What do you think?
Rate this book
Refiguring American Music
Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll
African American women have played a pivotal part in rock and roll—from laying its foundations and singing chart-topping hits to influencing some of the genre's most iconic acts. Despite this, black women's importance to the music's history has been diminished by narratives of rock as a mostly white male enterprise. In Black Diamond Queens , Maureen Mahon draws on recordings, press coverage, archival materials, and interviews to document the history of African American women in rock and roll between the 1950s and the 1980s. Mahon details the musical contributions and cultural impact of Big Mama Thornton, LaVern Baker, Betty Davis, Tina Turner, Merry Clayton, Labelle, the Shirelles, and others, demonstrating how dominant views of gender, race, sexuality, and genre affected their careers. By uncovering this hidden history of black women in rock and roll, Mahon reveals a powerful sonic legacy that continues to reverberate into the twenty-first century.
408 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2020
22 people are currently reading
915 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
August 3, 2021
Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll by Maureen Mahon is a 2020 Duke University Press publication.
I enjoyed this tribute to the black women who helped to shape rock music. Often times, these women, whose music was often mislabeled as soul or R&B, never got the respect or recognition they deserved- and doubly so for those who made contributions to male dominated rock groups. These women were influential outside of their work in the studio, as well.
Big Mama Thornton – who recorded ‘Hound Dog’ before Elvis, and ‘Ball and Chain’ before Janis Joplin- never got her due, though she worked well into her old age. (Janis gave public credit to Thornton- while Elvis refused.)
Girl groups such as ‘The Shirelles’ have been forgotten over the years. I admit I love the girl groups from this era of time- so I really enjoyed this section- and agree the influence of these groups was huge- but is rarely acknowledged in the world of rock music.
The author takes us through the years- with an interesting piece on Betty Davis- not to be confused with the actress- an artist I honestly have no memory of. Some YouTube clips were – shall we say- eye popping! She was ahead of her time and her influence can still be seen today.
It is only fitting that Tina Turner is the headliner here, as her success as a rock artist has been simply phenomenal.
These profiles are interesting and informative- but there weren’t enough of them. The author seemed to have jumped down a rabbit hole when she began to dissect the Rolling Stones song called ‘Brown Sugar’.
(Clarification from original review) To be clear- Brown Sugar is about race- but when I was growing up- many adults trashed the song- because they thought it was about drugs. I understand why they thought that- based on the title alone- but if you listened to the lyrics at all - it's obvious what the song is about- although I didn't fully understand all the connotations until I was older and really gave the words some thought.
Although the author makes very valid points, and she does go on to highlight artists such as Merry Clayton, whose incredible vocals on the Stones’ song ‘Gimme Shelter’ is what made that song good, she veered way off course- and seem to lose track of the book’s primary focus, there for a while.
There were also a few behind the scenes influencers- ‘groupies’ and such, that were part of the culture, people long forgotten by now, which was a nice bit of trivia- but I’m not sure their contributions were strong enough to have made it into the pages of this book. Again, something that seemed a bit off-topic to me.
That said, this will give readers a different perspective on black women and their role in rock music. The highlighted artists were influential black women for many- but never got widespread, mainstream credit under the 'rock and roll' category- with the exception of Tina Turner- who insisted on performing rock music-and being labeled and promoted as a rock artist.
Rock music categories and lines are blurred, more now than ever, and the genre has fallen far from the royalty and power it once boasted of, but, the women featured in this book are still influencing current day artist in ways I never thought of before.
Overall, the book starts off strong, but the midsection goes off track, and loses momentum, but- it finishes strong, and will give readers a some societal, cultural, and musical history.
3.5 stars
I enjoyed this tribute to the black women who helped to shape rock music. Often times, these women, whose music was often mislabeled as soul or R&B, never got the respect or recognition they deserved- and doubly so for those who made contributions to male dominated rock groups. These women were influential outside of their work in the studio, as well.
Big Mama Thornton – who recorded ‘Hound Dog’ before Elvis, and ‘Ball and Chain’ before Janis Joplin- never got her due, though she worked well into her old age. (Janis gave public credit to Thornton- while Elvis refused.)
Girl groups such as ‘The Shirelles’ have been forgotten over the years. I admit I love the girl groups from this era of time- so I really enjoyed this section- and agree the influence of these groups was huge- but is rarely acknowledged in the world of rock music.
The author takes us through the years- with an interesting piece on Betty Davis- not to be confused with the actress- an artist I honestly have no memory of. Some YouTube clips were – shall we say- eye popping! She was ahead of her time and her influence can still be seen today.
It is only fitting that Tina Turner is the headliner here, as her success as a rock artist has been simply phenomenal.
These profiles are interesting and informative- but there weren’t enough of them. The author seemed to have jumped down a rabbit hole when she began to dissect the Rolling Stones song called ‘Brown Sugar’.
(Clarification from original review) To be clear- Brown Sugar is about race- but when I was growing up- many adults trashed the song- because they thought it was about drugs. I understand why they thought that- based on the title alone- but if you listened to the lyrics at all - it's obvious what the song is about- although I didn't fully understand all the connotations until I was older and really gave the words some thought.
Although the author makes very valid points, and she does go on to highlight artists such as Merry Clayton, whose incredible vocals on the Stones’ song ‘Gimme Shelter’ is what made that song good, she veered way off course- and seem to lose track of the book’s primary focus, there for a while.
There were also a few behind the scenes influencers- ‘groupies’ and such, that were part of the culture, people long forgotten by now, which was a nice bit of trivia- but I’m not sure their contributions were strong enough to have made it into the pages of this book. Again, something that seemed a bit off-topic to me.
