Joan Jett Has Staying Power

by Mary Colurso -- Birmingham News
Friday August 01, 2008,
Veteran singer serious about her craft, keeps own vision in focus

Joan Jett has just a few minutes. Maybe 10, at most.

The veteran singer and frontwoman of the Blackhearts -- best known for hits such as "Bad Reputation," "I Love Rock¤'N' Roll" and "I Hate Myself for Loving You" -- is hustling through an airport, getting ready to board a plane.

Jett, 49, obviously prefers making music to talking about it. She's been tough to pin down, over a period of several days, and there's reluctance in her husky voice when her professional partner, Kenny Laguna, hands her a mobile phone.

But talk she does, competing with cell-to-cell static, to help spread the word about her concert in Pelham. Jett's touring with Def Leppard, and will open for that band on Saturday at the Verizon Wireless Music Center.

Asking about her strict vegan diet seems frivolous, considering the compressed time frame. A much more relevant topic: longevity in rock music. What's Jett's secret for sticking around in the industry since the 1970s?

"Well, I don't like any time off," she says. "I think people, when they get successful, take time to enjoy it. They take time off, go on vacation, go do other things. Not that it means artistic mold, but the audience moves so much faster these days. In the past, yeah, you could take time off and come back a year or six months later. But I've never taken any time off. Since I started with the Runaways, I've always been touring, always doing it. It keeps me feeling interested, feeling out there, feeling connected."

Jett started performing professionally as a teenager, and was a founding member of the Runaways (1975-79), an all-female band that played hard, loud and fast, just like the guys did. Jett went solo after leaving that group and found widespread success with the Blackhearts, producing Top 40 singles that became pop-culture touchstones.

Next question, then: Do women face more challenges in the rock world than men?

"A million more," Jett says, "all the ones that you've heard. It's a man's world; that's completely true. In the Runaways, we took (verbal abuse) from people for what we did. The boys are telling us, 'Girls can't rock.' The girls are telling us, 'You can rock, but you can't have any sexuality in it.' All those conflicting ideas, all those people telling us what to do."

Jett didn't listen to anything that might compromise her principles, starting her own label, Blackheart Records, and teaming with Laguna, a producer and songwriter, to create her own opportunities in the entertainment business. Not an easy task, then or now, but the two had a vision they were determined to keep intact.

"Joan's had this awesome career; I can't count the hits, 17 of them," Laguna says. (Different day, different interview.) "Every one was a battle."

Laguna describes Jett as consistently "very pure" in her approach to music, making decisions based on artistic considerations, rather than commercial ones.

"She truly has that thing a lot of artists pretend; she doesn't really need anything," Laguna says. "Her pleasure is not in material things. That's not where Joan is at. She keeps it to herself and reads philosophy books. She has inner contentment. She's never asked me how much we were making at a gig."

Jett, at the airport, manages to squeeze in a comment about the choices she makes, from movies (such as 1987's "Light of Day") to CDs (her latest is 2006's "Sinner") to philanthropy (she's a staunch supporter of U.S. troops and often travels to war zones).

"It's for my own self and knowing what I'll be comfortable with," she says. "Sometimes, it's about not accepting an opportunity, a gig that's not something I really want to do."

No chance to elaborate; the plane's about to leave. Jett's gone, quick -- and independent -- as she came.