All-female band

An all-female band is a musical group in popular music that is exclusively composed of female musicians. This is distinct from a girl group, in which the female members are solely vocalists, though this terminology is not universally followed. While all-male bands are common in many rock and pop scenes, all-female bands are less common.

In the Jazz Age and during the 1930s, "all-girl" bands such as the Blue Belles, the Parisian Redheads (later the Bricktops), Lil-Hardin's All-Girl Band, the Ingenues, the Harlem Playgirls led by the likes of Neliska Ann Briscoe and Eddie Crump, the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, Phil Spitalny's Musical Sweethearts, Helen Lewis and Her All-Girl Jazz Syncopators as well as Helen Lewis and Her Rhythm Queens were popular. Dozens of early sound films were made of the vaudeville style all-girl groups, especially short subject promotional films for Paramount and Vitaphone. (In 1925, Lee de Forest filmed Lewis and her band in his short-lived Phonofilm process, in a film now in the Maurice Zouary collection at the Library of Congress.) Blanche Calloway, sister of Cab Calloway, led a male band, Blanche Calloway and Her Joy Boys, from 1932 to 1939, and Ina Ray Hutton led an all-girl band, the Melodears, from 1934 to 1939. Eunice Westmoreland, under the name Rita Rio, led an all-girl band appearing on NBC Radio and in short subjects for Vitaphone and RKO before changing her career to acting and her professional name to Dona Drake, appearing in numerous 1940s movies. Ivy Benson's "All Girls Band" was the BBC's resident dance band in 1943 and toured until the 1980s. All-girl bands active in vaudeville, variety shows, and early sound films during the 1920s to the 1950s are documented in Kristin McGee's book Some Liked it Hot: Jazz Women in Film and Television. Sally Placksin, Linda Dahl, D. Antoinette Handy, and Frank Driggs along with professor Sherrie Tucker, in her book Swing Shift: "All-Girl" Bands of the 1940s, have also documented this era.

Bands composed solely of women began to emerge with the advent of rock and roll. Among the earliest all-female rock bands to be signed to a record label were Goldie and the Gingerbreads, to Atlantic Records in 1964, the Pleasure Seekers with Suzi Quatro to Hideout Records in 1964 and Mercury Records in 1968, the Feminine Complex to Athena Records in 1968, and Fanny (who pioneered the all-female band sound in the early to mid-1970s) in 1969 when Mo Ostin signed them to Warner Bros. Records. There were also others, such as the Liverbirds (1962–1967), the Ace of Cups (1967), the Heart Beats (1968), and Ariel (1968–1970) which included the three members of the Deadly Nightshade.

From 1964 to 1968 the Pandoras was an all-girl band (one of the first) playing a few original tunes and a bunch of popular covers at concerts and dances throughout New England. They started out as a trio, with Simmons College students Kathy Kinsella and Pinky Keehner on rhythm guitar and lead guitar, and Sally Levy on drums. Much later, under the management guidance of Peter Bonfils, the band had some success, including a recording contract and a couple of singles with Liberty Records ("About My Baby", b/w "New Day," and "Games" b/w "Don't Bother"), and gigs that showed all around the U.S. as well as in Newfoundland and Puerto Rico, opening for acts including the Kingsmen, Dionne Warwick, the Byrds, and Gary Lewis & the Playboys.

The Shaggs were an all-female family band who earned some regional notoriety during their time as a performing band in the late 1960s; by the time they had disbanded in 1975 their first album Philosophy of the World had caught the attention of Frank Zappa and by 1980, NRBQ arranged for it to have a wide release. The Shaggs, particularly in their early years, were noted for their inability to adhere to basic norms of popular music (their drummer, Helen Wiggin, often found herself detached from the music her sisters Dot and Betty were singing and playing on guitar), which somewhat ironically (and to their bewilderment) made them icons of outsider music.

Roger Ebert, in his audio commentary for Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970) gives the film credit for inspiring all-female rock bands, with the fictional band Carrie Nations created for the film, stating that such bands were quite rare at the time, but started to spring up in the film's wake.

Fanny were the first all-female rock band to release an album on a major label. On November 6, 1971, Fanny became the first all-female band to reach the Hot 100's top 40, with "Charity Ball" peaking at No. 40.^{[citation needed]}

In 1975, the Canadian duo of sisters, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, recorded the first of a string of albums, sometimes joined by their sister Jane. The Runaways were an early commercially successful, hard-edged, all-female hard rock band, releasing their first album in 1976; band members Joan Jett, Cherie Currie, and Lita Ford all went on to solo careers.