That said, this will give readers a different perspective on black women and their role in rock music. The highlighted artists were influential black women for many- but never got widespread, mainstream credit under the 'rock and roll' category- with the exception of Tina Turner- who insisted on performing rock music-and being labeled and promoted as a rock artist.
Rock music categories and lines are blurred, more now than ever, and the genre has fallen far from the royalty and power it once boasted of, but, the women featured in this book are still influencing current day artist in ways I never thought of before.
Overall, the book starts off strong, but the midsection goes off track, and loses momentum, but- it finishes strong, and will give readers a some societal, cultural, and musical history.
3.5 stars
December 3, 2020
So many of the artists covered in this book I would not have considered rock musicians, which gets to the issue Mahon's book addresses. White rockers who became synonymous with the genre built their sound on the techniques and creatives visions of musicians like Big Mama Thornton, LaVern Baker, The Shirelles, and Tina Turner. And yet these Black mentors and collaborators were pushed further to the margins. Mahon puts them where they should have always been: front and center. Her discussion of the rigid expectations these artists faced are succinctly explained; and through her analyses of these women's careers, reinforces rock's indebtedness to Black music practices, and Black women vocalists in particular. This book had me revisiting artists I thought I knew, introduced me to artists I've rarely listened to, and helped me re-conceptualize how I understand and hear rock music. This needs to be a primary rock history text from here on out.
July 30, 2021
A refreshing perspective on music and the artists that have persisted through the restrictions placed on women and in particular, Black American women. This is as fine a telling of music history as you’re likely to find.
February 18, 2021
Tina Turner is on the cover of Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll. How could she not be? She's the Queen of Rock and Roll! Great. Okay, now name ten more Black women rockers.
Having a hard time? That's exactly Mahon's point. Turner has been firmly canonized in rock history...though even in her case, not so firmly that she's not still waiting for induction to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Getting to this point, Mahon argues, took decades of concerted effort by Turner to be recognized as a legitimate participant in a genre that votes artists like Green Day and Pearl Jam into the Rock Hall in their first year of eligibility. The only Black woman inducted into the Rock Hall in her first year of eligibility was Cynthia Robinson, as a member of Sly and the Family Stone. Even Aretha Franklin, often touted as the first woman inducted into the hall, had to wait for her second ballot.
I reviewed Black Diamond Queens for The Current.
Having a hard time? That's exactly Mahon's point. Turner has been firmly canonized in rock history...though even in her case, not so firmly that she's not still waiting for induction to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Getting to this point, Mahon argues, took decades of concerted effort by Turner to be recognized as a legitimate participant in a genre that votes artists like Green Day and Pearl Jam into the Rock Hall in their first year of eligibility. The only Black woman inducted into the Rock Hall in her first year of eligibility was Cynthia Robinson, as a member of Sly and the Family Stone. Even Aretha Franklin, often touted as the first woman inducted into the hall, had to wait for her second ballot.
I reviewed Black Diamond Queens for The Current.
May 13, 2021
This was by far one of the best books dealing with female African American musicians - not only it discussed their sound, influence and importance analytically and seriously, but it places them in a socio-cultural perspective, explains why they mattered, how come they were for such a long time mostly ignored in Rock histories (or relegated into the background) and it also references a tons of interesting literature for future reading.
As we all know, Rock music (or any other music genre, come to think of it) came as a hybrid of many various ingredients and the earliest influences - now reverently mentioned in rock and Roll Hall of fame - were African American musicians. While the guys were eventually grudgingly accepted as Rock architects, women were not so lucky - Mahon points why this came to be and how the image of rock music as predominantly white macho world of the guys with the guitars somehow became dominant idea - girls who were not writing their own material or playing instruments but "only singing" were perceived as not quintessential. And this went on forever, to some degree even today.
There is a lot of interesting thoughts and ideas around this book, some of them being the difficulty women have gaining inclusion in the rock canon and how "white British singers borrowed African American women’s phrasing, inflection, and vocal mannerisms, using these features to develop the individual styles that came to be associated with them throughout their careers". By idolising Tina & The Ikettes, lots of white Rock guys started using backing vocal trios that eventually became a norm in Rock music - however important, this role was always in the background and perceived as ornamentation. For various reason, Afro-American women had hard time breaking into Rock music, not only because music critics constantly insisted their place should be in R&B, Soul or Funk, but also because apparently Afro-Americans themselves saw it that way - girls who dared to venture into Rock music were rare anomaly and perceived as indecent.
I thought it was very interesting, specially when it discussed less known artists like Marsha Hunt whom I never heard of before. Perhaps the only disappointment is the final chapter, on which i carefully waited and which should have been culmination - when she approach the case of the only Afro-American woman who have actually established herself in a world of Rock music, Mahon twists herself into a pretzel trying to explain Tina Turner's success by careful strategy, this or that - no, she became Queen of Rock because she had a unique, unmatched combination of sound, looks and passion that always set her apart. It seems that Mahon has a problem simply accepting that.
As we all know, Rock music (or any other music genre, come to think of it) came as a hybrid of many various ingredients and the earliest influences - now reverently mentioned in rock and Roll Hall of fame - were African American musicians. While the guys were eventually grudgingly accepted as Rock architects, women were not so lucky - Mahon points why this came to be and how the image of rock music as predominantly white macho world of the guys with the guitars somehow became dominant idea - girls who were not writing their own material or playing instruments but "only singing" were perceived as not quintessential. And this went on forever, to some degree even today.
