Ronnie Spector

In honor of Phil Spector taking one more step on the long journey to jail, today's female musician will be the person who's probably taken more of his crap than anybody--Ronnie Spector, girl group singer extraordinare. Ronnie Spector has recorded some really fantastic pop music over her now four decades long career, but to call it a tumultous career would be risking understatement. Still, she will go down in the annals of of pop music history for her truly distinctive voice, if nothing else. But she should also be remembered for her persistence and ability to work well with a huge variety of artists.

Ronnie started off with her own group, The Ronettes, who are one of the classic girl groups of the 60's, and really a breath of fresh air, all trashy good-naturedness. She's recorded with everyone from Bruce Springsteen to Eddie Money to Joey Ramone, of course. She is well-known for her willingness to put on bold performances in the 60's, when women were not encouraged at all to be anything but demure as performers.

For further reading, here's an interview I enjoyed. She also recorded an EP with Joey Ramone producing a few years ago called She Talks to Rainbows that's just really fun to listen to, if you want to hear some more recent stuff she's done.