Future Glam rocker Suzi Quatro joined her sister Patti and three other women in the awesome ’60s garage band The Pleasure Seekers. This single is pretty amazing - very protopunk.
BlackBook talks about Beyonce’s amazing all-female band
One of the coolest things about Beyoncé’s live show won’t get nearly as much play as the impressive choreography or the light show or the ’90s-kid-Twitter-detonating reunion, and that is The Suga Mamas, Beyoncé’s all-female tour band, with whom she has been touring for years (as NPR’s Ann Powers helpfully pointed out, “not a gimmick”).
An all-female backing band may be part of her image and a very deliberate decision, but in an age where women playing rock instruments is still totally novel to a lot of people because most of America and the world is in a dumb time warp about stuff like this and women who are guitarists, drummers, etc. still have to “prove” themselves more than their male counterparts, to have The Suga Mamas on the biggest and most mainstream stage, performing to millions the world over, is really goddamn impressive, even if they were supporting one of the biggest names in music and of course they’d be there.
And leading this pack is Bibi McGill, who in addition to having a pretty incredible stage presence and complementing Our Bey well, can play like nobody’s business. It’s a shame people probably missed her playing because everyone was waiting so attentively to see if Destiny’s Child would show up, because it was boss. There were pyrotechnics. There was shredding. The planets aligned and all was well.
Find out about every member of The Sugar Mamas, Beyonce’s all female band here.
This, this, a thousand times this!
Bibi McGill
The Duchess.
Norma-Jean Wofford (circa 1942 — April 30, 2005) was an American guitarist who played with Bo Diddley and his band from 1962 to 1966.
Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, she was Bo Diddley’s second female guitarist replacing Peggy Jones aka ‘Lady Bo’. After Jones left the band, Bo Diddley was asked by disappointed fans what happened to the girl. As a response, he enlisted Miss Wofford, nicknamed her ‘The Duchess’, taught her to play rhythm guitar and informed male admirers that she was his sister. In reality, they were not related. Onstage, Wofford played guitar and sang alongside Gloria Morgan and Lily “Bee Bee” Jamieson as the Bo-ettes.
She was known for skintight stage clothes and appeared on several of Bo Diddley’s record releases during her time in his band. These include the albums Bo Diddley & Company, Bo Diddley’s Beach Party, Hey! Good Lookin’, 500% More Man and The Originator.
She married and left the band to raise a family in Florida in 1966. Her married name was Richardson.