There is a lot of interesting thoughts and ideas around this book, some of them being the difficulty women have gaining inclusion in the rock canon and how "white British singers borrowed African American women’s phrasing, inflection, and vocal mannerisms, using these features to develop the individual styles that came to be associated with them throughout their careers". By idolising Tina & The Ikettes, lots of white Rock guys started using backing vocal trios that eventually became a norm in Rock music - however important, this role was always in the background and perceived as ornamentation. For various reason, Afro-American women had hard time breaking into Rock music, not only because music critics constantly insisted their place should be in R&B, Soul or Funk, but also because apparently Afro-Americans themselves saw it that way - girls who dared to venture into Rock music were rare anomaly and perceived as indecent.
I thought it was very interesting, specially when it discussed less known artists like Marsha Hunt whom I never heard of before. Perhaps the only disappointment is the final chapter, on which i carefully waited and which should have been culmination - when she approach the case of the only Afro-American woman who have actually established herself in a world of Rock music, Mahon twists herself into a pretzel trying to explain Tina Turner's success by careful strategy, this or that - no, she became Queen of Rock because she had a unique, unmatched combination of sound, looks and passion that always set her apart. It seems that Mahon has a problem simply accepting that.
December 19, 2024
I read this for my rock and roll class and really enjoyed it. It highlights the undervalued Black women of rock with history, critical theory, and interviews and I love how everything tied together. Lavern Baker and Betty Davis were my favorite chapters because they SLAYED and were so fashionable and talented.
November 29, 2021
Excellent book that i savored as i read, partially because it started and ended with mentions of my favorite artist, Santigold. A must read for music fans even remotely interested in the stories of the other black women who contributed to the greatness of music.
June 3, 2021
Do yourself a favor and read this book. So much research went into it and I learned so much. It will definitely change the way I listen to music. I'll be reading this more than once.
September 2, 2025
Actual Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 (4.75/5)
A must-read for any rock ‘n’ roll fan! As a metalhead and someone whose favorite genre is all things rock, I thought I had a solid grasp of its origins. Let me tell you…I was wrong.
This book taught me so much about the birth of rock ‘n’ roll and, more importantly, the lack of credit Black women have received for shaping and pioneering the genre. I went in knowing that racism and sexism played a role in this erasure, but reading it laid bare just how deeply those systems impact every facet of the music industry.
The book opens with Big Mama Thornton, who originally released “Hound Dog”, yes, that “Hound Dog.” The same one Elvis made famous. He never credited, acknowledged, or compensated her, even though that song was key to launching his stardom.
Each chapter dives into the stories of influential musicians like LaVern Baker, Bette Davis, Tina Turner, LaBelle, and The Shirelles. One chapter explores the legacy of three women who profoundly influenced major rockers like The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix. Another digs into the powerful impact of background singers, Black women whose voices helped white artists tap into blues, gospel, and rock elements. (Helter Skelter by The Rolling Stones is one striking example.)
The only reason I knocked off a quarter star is that a few parts felt slightly repetitive. But overall? This was an incredible, eye-opening read.
🎧 I even made a playlist featuring every song mentioned in the book because this history deserves to be heard.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4K9...
A must-read for any rock ‘n’ roll fan! As a metalhead and someone whose favorite genre is all things rock, I thought I had a solid grasp of its origins. Let me tell you…I was wrong.
This book taught me so much about the birth of rock ‘n’ roll and, more importantly, the lack of credit Black women have received for shaping and pioneering the genre. I went in knowing that racism and sexism played a role in this erasure, but reading it laid bare just how deeply those systems impact every facet of the music industry.
The book opens with Big Mama Thornton, who originally released “Hound Dog”, yes, that “Hound Dog.” The same one Elvis made famous. He never credited, acknowledged, or compensated her, even though that song was key to launching his stardom.
Each chapter dives into the stories of influential musicians like LaVern Baker, Bette Davis, Tina Turner, LaBelle, and The Shirelles. One chapter explores the legacy of three women who profoundly influenced major rockers like The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix. Another digs into the powerful impact of background singers, Black women whose voices helped white artists tap into blues, gospel, and rock elements. (Helter Skelter by The Rolling Stones is one striking example.)
The only reason I knocked off a quarter star is that a few parts felt slightly repetitive. But overall? This was an incredible, eye-opening read.
🎧 I even made a playlist featuring every song mentioned in the book because this history deserves to be heard.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4K9...
April 7, 2021
Not intended to be a comprehensive history of black women in rock and roll, Maureen Mahon enters this book into the canon hoping to bend the history of rock and roll toward black women’s influence. Her focus looks at how both race and gender have systematically excluded these women from inclusion in the genre’s history, and a critical look at genre itself. She finds that, like Tina Turner in her own museum, these women are often left in a single line in the history books meaning that “you have to know her story going in.” This book aims to tell some of those stories.
While Mahon tackles genre in the introduction and speaks about genre throughout, it could be easy to miss the thread of her most compelling argument: race and genre are impossible to separate. While genre may be arbitrary in matters of sound, it is not arbitrary in marketing, and hence where race comes central to her thesis. These women must be included in rock and roll narrative, both because of and to push back on the genre. Mahon’s case is even relevant in modern times, pointing towards Santi White (Santogold) who said in 2008:
“’It's racist. It's totally racist. Everyone is just so shocked that I don't like R&B. Why does R&B keep coming into my interviews? It's pissing me off. I didn't grow up as a big fan of R&B and, like, what is the big shocker? It's stupid. In the beginning I thought that was funny. I'm an 'MC', I'm a 'soul singer', I'm a 'dance hybrid artist'.’”
