Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde Believes In Rock Without Gender

10/16/2002 10:00 AM, Yahoo! Music
Brett Anderson

(10/16/02, 10 a.m. ET) -- She may have influenced numerous women to pick up a guitar and write songs, and she recently took part in the taping of the TV special Women Rock! Girls And Guitars, but the Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde told LAUNCH she doesn't think of herself as a female rocker.

"I don't know. I don't think about women in rock, I never have. I just think about the music and y'know, if someone's a songwriter or singer I like," she said. "It's nothing to do with men or woman. In fact, what I always liked about rock in the first place was and what attracted me, obviously, was the guys, but I also liked sort of that androgynous thing. I mean, and that's why I fit in nicely, because I'm not that, y'know, I don't really look so girlie or anything. So I could kind of sneak in there and get away with it."

Presented by Lifetime and Marie Claire magazine, Women Rock! Girls And Guitars airs October 25 at 10 p.m. ET on the Lifetime channel. Proceeds from the two-hour concert will benefit the National Breast Cancer Coalition, the National Alliance of Breast Cancer Organizations, Breast Cancer Action, Nueva Vida, SHARE, Sisters Network, Inc., Y-Me, and the Young Survival Coalition.

The Pretenders' debut album for Artemis Records, Loose Screw, bolts into stores on November 12.

-- Darryl Morden, Los Angeles

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