Jen Cloher on her determination to make women heard

A lack of female superstars and being gender-bullied as a younger woman is driving Jen Cloher to make music for change.

As Jen Cloher began writing a song inspired by the female-fronted 90s bands she fell in love with as a young music fan in Adelaide, she pondered the lack of tributes for Australia’s iconic musical women.

The song Falling Clouds — in honour of the popular alternative bands Falling Joys and The Clouds — would become the first single from her indie supergroup Dyson Stringer Cloher.

Formed with her close friends and equally respected musicians Liz Stringer and Mia Dyson, Cloher wanted to pose the question as to why our older female artists don’t get the same veneration as their male counterparts such as Paul Kelly, Nick Cave, Jimmy Barnes or John Farnham.

Looking at the roll call of the ARIA Hall of Fame confirms there is inequality in the recognition of the contributions of women in the Australian music industry.

There are only 12 solo women or groups featuring a female member out of 77 inductees named since the Hall of Fame was formed in 1988.

Jen Cloher questions why Australia’s older female artists don’t get the same respect as their male counterparts.

They include Dames Joan Sutherland and Nellie Melba, Olivia Newton-John, The Seekers (Judith Durham), Renee Geyer, Divinyls (Chrissy Amphlett), Helen Reddy, Marcia Hines, Little Pattie, Kylie Minogue, Tina Arena and last year’s recipient Kasey Chambers.

The obvious artists missing from the list who fit the criteria of making a significant contribution to Australian culture, at least 20 years prior to the year of proposed induction, include Kate Ceberano, Ruby Hunter and Joy McKean (country music legend and Slim Dusty’s wife).

“I started wondering where are our icons making albums and touring without the same adoration and success as someone like Paul Kelly. It’s just kind of weird,” Cloher says.

“And if we don’t have women from those eras that are as great as Paul or Nick (Cave), then why?

“There is a stark absence of women or gender non-conforming artists from their mid to late 50s or older on tour posters or awards nights.”

Motherhood, as it is for any profession, can be a factor in a woman continuing her performing career.

Kasey Chambers, Missy Higgins, country sisters The McClymonts and Tina Arena are among those who are juggling the demands of recording and touring with raising young families and it ain’t easy.

“I know musician friends who are mothers and have said mothering takes them out of music circulation. Touring and breastfeeding, forget about it, let alone building a tour around the school schedule,” Cloher says.

Dyson Stringer Cloher featuring Jen Cloher, Liz Stringer and Mia Dyson. Picture: Supplied

So Cloher wrote Falling Clouds with its pull-no-punches lyric “A woman’s work is never done, Or it’s erased from history books, Nothing against Paul or Nick, but if you want to be remembered then you better have a d....”

She soon worried the conversation about the sparsity of female musical icons might be overshadowed by the cheeky lyric and its potential to offend gender non-conforming artists.

To address her decision not to change the lyric, she penned a blog which ended up starting a whole other online conversation.

Cloher’s essay revealed her own experiences of being “gender bullied” as a young girl, and then young woman, who didn’t want to wear dresses or conform to female stereotypes.

In her blog, posted on medium.com, Cloher, whose first artistic passion was acting, shares how she was warned to stay in the closet by gay male teaching staff at NIDA to avoid being “pinklisted”.

They advised her to wear dresses and make-up for her second year at the famous acting college.

“As I said in the post, they were doing it in our best interests,” she says.

“It was a very different time and yet it was only 25 years ago. The effect it has on a young person is that whatever I am, it isn’t right and I need to cover that up to be something different. I spent a long time not knowing who I was.”

She has a good grip on who she is now both as a solo artist and a member of Australia’s latest indie “supergroup” Dyson Stringer Cloher.

The women began their friendship 15 years ago out of mutual admiration for each other’s songwriting and musicality.

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Jen Cloher says she was gender-bullied as a young woman.

Cloher is in awe of the guitar skills of her bandmates, citing their influence on young women to pick guitars and write songs in recent years.

“They are like the blood sisters I didn’t have,” she says.

“There’s something very special about living through a 15-year career so far with people who have been there right from the start and have seen the ups and downs, and all the moments where you question whether you should still be doing this during the troughs, or helping to celebrate the success for an album or song.”

Unexpectedly, the Dyson Stringer Cloher experience has also given her a new appreciation for football.

Cloher, who steers the art and videos for the project, decided for the new single Believer to make a film celebrating the cultural impact of the AFLW and how it has inspired girls to take up the sport.

Like the majority of Australians, she was captivated by the power and symbolism of the photo of Tayla Harris’s now legendary kick.

She approached her 16-year-old neighbour Lulu who is always kicking a ball around with her dad to star in the Believer video.

“A lot of my musician friends posted the famous Tayla Harris kick photo and I thought ‘How f … in’ awesome is this?’ It captured my imagination and I thought of my neighbour Lulu and how I always see her walking down the street to the park to play footy with her dad Vinnie,” Cloher says.

“So I asked her about being in Believer, showing how hard you have to train to do it, and luckily she loves acting and football.”

The debut Dyson Stringer Cloher album is out now. Their tour begins at the Lansdowne Hotel in Sydney on November 7 and heads to Lizottes, Newcastle on November 8, The Zoo, Brisbane on November 9, Howler, Melbourne on November 14, Theatre Royal, Castlemaine on November 15 and Grace Emily Hotel, Adelaide on November 16.