This is, believe it or not, the first all-female band on the list. It’s only taken 26 years and 483 albums to get here (The Slits don’t qualify as their entry featured Budgie on drums, even though they would become all-female shortly after). The Go-Go's aren’t the first all-girl group *at all*, but some of the earlier ones, such as the unfortunately-named Fanny, don’t make it into Dimery’s book.
Soundwise they’re as if the front of the band (Belinda Carlisle on vocals, Charlotte Caffey and Jane Wiedlin on guitars and backing vocals) are a Sixties bubblegum-pop girl group while the back of the group (Gina Schock on drums and Kathy Valentine on bass – those are real, not stage names) are playing post-punk hard beats. And yet, the combo works.
Carlisle, I hope she forgives me for saying, has quite a cutesy girly quality to her voice, and if the Go-Go's had pursued the more solemn kind of post-punk fayre, I don’t think it would have worked so well – she lacks the menace to her voice that, say, Siouxsie Sioux has. As it is, it also means that they stand out amid a fairly packed field.
The harmonies are lush, and I was reminded at times of the likes of The Mamas and The Papas, especially on tracks like Lust To Love and This Town. Meanwhile the rhythm section pump out some infectious beats, especially on the likes of We Got The Beat. Although at times each track sounds like it ought to be in the soundtrack to a high school film starring Ally Sheedy and Emilio Estevez (and some of them probably were), they’re all some great power pop, and a refreshing change from the usual darkness.
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