Women Guitarists

"When the rain came down, I was older than the earth. I could die right now, and plan another birth Anytime I choose. I am in peace, in love, in harmony, when the rain comes"

"The first time my brothers saw me, when I was a day or two old and still in the hospital, my brother Mark could not pronounce the name "Kimberley," and I was an especially happy baby, so he decided it would be easier to call me "Happy." From that moment on, my family members never used the name Kimberley. I was forced, however, to use my given name while attending school. As soon as I turned sixteen, my name was legally changed to Happy Tyler Rhodes. As far as I'm concerned, it's the ony name I've ever had. When people ask me if it's my real name, I always say "yes.""

"I'm thrilled that people can get something out of my music. I have to attribute that to integrity and honesty. I've found that people aren't really as different as they sometimes seem. We all have joy and tragedy in our lives. So it only follows that if I write something from my heart and stay true to myself, others will easily identify."

"I wrote and recorded music for many years, thinking I was only pleasing myself. The fact that so many people have appreciated the music, makes my life incredibly rewarding and full."

"There's not much to hide behind We can see for a mile Without our eyes. I can see through a smile To any lie."

"Do I have to dig? Do I have to prod? Reach into your chest And pull your feelings out? Are you dancing dead? Or maybe walking toast? If you feel anything Be brave Come forth Let it show. Tell me what d'you think of life? Tell me do you think at all?"

"He is broken, far from free Words were spoken, 'tween him and me: "I had friends, yes, I was admired I'm so old now, feel so tired." Well he walks to the gate and he looks behind at life in rewind And wishes he had known these things while still alive."

"My time's too short to waste on Things you say without your brain. Will you paint works of art When you speak? When you open your mouth Will I weep?"

"I want to go wherever you go because all the colors are brighter there and there is more magic in the air wherever you go, here and hereafter."

"Can't stop flinching, everything is lethal Looking for a hero to get me outta this Can't stop flinching, tell me that you're ok Looking for approval and one last kiss."

"She walked down the aisle with all eyes on her and she glowed Someone chose her above all other women they had known I can only wonder what it must be like to be so perfect in a lover's eyes, the only one they see Well, it’s never been me, the chosen one It’s never been me If ever I see a chosen one I feel ugly"

"That I am one and many is at the heart of my dis-ease Yet I am one and many"

"Even the leaves laugh 'cause they have what I have Reach from the best tree So he can see me And with your face With your face comes laughter And with your touch And with your touch comes joy."

"I am skilled now, at casting iron To make a hardened bed for my heavy world"

"Everybody sees me as a solitary entity but I long to be important to somebody It's a love of fairy tales that drives this guilty wish To walk serenely in front of family to collect my kiss and though this notion is as flawed as any I have learned I'd like to think that like the others, it's something I deserve"

"I wish I could promise I'll Be there when you dream I wish that when you spoke to me I'd know what you mean But you can't bring me comfort By filling up my eyes They don't stay dry Hard as I try Can't figure why Made I this choice"

"Turn the lights down for a while And have a rock with the solitude Many worlds are born tonight Because the needy is everyone."

"Where're you going Ra? Take me with you Ra... You're such a busy God I wish you could stay I only want to play and play But you're such a busy god and I'm such a mortal Ra"

"With all the confidence I have It seems I could go forever But forever has no rest-stops And my endurance sometimes fails Hold me, hold me, hold me in your arms Can you tell me how I'm gonna make it"

""I can see the purpose now and all I've learned All the roads and where they've turned I can see, I can see everything, the total truth I'm ready for another youth." Going to fly"

"If you stare into a flame You'll get an eye full of energy If you write your nightscapades You'll get a dawn full of promises"

"Oh, even the leaves laugh As you spin and tumble through We explode in color All for your honor"

"When the moon comes up, I go down For the first time There’s a garden deep, deep in my heart But it’s blossomed for the last time"

"Why couldn't someone have patience for me? Why couldn't someone be wise to my fears? Tell me why couldn't somebody cry for me This time? And if I should die, who'll be the first to cry?"

"Every step I take, I am alive. I am Life."

