My Weekend Crush

The universe can feel so small and so cruel sometimes. Like why would it take someone so vibrant and so sweet and so creative like Jill Sobule. News of her death in a house fire last week at age 66 was a shock to the system. While many people may not have thought of Jill since the mid-90s when her songs were on the radio and in movies. Like, “Clueless” wouldn’t be “Clueless” without “Supermodel.” Still I was lucky enough to have interviewed her, and enjoyed her music, well past her MTV/VH1/charting days. She remained an advocate and an activist through the years. And she will always, always be the singer of the infinitely superior and actually gay “I Kissed a Girl.” May her music and memory live on in the hearts forever. Thanks for all the lovely songs and sentiments. Now rest in power, Jill. Happy weekend, all.

Music Monday: Jill Sobule Edition

Yes, the 90s nostalgia continues and I’m not even a little sorry about it. Remember Jill Sobule? Remember that other “I Kissed a Girl” song from 1995 (not the aughts song over a decade later about cherry Chapstick from that reformed Christian singer)? I sure do. The difference was one was about exploration and the other about exploitation, and of course the presence of THE Fabio. Jill Sobule is among that plucky class of female singer-songwriters with guitars trying to be heard above the synthesized din of that era’s reigning boy and girl bands of the late 90s and early 00s. She always had such a joyful, winsome way about her. Her biggest hits, “I Kissed a Girl” and “Supermodel,” were wonderful little windows into womanhood (well, I mean not so wonderful in the case of “Supermodel,” but real). Earlier this year Jill celebrated the two-year anniversary of her successful brain surgery. Yes, brain surgery. She had been diagnosed with essential tremors, making performing difficult near impossible. She posted a clip of herself, in the operating room, with her guitar. With sensitive brain surgeries like this, they often want the subject to be awake to test their faculties and in Jill’s case her hands. So, she played ”Supermodel” while they operated on her brain which is so rock star I can’t even stand it. Like Mick, Bono and Bruce could never. Keep on strumming, Jill, Happy Monday, kittens.