Therefore, if genre is important, then getting its history right is also important as white rockers have continually “borrowed” from black blues and rock musicians. Elvis and Janis Joplin not only covered Big Mama Thornton’s most famous songs, they also mimicked her guttural and syncopated singing style. The Beatles covered the Shirelles adapting their sound to mimic their harmonies. The Rolling Stones featured black women background vocalists in an ode to gospel choirs, literally using black women to emphasize the blackness in their sound. Labelle brought gender bending sexuality with space alien glamour well before glam and dressing up was the rock and roll norm. Tina Turner taught Mick Jagger how to dance.
As Mahon states in her epilogue, “I considered the final connection between all of the women I have discussed: unconventionality.” These unconventional women have stories worth sharing and music worth listening to help understand the rich tapestry that makes up rock and roll.
While Mahon tackles genre in the introduction and speaks about genre throughout, it could be easy to miss the thread of her most compelling argument: race and genre are impossible to separate. While genre may be arbitrary in matters of sound, it is not arbitrary in marketing, and hence where race comes central to her thesis. These women must be included in rock and roll narrative, both because of and to push back on the genre. Mahon’s case is even relevant in modern times, pointing towards Santi White (Santogold) who said in 2008:
“’It's racist. It's totally racist. Everyone is just so shocked that I don't like R&B. Why does R&B keep coming into my interviews? It's pissing me off. I didn't grow up as a big fan of R&B and, like, what is the big shocker? It's stupid. In the beginning I thought that was funny. I'm an 'MC', I'm a 'soul singer', I'm a 'dance hybrid artist'.’”
Therefore, if genre is important, then getting its history right is also important as white rockers have continually “borrowed” from black blues and rock musicians. Elvis and Janis Joplin not only covered Big Mama Thornton’s most famous songs, they also mimicked her guttural and syncopated singing style. The Beatles covered the Shirelles adapting their sound to mimic their harmonies. The Rolling Stones featured black women background vocalists in an ode to gospel choirs, literally using black women to emphasize the blackness in their sound. Labelle brought gender bending sexuality with space alien glamour well before glam and dressing up was the rock and roll norm. Tina Turner taught Mick Jagger how to dance.
As Mahon states in her epilogue, “I considered the final connection between all of the women I have discussed: unconventionality.” These unconventional women have stories worth sharing and music worth listening to help understand the rich tapestry that makes up rock and roll.
February 22, 2024
Well written, investigative narratives pop out from the detailed pages of Black Diamond Queens: African American Women and Rock and Roll.
Published in 2020, author Maureen Mahon does an exceptional job chronicling a history of Black women's influence on the rock genre. During the COVID pandemic, I attended a live Zoom presentation where Mahon talked about her book.
I recently finished reading Black Diamond Queens. My favorite two chapters are "Tina Turner’s Turn To Rock" and "The Revolutionary Sisterhood of Labelle."
After Tina Turner's 2023 passing, in a video I produced, I reference a quote by Maureen Mahon about how Tina was able to make the transition from R&B / soul to rock.
Maureen states that "The book's title lifts a lyric from "Steppin in Her I. Miller Shoes," a song Betty Davis wrote in honor of her friend Devon Wilson, a black rock and roll woman who was, she sings, "a black diamond queen, a woman who loved and lived rock and roll."
Before getting into the substance of the book, I'm going to address the style of Mahon's writing. Black Diamond Queens is written by a woman who is a trained cultural anthropologist. Maureen also teaches in an "ethnomusicology program in a music department."
Often there are very long sentences. The prose is scholarly, and sometimes pedantic. However, after the first 30 pages, the soul of the stories come to life written, with more informality to make the chapters very accessible and readable.
Mahon presents short interview dialogue in the chapters with her and others questioning the artists. The author thanks Merry Clayton, Sarah Dash, Betty Davis, Gloria Jones, and Beverly Lee for speaking to her "about their experiences in rock and roll."
I won't go through every chapter, but will highlight many of them for you. Use Black Diamond Queens as a reference, or as an exhaustive read, written with rigor.
There was always recorded music playing on turntables in Maureen Mahon’s home during her younger years. She listened to rock radio as a teenager.
At Northwestern University just outside of Chicago, she played jazz on the student radio station, WNUR-FM performing DJ duties.
Mahon talks about how she and friends would take public transportation from Evanston to Chicago to see local concerts featuring nationally touring acts.
Despite her eclectic tastes ranging from Joan Armatrading to the Clash to the English Beat, the author says that "in high school and college, I learned that my interest in what was understood as "white music" was not what people, Black or white, expected."
The racial dynamic is thoroughly addressed throughout the book as a counterpoint to the predominant white, male image of rock and roll.
You'll learn about the progression of 'race music' to 'pop music' to 'rock and roll' and then to 'rock.'
The chronology of "Black Diamond Queens" begins with a nice chapter about Big Mama Thornton. Mahon says that Thornton is a "bridge figure between the blues women of the 1920s and the rhythm and blues women of the rock and roll era."
There's an acknowledgment on a few pages in the book about Sister Rosetta Tharpe. I would also recommend Gayle E. Wald's book Shout, Sister, Shout!: The Untold Story of Rock-and-Roll Trailblazer Sister Rosetta Tharpe to learn more. Tharpe was another rockin' Black female original during the same time period as Thornton.
Mahon says that Big Mama Thornton's "arrangement of her 1953 hit single "Hound Dog" anticipates the sound of rock that departed from the horn-centered style of rhythm and blues…" Another Thornton song “Ball and Chain” is referenced.
We learn that 10 covers of the Thornton "Hound Dog" (she had the original version) preceded the version by Elvis Presley in 1956.
