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Evelyn McDonnell

Evelyn McDonnell

Evelyn McDonnell is assistant professor of journalism and new media at Loyola Marymount University. She has been writing about popular culture and society for more than 20 years. She is the author of three books: Mamarama: A Memoir of Sex, Kids and Rock ‘n’ Roll, Army of She: Icelandic, Iconoclastic, Irrepressible Bjork and Rent by Jonathan Larson. She coedited the anthologies Rock She Wrote: Women Write About Rock, Pop and Rap and Stars Don’t Stand Still in the Sky: Music and Myth. Da Capo will publish Queens of Noise: The Real Story of the Runaways in 2013.

Evelyn has been the editorial director of www.MOLI.com, pop culture writer at The Miami Herald, senior editor at The Village Voice, and associate editor at SF Weekly. Her writing on music, poetry, theater, and culture has appeared in numerous publications and anthologies, including the Los Angeles Times, Ms., Rolling Stone, The New York Times, Spin, Travel & Leisure, Us, Billboard, Vibe, Interview, Black Book, and Option. She codirected the conference Stars Don’t Stand Still in the Sky: Music and Myth at the Dia Center for the Arts in New York in 1998. She has won several fellowships and awards, including an Annenberg Fellowship at USC and a fellowship to the NEA Arts Journalism Institute in Theater and Musical Theater.

Her 2004 Herald expose of hip-hop cops was awarded first place for enterprise reporting by the South Florida Black Journalists Association and second place in the Society of Professional Journalists’ Sunshine State Awards. She earned her Master’s in Specialized Journalism, the Arts, from USC, where she was chosen for the Phi Kappa Phi honor society. She earned her Bachelor’s in American studies, graduating magna cum laude from Brown University. She leaves in San Pedro with her husband, son, many animals, and a fantastic view of the ocean.

List of articles in the library by artist

Bikini Kill: Sara Marcus: Girls to the Front

Book Review by Evelyn McDonnell, Los Angeles Times, October 2010

BROOKLYN-BASED writer and musician Sara Marcus deserves a medal just for daring to write a book about Riot Grrrl, the fiercely uncompromising feminist movement of ...

Björk: A New Map to Björk's Music

Report and Interview by Evelyn McDonnell, Los Angeles Times, October 2011

IT'S A SAD IRONY: The digitization of music has impoverished the average listening experience. Not only do compressed files sound meagre compared to the sonic ...

Marianne Faithfull

Interview by Evelyn McDonnell, Interview, April 2009

TALKING TO MariaTALKING TO Marianne Faithfull over the day's first coffee is a bit like waking up for cocktails. She's alert and energetic, but chicly ...

PJ Harvey: P.J. Harvey: 4-Track Demos

Review by Evelyn McDonnell, Rolling Stone, November 1993

THE POP INDUSTRY loves to simulate authenticity, a trick that, like the manufacturing of fake antiques, puts demands on the consumer. It's hard to tell ...

Runaways, The: The Runaways: Wild Thing — How Sandy West Was Lost

Retrospective by Evelyn McDonnell, L.A. Weekly, March 2010

ON A SUMMER day in 1975, a 16-year-old girl carrying a Silvertone guitar took four public buses from Canoga Park to a two-story house in ...

Britney Spears, Nicki Minaj: Staples Center, Los Angeles CA

Live Review by Evelyn McDonnell, Los Angeles Times, June 2011

Haters Go Home: Britney Dominates L.A. Show ...

Yo La Tengo: Jesse Jarnow: Big Day Coming: Yo La Tengo and the Rise of Indie Rock (Gotham Books)

Book Review by Evelyn McDonnell, Los Angeles Times, July 2012

THIS IS AS SCINTILLATING as it gets: The opening and closing anecdotes of Big Day Coming revolve around typos. Shockingly, promoters and newspapers have had ...

List of genre pieces

Ellen Willis: Out Of The Vinyl Deeps – Ellen Willis on Rock Music (University of Minnesota Press)

Book Review by Evelyn McDonnell, New York Times, June 2011

WOODSTOCK WAS A RIP-OFF. Creedence Clearwater Revival eclipsed the Rolling Stones. Bob Dylan struggled with identity. Janis Joplin "was not so much a victim as ...

Miami Sound Machine: The Hit Factory Criteria Studio

Report and Interview by Evelyn McDonnell, Los Angeles Times, July 2008

MIAMI – On any given night, as the fabled moon rises over Miami, the densest concentration of pop stars per square foot is likely to ...

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's women problem

Comment by Evelyn McDonnell, salon.com, December 2011

DO THE MATH: Out of the 11 new members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame class of 2012, one — Laura Nyro — ...

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