Introduction to Jill Sobule
Jill Sobule, the singer and songwriter whose 1995 hit “I Kissed a Girl” was the rare pop song of that era to take an openly queer theme into the cultural mainstream, died Thursday. She was 66.
Death Announcement
Her death was announced by her spokesman, David Elkin, who said she died in a house fire in the Minneapolis suburb of Woodbury. Sobule had been on tour and was scheduled to play a hometown concert Friday night in Denver.
Career Overview
With a sharp wit and a playwright’s dramatic sense, Sobule wrote about characters squaring their internal lives with the way the world views them, and she had a flair for vividly drawn scenes in which people make discoveries about themselves.
Musical Style and Hits
“I Kissed a Girl,” which puts a bouncy folk-pop groove beneath Sobule’s lightly raspy vocal, opens with two friends hanging out one night as they compare notes on their disappointing boyfriends. Soon they’re drinking and smoking and the narrator’s friend takes off her overcoat. Sobule, who identified as bisexual, sings:
She called home to say she’d be late
He said he’d worried but now he’d feel safe
I’m glad you’re with your girlfriend
Tell her hi for me
And then I looked at you
You had guilt in your eyes
But it only lasted a little while
And then I felt your hand above my knee
Chart Performance and Music Videos
“I Kissed a Girl,” which came out as the lead single from Sobule’s self-titled 1995 LP, reached the top 20 of Billboard’s alternative radio chart and peaked at No. 67 on the all-genre Hot 100; the song’s music video, starring the model Fabio as one of the crummy boyfriends, was nominated for two prizes at MTV’s Video Music Awards. Sobule’s self-titled album also spawned the punky “Supermodel,” which was featured on the soundtrack of that year’s hit “Clueless” movie.
Comparison to Other Artists
Sobule was part of a mid-’90s cohort of clever songwriters that included Juliana Hatfield, Lisa Loeb and Liz Phair, whose success could be seen as a reaction to the gloomy, male-dominated grunge craze of a few years earlier. Yet Sobule recognized the persistent sexism that followed her and her peers onto television and the covers of magazines.
Quotes from the Artist
“I love the way they try to pit us against each other — like it’s ‘Dynasty’ and we’re gonna get in a Joan Collins/Linda Evans fight,” she joked to The Times in 1995. “Me and Sheryl Crow, going at it!”
Early Life and Education
Sobule was born in Denver in 1959 and played guitar in her high school jazz band. Studying abroad while in college, she was spotted by a nightclub owner as she and a friend performed on the street in Madrid; he invited them to play his club, and she dropped out of school a month later.
Debut Album and Career Challenges
In 1990, Sobule made a debut album with Todd Rundgren for MCA Records that went nowhere despite plenty of critical praise. (Writing in The Times, Chris Willman called it “as accomplished a debut as you’ll hear this year.”) MCA dropped her before releasing a second LP she’d made with Joe Jackson.
Career Struggles
“It was a really hard time in my life,” Sobule told The Times in 1995. “I mean, I had no other skills, aside from having studied political science.”
Later Career and Television Work
Atlantic signed her for “Jill Sobule” then released its 1997 follow-up, “Happy Town,” which failed to yield another pop hit.
Television Theme Songs
Yet Sobule continued to record and perform, and she established a career in television that included the theme song for Nickelodeon’s “Unfabulous.” In 2009 she published a piece on the Huffington Post in which she explained tongue-in-cheek remarks she’d made in an earlier interview about Katy Perry, who’d topped the Hot 100 the previous year with a different song called “I Kissed a Girl.”
Recent Projects
For her 2014 album, “Dottie’s Charms,” Sobule wrote songs to lyrics she commissioned from writers such as Jonathan Lethem, David Hajdu and Vendela Vida.
Autobiographical Musical
“I’m an older woman who’s not going to have a shiny pop song ever again, so that gives me license to do whatever the hell I want,” she told the New York Times with a laugh.
Conclusion
Sobule’s most recent project was an autobiographical coming-of-age musical called “F*ck7thGrade” whose original cast recording is due for release in June. Her survivors include a brother and several nephews.
FAQs
Q: What was Jill Sobule’s most famous song?
A: Jill Sobule’s most famous song was "I Kissed a Girl," released in 1995.
Q: How did Jill Sobule die?
A: Jill Sobule died in a house fire in the Minneapolis suburb of Woodbury.
Q: What was Jill Sobule’s age at the time of her death?
A: Jill Sobule was 66 years old at the time of her death.
Q: What other artists was Jill Sobule compared to?
A: Jill Sobule was compared to other clever songwriters of the mid-1990s, including Juliana Hatfield, Lisa Loeb, and Liz Phair.