I did not know that 1953's "Bear Cat" by Memphis DJ Rufus Thomas was an answer to "Hound Dog" and the battling covers!
The author reveals in a few Thornton quotes that Elvis never gave Thornton anything for "Hound Dog." Thornton also says that Elvis refused to play with her when he got famous.
As the book moves along, Lavern Baker's story is detailed next.
By the time we enter the 1960's, although I was only 8 years old, I do remember hearing Passaic, New Jersey's the Shirelles, and many of their hits on the radio.
The Shirelles were the first all-female vocal group to have a number one pop hit in the rock and roll era. Crossover appeal elevated this group into the mainstream.
I often wondered in the early 1970s why many of the rock and roll bands all toured with Black female background vocalists. There is a great picture of the English band Humble Pie in chapter four of the book: "Call and Response" with the Blackberries, an African American female vocal trio.
The Blackberries sang with Humble Pie on tour and on record. "Call and Response" is a great chapter.
Maureen Mahon has a thing about the Rolling Stones song "Brown Sugar." She goes into a lot of detail in chapter five: "Negotiating 'Brown Sugar.'" Earlier in the book she explains why she never liked the song.
"Negotiating Brown Sugar" expands on the implied sexuality and social messages Maureen feels were telegraphed by this song.
Chapter Six: "The Revolutionary Sisterhood of Labelle" is fascinating. We learn what Patti LaBelle really thought about the group's transformation from Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles to Labelle.
There's much more in Black Diamond Queens including the important chapters on Betty Davis and Tina Turner. Clocking in at 282 pages, there's an additional 100 plus pages with end notes and an index.
What I like most about the book is the meticulous research and the fact based detail reflected in all of the stories. If you want to discover more about African American Women and rock and roll, this is your definitive resource.
Published in 2020, author Maureen Mahon does an exceptional job chronicling a history of Black women's influence on the rock genre. During the COVID pandemic, I attended a live Zoom presentation where Mahon talked about her book.
I recently finished reading Black Diamond Queens. My favorite two chapters are "Tina Turner’s Turn To Rock" and "The Revolutionary Sisterhood of Labelle."
After Tina Turner's 2023 passing, in a video I produced, I reference a quote by Maureen Mahon about how Tina was able to make the transition from R&B / soul to rock.
Maureen states that "The book's title lifts a lyric from "Steppin in Her I. Miller Shoes," a song Betty Davis wrote in honor of her friend Devon Wilson, a black rock and roll woman who was, she sings, "a black diamond queen, a woman who loved and lived rock and roll."
Before getting into the substance of the book, I'm going to address the style of Mahon's writing. Black Diamond Queens is written by a woman who is a trained cultural anthropologist. Maureen also teaches in an "ethnomusicology program in a music department."
Often there are very long sentences. The prose is scholarly, and sometimes pedantic. However, after the first 30 pages, the soul of the stories come to life written, with more informality to make the chapters very accessible and readable.
Mahon presents short interview dialogue in the chapters with her and others questioning the artists. The author thanks Merry Clayton, Sarah Dash, Betty Davis, Gloria Jones, and Beverly Lee for speaking to her "about their experiences in rock and roll."
I won't go through every chapter, but will highlight many of them for you. Use Black Diamond Queens as a reference, or as an exhaustive read, written with rigor.
There was always recorded music playing on turntables in Maureen Mahon’s home during her younger years. She listened to rock radio as a teenager.
At Northwestern University just outside of Chicago, she played jazz on the student radio station, WNUR-FM performing DJ duties.
Mahon talks about how she and friends would take public transportation from Evanston to Chicago to see local concerts featuring nationally touring acts.
Despite her eclectic tastes ranging from Joan Armatrading to the Clash to the English Beat, the author says that "in high school and college, I learned that my interest in what was understood as "white music" was not what people, Black or white, expected."
The racial dynamic is thoroughly addressed throughout the book as a counterpoint to the predominant white, male image of rock and roll.
You'll learn about the progression of 'race music' to 'pop music' to 'rock and roll' and then to 'rock.'
The chronology of "Black Diamond Queens" begins with a nice chapter about Big Mama Thornton. Mahon says that Thornton is a "bridge figure between the blues women of the 1920s and the rhythm and blues women of the rock and roll era."
There's an acknowledgment on a few pages in the book about Sister Rosetta Tharpe. I would also recommend Gayle E. Wald's book Shout, Sister, Shout!: The Untold Story of Rock-and-Roll Trailblazer Sister Rosetta Tharpe to learn more. Tharpe was another rockin' Black female original during the same time period as Thornton.
Mahon says that Big Mama Thornton's "arrangement of her 1953 hit single "Hound Dog" anticipates the sound of rock that departed from the horn-centered style of rhythm and blues…" Another Thornton song “Ball and Chain” is referenced.
We learn that 10 covers of the Thornton "Hound Dog" (she had the original version) preceded the version by Elvis Presley in 1956.
I did not know that 1953's "Bear Cat" by Memphis DJ Rufus Thomas was an answer to "Hound Dog" and the battling covers!
The author reveals in a few Thornton quotes that Elvis never gave Thornton anything for "Hound Dog." Thornton also says that Elvis refused to play with her when he got famous.
As the book moves along, Lavern Baker's story is detailed next.
By the time we enter the 1960's, although I was only 8 years old, I do remember hearing Passaic, New Jersey's the Shirelles, and many of their hits on the radio.
The Shirelles were the first all-female vocal group to have a number one pop hit in the rock and roll era. Crossover appeal elevated this group into the mainstream.
I often wondered in the early 1970s why many of the rock and roll bands all toured with Black female background vocalists. There is a great picture of the English band Humble Pie in chapter four of the book: "Call and Response" with the Blackberries, an African American female vocal trio.