"There was a new popular music of protest. Pete Seeger had been singing protest songs since the forties, but now he came into his own, his audiences much larger. Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, singing not only protest songs, but songs reflecting the new abandon, the new culture, became popular idols. A middle-aged woman on the West Coast, Malvina Reynolds, wrote and sang songs that fit her socialist thinking and her libertarian spirit, as well as her critique of the modern commercial culture. Everybody now, she sang, lived in "little boxes" and they "all came out just the same.""

"I don't mind failing in this world, I'll stay down here with the raggedy crew, 'Cause getting up there means stepping on you, so I don't mind failing in this world."

"Little man stood at the Mayor's door, No one had ever seen him before, Dressed in clothes of a gayer mood Than ever are seen in Hollywood."

"There was a little boat sailed down the river, Hull was a cup and sail was a feather, Cum peedle ump pump pay."

"Train whistle blowin', Makes a sleepy noise; Underneath their blankets Go all the girls and boys. Rockin', rollin', ridin', Out along the bay, All bound for Morningtown, Many miles away."

"If you are a piano, You will laugh on ev'ry string, And if you are a girl or boy, You'll sing."

"Love is something if you give it away, Give it away, give it away. Love is something if you give it away, You end up having more. It's just like a magic penny, Hold it tight and you won't have any. Lend it, spend it, and you'll have so many They'll roll all over the floor."

"And there's doctors and lawyers, And business executives, And they're all made out of ticky tacky And they all look just the same."

"They don't know my head's full of me And that I have my own special thing, And there's no hole in my head. Too bad."

"I have done. Well, I've shared a moving vehicle with 18 naked men — not many women do that... fantastic, never felt better."

"I like communicating. I think it’s as simple as that. I get really lonely and dark if I can’t communicate with people."

"I'm a sucker for tragedy - I love the death scenes."

"Until we command the exact same salary as every male counterpart, I feel a political desire to stand by other women. If we don’t stand together, that equality will never be fully realized, and that bothers me. I see very little in our culture, actually, of women necessarily standing up for one another. I think there’s still an underlying fear if one woman has the light shone upon her, it takes away from your light, which of course is not the case at all. But I think when you’re young, you maybe fear that."

"I'm not a greedy person, I just want to accomplish so many different things."

"The initial drive was instilled in me when I was little, growing up with a single mom, we struggled a lot. I saw my dad but he wasn't financially supportive at all so we were, for lack of a better word, very poor. But I don't want to be the one with that story of being poor and coming up from it. It was really that my mother instilled in me that drive and sense of urgency and it's always been inside of me."

"I have so many friends who hate their jobs and man, it's such a struggle trying to find what they love or what they dream of. I feel so lucky that I found what I love and my dreams have started to come true."

"Maybe my face is edgy, but that's because it's the face of somebody who's seen life."

"The whole business is a gamble. There's no real stability, you're kind of just floating around like a feather your whole life."

"Her stage name was inspired by the hospital where Dylan Thomas spent his last hours. “It’s the place where poetry comes to die,” she said, joking. “That’s me.""

"The first time I saw her perform — she must’ve been 15, maybe 14 — she got up in a club in Dallas, sat in with her guitar teacher’s band, played "The Wind Cries Mary" and just blew everybody away. ... At that time she was very shy and diminutive, except when you listened to her guitar playing. ... She’s physically a very intense player. She takes a kind of ferocious approach to the technique of the guitar, a real high energy."

"I still remember going to the CD store and buying The Sensual World when I was 16, and the cover — there was a rose in front of her mouth, that has bloomed, she's got big wide eyes, and I remember, you know, putting it on the shitty car stereo on the way home, you know — and my life was forever changed."

"You don’t ever get the sense that she's making music to pander to anyone. I think you always get her absolute best attempt at her true vision whenever you get a Kate Bush record."

"You can hear one note of a Kate Bush song, or one note of her voice even, and know immediately what it is. And that is the biggest feat of any artist, especially when you consider, you know, all the roads that she's gone down."

"Bodies like wrecking balls fuck, fuck with dynamite."

"For that to have come out of someone's brain, period, is a remarkable feat. For that to have come out of someone's brain, at 17 years old — this incredible song, incredible song … there aren't that many amazing pop songs that have two or three key changes in them —‚ and I'm not talking about some modulations, I'm talking: "Okay, now we're in the key of Q." It's like WHAT?! But it's so brilliant, it's so memorable. I always karaoke that song — if I drink enough."