Joan Jett has always led a punk lifestyle.
Now 47, Jett started making music when she was 15. She was the first female rocker to launch her own record label and paved a path for bands like Bikini Kill, Le Tigre and Sleater-Kinney and now scouts young bands to help get them started.
Jett, who plays the House of Blues downtown on Monday, talked from her beachside home in Long Beach, N.Y. about today's music business.
Question: You're 47 – you could conceivably be a grandma to some of the kids listening today – how messed up is that?
Jett: Absolutely! I don't even think about it. I got into a band at 15. I didn't finish high school and didn't go to prom and didn't grow up how most people grew up. In some ways, I still feel like I'm 18. I'm not concerned about age and judgment.
DATEBOOK
Joan Jett & The Blackhearts, with Eagles of Death Metal and Throw Rag
8 p.m. Monday;
House of Blues, 1055 Fifth Ave., downtown;
$24-$28;
(619) 220-TIXS or www.hob.com
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Q: You were a pioneer, not by choice, in that you had your own record label to put out your music when no one else would. Did all the majors come running after you found success in the early 1980s?
Jett: Twenty-three labels heard (demos) and said there was nothing there. That either tells you that they don't listen to what bands send them or they can't hear hits. They heard “I Love Rock and Roll” – they heard four hits! People did not come running. They still don't get it.
Q: Who are some of the bands signed to your label, Blackheart Records?
Jett: The Eyeliners, these three sisters out of Albuquerque, and the Vacancies from Cleveland. We're always just looking to help people who are in the same position we were in.
Ari Bendersky writes for the Associated Press.