The Blackberries sang with Humble Pie on tour and on record. "Call and Response" is a great chapter.
Maureen Mahon has a thing about the Rolling Stones song "Brown Sugar." She goes into a lot of detail in chapter five: "Negotiating 'Brown Sugar.'" Earlier in the book she explains why she never liked the song.
"Negotiating Brown Sugar" expands on the implied sexuality and social messages Maureen feels were telegraphed by this song.
Chapter Six: "The Revolutionary Sisterhood of Labelle" is fascinating. We learn what Patti LaBelle really thought about the group's transformation from Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles to Labelle.
There's much more in Black Diamond Queens including the important chapters on Betty Davis and Tina Turner. Clocking in at 282 pages, there's an additional 100 plus pages with end notes and an index.
What I like most about the book is the meticulous research and the fact based detail reflected in all of the stories. If you want to discover more about African American Women and rock and roll, this is your definitive resource.
May 16, 2021
A well-researched and largely engrossing account of the careers of a handful of Black female rock ‘n roll pioneers. It’s only very lightly theorized and is too often repetitive, but is a pleasant read that contains some key insights into the music industry.
March 27, 2024
One of those books with the power to reshape the way you listen to and think about music. Mahon's essential point is that "rock" has been defined as an essentially white and male field, and so your Jaggers, Dylans, Marriotts, Bolans and so on can wander into Black musical traditions, country, blues, whatever else, go back to being in rock bands, and get celebrated as eclectic, adventurous, creative, etc., whereas your Labelles (who hated "Lady Marmalade" to a degree I had not realized), Betty Davises, Lavern Bakers, and Big Mama Thorntons (highlighted by a GREAT chapter on the hidden social/emotional/artistic/sexual labor performed by the women who served as background singers and signals of "authenticity," "heart," "warmth," and of course "soul" for the white Brits who hired them--only Humble Pie considered bringing them on as equals, which lasted a year) have to explain why they're not soul/r&b; there's something apparently weird and in need of explanation about wanting to play rock, or even "funk," which is seen as male...and also still not "rock." (There's a lot of sad "we were too rock for Black audiences, and too Black for white rock audiences" stories here.) Only Tina Turner, who gets the last chapter, managed to escape this, though that required untold suffering--not just the obvious, but getting dropped by her label, wandering in the wilderness, and finding a Svengali (but in a good sense, I guess?) who cannily marketed her as a rock singer with a rock band (lotsa white Brits again) whose appeal and audience were multiple. And this even after she'd done some pretty world-historic rock covers already; I knew "Proud Mary" but not "Whole Lotta Love," which she rewrote some of the lyrics to and which I'm about to go listen to. (Hmm. Almost a dub remix, or a dub remix crossed with "Rock On." Digging it.) She also gives us a sharp rereading of the Shirelles as fundamental rock institution who inspired and challenged and role-modeled for all those Brit boys in 1962. Sent me back to listen to a lot of things I'd sort of listened to: more Shirelles, more Big Mama Thornton, more Labelle, and Mother's Finest, whom I'd never heard of and just found on YouTube. Also reminded me of my first concert, which was Tina Turner at MSG in 1984. I knew literally nothing of her story at that point, and wow, had I missed a lot.
April 3, 2022
Not a comprehensive survey of Black women in rock, but a deep dig into a handful of iconic artists (Tina Turner being the best-known, the others ranging from still-legendary to largely forgotten) and a search for the patterns that connect them. For me the standouts were the chapter on the Shirelles, which brought to light how genre conventions and societal expectations clashed with the rock-and-roll spirit of the girl group. And the Brown Sugar chapter (I realized I had...never actually listened to the lyrics of that song, yikes), which centered the voices of women who might have been Jagger's subject and explored how they found liberation and artistic expression in the role of "groupie" or "[famous white rocker]'s girlfriend" that might look demeaning from the outside.
While all of these women's artistry and life experience was unique, the common theme Mahon builds around their stories is how the white male artists, producers, critics, and other powerful figures of the rock world constructed rock as a white male genre. It's one of those things where maybe you go in knowing that's the case, but then you read the details and see exactly how the wheels turned to take credit away from rock's Black originators, exclude its female fans, etc., and it's kind of shocking just how deliberate and insidious and self-perpetuating it is.
And a real highlight of this book is how it addresses this ongoing injustice without making the artists' stories ones of oppression or commercial failure - their skill and creativity is central and Mahon makes it clear that rock was the place for their artistry, their sexuality, their self-expression through fashion, their politics, their liberation from family expectations, whatever self-determination and rebellion against tradition meant in their moment in music history.
(Looking back at my dates on here, this one apparently took me 3 months to read - I'd say that while there is a through-line, the chapters all stand well alone and it works great for picking up one at a time! Ideally when you're sitting down with a stack of records or the author's Spotify soundtrack.)
While all of these women's artistry and life experience was unique, the common theme Mahon builds around their stories is how the white male artists, producers, critics, and other powerful figures of the rock world constructed rock as a white male genre. It's one of those things where maybe you go in knowing that's the case, but then you read the details and see exactly how the wheels turned to take credit away from rock's Black originators, exclude its female fans, etc., and it's kind of shocking just how deliberate and insidious and self-perpetuating it is.
And a real highlight of this book is how it addresses this ongoing injustice without making the artists' stories ones of oppression or commercial failure - their skill and creativity is central and Mahon makes it clear that rock was the place for their artistry, their sexuality, their self-expression through fashion, their politics, their liberation from family expectations, whatever self-determination and rebellion against tradition meant in their moment in music history.
