The Band essays – Track 1 Side 2 – Jemima Surrender

This idea sprang from here.

Track 1 Side 1 - Across the Great Divide is here.
Track 2 Side 1 - Rag Mama Rag is here.
Track 3 Side 1 - The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down is here.
Track 4 Side 1 - When You Awake is here.
Track 5 Side 1 - Up On Cripple Creek is here.
Track 6 Side 1 - Whispering Pines is here.

Back in the album days you had to stand up and flip the thing over, so the juxtaposition between the quiet desperation of Whispering Pines, the last song on side one, and Levon Helm howling like a dog in heat in first song on side two was less jarring. But on CD and on a streaming service the two second pause is not nearly enough...and even when you know it's coming it's still kinda like somebody putting a boot in your ass.

Jemima Surrender is so leeringly lascivious that it inspired an American cognitive psychologist and self-professed radical feminist to form "The Chicago Women's Liberation Rock Band", a group who were "tired of hearing pop music glorify the subjugation and degradation of women...We loved to dance but we were dancing to songs that were degrading to us". The group released songs like "Abortion Song", "Sister Witch", and "Ain't Gonna Marry" and helped inspire the Riot Grrrl do-it-yourself genre decades later. For this reason alone Jemima Surrender is still a banger.