you both, pointing out buildings whose facades have changed, spaces where structures may no longer even stand but which still somehow form part of the landscape for having once been there. Kuhns guides us through this musical city, connecting us to it, with the pleasure and assuredness of the local she is. This is a book that asks you to linger.”
—AnnMarie MacKinnon, writer, publisher, former editor-in-chief of Geist
There is living history that must be analysed and documented. And there are issues that are as urgent today as they were in the beginning. –Connie Kuhns
“Connie Kuhns’ Rubymusic is an act of loving social labour and a brilliant love letter to the ‘beginnings’ of Women’s music. From the epicenter of it all, Connie meticulously researched and created an encyclopedic archive that is gritty, insightful, moving, complex, and deeply rewarding. This is a story of how women, on the heels of feminism (with its limitations and its idealisms), dreamed and created new possibilities for women’s voices, gave us some great and glorious music, and built a movement that has and continues to transform our communities and music culture. Connie Kuhn’s writing reaches into the past and swirls us into memorable and surprising details, tussles, turns and intriguing accounts of this unfolding revolution of women’s voices in music, gloriously illuminating the ever-present spiritual, societal, and social legacy of this movement.”
—Lillian Allen, two-time JUNO Award winner, dub poet and university professor