(Looking back at my dates on here, this one apparently took me 3 months to read - I'd say that while there is a through-line, the chapters all stand well alone and it works great for picking up one at a time! Ideally when you're sitting down with a stack of records or the author's Spotify soundtrack.)
Want to read
November 24, 20202020 400pp paper $31
WRB Sep 2020 positive review.
"No black-dervid musicl form in American history has more assiduously moved to erase and blockade black participation than rock music" Hamilton] and Mahon makes teh case that Black women were expunged the most thoroughly of all.
"Using interviews, recordings and archives, Mahon examines the experiences of artists Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton
LaVern Baker
Betty Davis
Tina Turner,
The Shirelles
Labelle
The music industry always wants to label black [female] music as R&B, reserving the category Rock for white males. Whereas it sounds like it was black woman [esp Thornton] who originated rock. \It was Thornton who sang the original version os "Hound Dog", which Presley took over with no acknowledgement.
Tina TUrner is an exception - starting out R&B with the duo Ike and Tina, later she went rock and became "one of the most important rock vocalists of all time".
WRB Sep 2020 positive review.
"No black-dervid musicl form in American history has more assiduously moved to erase and blockade black participation than rock music" Hamilton] and Mahon makes teh case that Black women were expunged the most thoroughly of all.
"Using interviews, recordings and archives, Mahon examines the experiences of artists Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton
LaVern Baker
Betty Davis
Tina Turner,
The Shirelles
Labelle
The music industry always wants to label black [female] music as R&B, reserving the category Rock for white males. Whereas it sounds like it was black woman [esp Thornton] who originated rock. \It was Thornton who sang the original version os "Hound Dog", which Presley took over with no acknowledgement.
Tina TUrner is an exception - starting out R&B with the duo Ike and Tina, later she went rock and became "one of the most important rock vocalists of all time".
October 30, 2022
This book is right in my wheelhouse, an analysis of Black women in the history of rock music, some known and given their due in the genre but most others egregiously left out of the conversation despite their contributions and innovations in the genre. This is definitely the type of work I was hoping to do 20 years ago and am glad to see the space finally opening for these conversations. It's not only a refreshing analysis of these artists but also very timely for me with my own work. Mahon's work on the women who made the music is in direct conversation with works such as Laina Dawes' "What Are You Doing Here?!" which focuses on being a Black woman fan of heavy metal. Not only would I highly recommend this, but I would also love to see much more of this type of scholarship.
December 22, 2025
Black women have rarely gotten their due as creators of rock and roll. Author Mahon emphasizes the importance of pioneers like Big Mama Thornton, of Hound Dog creation well before Elvis had success with it. She goes on to explain the other pioneers who refused to stay in their Rhythm and Blues lanes because they wanted to perform rock and roll. White men were enamored of black American music and used their talents to mix influences. The rise of Tina Turner and the success of Alabama Shakes’ Brittany Howard brings us up to the present with great respect for the innovators from the past.
October 6, 2022
I'd recommend this if you are a music head, a nice deep dive into black women and their contributions to rock and roll. I definitely didn't know about some of the women included or their histories, which is the whole point of this book. Black women especially are often left out of the convo when talking about certain music genres and this did a great job of showing where these women fit into the history of rock and roll and reflecting their legacy.
July 10, 2023
Really interesting stuff, and it's kind of nice thinking that Mahon is early in her career, and that I might be able to read lots of other things by her in the future.
I think her choices of focus make a lot of sense and she covers them well, but the other lesson in it is how easy it is to keep ignoring what has largely been ignored. Mahon works to fight erasure.
I think her choices of focus make a lot of sense and she covers them well, but the other lesson in it is how easy it is to keep ignoring what has largely been ignored. Mahon works to fight erasure.
April 12, 2021
Excellent book, made me rethink may of the ways I've looked at and thought about rock and roll. Highly recommended.
February 18, 2022
Read this book and you won’t think if mid 20th century popular music the same way again,and that’s a wonderful thing.
February 2, 2025
Rating: 5* of five
The Publisher Says: African American women have played a pivotal part in rock and roll—from laying its foundations and singing chart-topping hits to influencing some of the genre's most iconic acts. Despite this, black women's importance to the music's history has been diminished by narratives of rock as a mostly white male enterprise.
In Black Diamond Queens, Maureen Mahon draws on recordings, press coverage, archival materials, and interviews to document the history of African American women in rock and roll between the 1950s and the 1980s. Mahon details the musical contributions and cultural impact of Big Mama Thornton, LaVern Baker, Betty Davis, Tina Turner, Merry Clayton, Labelle, the Shirelles, and others, demonstrating how dominant views of gender, race, sexuality, and genre affected their careers.
By uncovering this hidden history of black women in rock and roll, Mahon reveals a powerful sonic legacy that continues to reverberate into the twenty-first century.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: Get your pearl-clutching hand limbered up, y’all...white men grabbed a narrative and co-opted it again!
I know, I know...no one saw that coming, did they?
What I did not know about the history of women in rock and roll was a LOT. The underhanded way the gatekeepers would routinely mislabel Black women's music as soul or R&B, making it into an audience-awareness choice, reaching the natural market for these women's work, ie other Black folks. This made sure it all looked okay from the outside and still kept them separate from the white audiences that loved their music. Big Mama Thornton recorded major hits for white artists who got them from discovering her versions, eg Elvis re-recording "Hound Dog" after she did it, then refusing ever to acknowledge her as the source of the style and the rendition he made. She never got her ublic due, her deserved attention, or her merited rewards despite a many-decade career.
