(YouTube) I am a big fan of rapper DESSA, but hearing her daily throughout Turner Classic Movies’ June programming trailers, which include a lot of Hitchcock and also feature her original recording of -Dixon’s Girl- drove me a bit nuts. (I believe the inclusion of the song is a shoutout regarding screenwriter Alma Reville, Hitchcock’s wife and often-neglected creative partner.) I’ve had the line ‘call me up, day or night: free drinks and bad advice’ stuck in my head for roughly thirty days, as TCM plays in the background of our home practically 24/7.
My way of shunting out my obsessions is to write about them so: it’s a perfect song with a ton of great hooks and samples, and on top of that highlights not only the patriarchal nature of the the music industry, but also the women complicit in keeping the status quo.
The original video is available here:
And there was a symphonic version recorded in 2019 that I would have loved to see live:
DESSA also just released six singles within a six months, complete with videos, which comprise the IDES EP, all available via her site.And she’ll be touring soon-ish! We saw her at local indie rock tavern Schubas several years ago, and she’s absolutely blistering live.