There is an entire chapter on the girl groups like the Shirelles and the Supremes, huge cultural forces in their day and now largely ignored or forgotten entirely. Diana Ross might be familiar to some younger folk (likely as a solo act), but neither Florence Ballard nor Mary Wilson are, and that is nigh on criminal neglect! The history of the women who worked behind the stars, and in the session studios, are equally unknown to the broad swath of listeners. Who knows who Merry Clayton is, by name anyway? But listen to the Rolling Stones' absolutely ubiquitous "Gimme Shelter" and they know that voice. An actual human woman, with a career, made those glorious sounds behind Jagger's howl of lust. Women like Claudia Lennear and Minnie Riperton were "muses" for white, famous men, and had tiny fractions of their success.
Of course no one can take a cursory look at this book and fail to see Tina Turner front and center. Rightly so. Her life and career were legendary from the beginning. Every action, every concert, was An Event. A life lived in the glare of publicity, though, is not always a career that works for the aritst. While Tina Turner did find justly given adulation and success for her talents, she worked for everything she ever got *against* the men resisting he input and rejecting her needs and wants. It was not until the 1980s, her fourth decade as a singer, that she finally shed the R&B ghettoization and became a megastar. The fact is that Tina Turner was a musical force of nature, and should have been lionized with the greatest of the British white men who gave the US white audiences covers of the Black women's originals.
I think I leaarned most from Author Mahon's chapter on Betty Davis, one of Miles Davis' wives. Her astonishing music was a YouTube rathole I had not known existed. Listen to "If I'm In Luck I Might Get Picked Up" and tell me you don't feel deprived that you are hearing it for the first time in the 21st century. That is my—our—loss, and a bitter privation indeed. It slammed home the grotesque waste of Black women's talents and gifts this book was written to highlight.
For this MLK Day of reviews, this read was both fascinating and infuriating. The misogyny, the racism, the sheer hideous waste of so much life force, all left me more hell bent than ever to seek voices, experiences, and talents in as many corners that are not spotlit than ever. Join me and let's start shoutin’ about it.
The Publisher Says: African American women have played a pivotal part in rock and roll—from laying its foundations and singing chart-topping hits to influencing some of the genre's most iconic acts. Despite this, black women's importance to the music's history has been diminished by narratives of rock as a mostly white male enterprise.
In Black Diamond Queens, Maureen Mahon draws on recordings, press coverage, archival materials, and interviews to document the history of African American women in rock and roll between the 1950s and the 1980s. Mahon details the musical contributions and cultural impact of Big Mama Thornton, LaVern Baker, Betty Davis, Tina Turner, Merry Clayton, Labelle, the Shirelles, and others, demonstrating how dominant views of gender, race, sexuality, and genre affected their careers.
By uncovering this hidden history of black women in rock and roll, Mahon reveals a powerful sonic legacy that continues to reverberate into the twenty-first century.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: Get your pearl-clutching hand limbered up, y’all...white men grabbed a narrative and co-opted it again!
I know, I know...no one saw that coming, did they?
What I did not know about the history of women in rock and roll was a LOT. The underhanded way the gatekeepers would routinely mislabel Black women's music as soul or R&B, making it into an audience-awareness choice, reaching the natural market for these women's work, ie other Black folks. This made sure it all looked okay from the outside and still kept them separate from the white audiences that loved their music. Big Mama Thornton recorded major hits for white artists who got them from discovering her versions, eg Elvis re-recording "Hound Dog" after she did it, then refusing ever to acknowledge her as the source of the style and the rendition he made. She never got her ublic due, her deserved attention, or her merited rewards despite a many-decade career.
There is an entire chapter on the girl groups like the Shirelles and the Supremes, huge cultural forces in their day and now largely ignored or forgotten entirely. Diana Ross might be familiar to some younger folk (likely as a solo act), but neither Florence Ballard nor Mary Wilson are, and that is nigh on criminal neglect! The history of the women who worked behind the stars, and in the session studios, are equally unknown to the broad swath of listeners. Who knows who Merry Clayton is, by name anyway? But listen to the Rolling Stones' absolutely ubiquitous "Gimme Shelter" and they know that voice. An actual human woman, with a career, made those glorious sounds behind Jagger's howl of lust. Women like Claudia Lennear and Minnie Riperton were "muses" for white, famous men, and had tiny fractions of their success.
Of course no one can take a cursory look at this book and fail to see Tina Turner front and center. Rightly so. Her life and career were legendary from the beginning. Every action, every concert, was An Event. A life lived in the glare of publicity, though, is not always a career that works for the aritst. While Tina Turner did find justly given adulation and success for her talents, she worked for everything she ever got *against* the men resisting he input and rejecting her needs and wants. It was not until the 1980s, her fourth decade as a singer, that she finally shed the R&B ghettoization and became a megastar. The fact is that Tina Turner was a musical force of nature, and should have been lionized with the greatest of the British white men who gave the US white audiences covers of the Black women's originals.
I think I leaarned most from Author Mahon's chapter on Betty Davis, one of Miles Davis' wives. Her astonishing music was a YouTube rathole I had not known existed. Listen to "If I'm In Luck I Might Get Picked Up" and tell me you don't feel deprived that you are hearing it for the first time in the 21st century. That is my—our—loss, and a bitter privation indeed. It slammed home the grotesque waste of Black women's talents and gifts this book was written to highlight.
For this MLK Day of reviews, this read was both fascinating and infuriating. The misogyny, the racism, the sheer hideous waste of so much life force, all left me more hell bent than ever to seek voices, experiences, and talents in as many corners that are not spotlit than ever. Join me and let's start shoutin’ about it.
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews