Jaan Uhelszki at The Morton Report recently caught up with rock icon JOAN JETT. An excerpt from the interview is available below:

Q: You're the first female rocker to succeed in traditionally male territory. How have you managed while others have given up? What has kept you going?

Jett: "I think maybe the belief that it still mattered, in some way — that rock and roll could change your life. Not making it more than it is, but a song can just hit you at a certain time in life. Or it could be a TV show, it could be a movie, something that just struck you and gave you courage and energy to continue following your dream. I just always thought rock and roll stood for something. What, I'm not quite sure! Anymore, anyway. But a certain integrity, I suppose, just being true to your own self, and that it allows you enough freedom that someone can be who they are and be completely different than who I am when I'm being me. And enough room for everyone to be who they are."

Q: They say novelists write the same book in different ways. Do you see one theme in your songs?

Jett: "Sex is always the theme in my songs. Or has been. It could be a straight-up sex song, it could be just about falling in love, falling out of love, or that being in love sucks. I think that one theme, unfortunately - or fortunately - is the undercurrent of sexuality, or just sexualness."

Q: Do you think you grew into that or was the sexuality there from the very beginning?

Jett: "You know me from THE RUNAWAYS phase, and the thing about the Runaways was that the press so much keyed on the girl aspect. In hindsight, obviously, but there was an undercurrent of sexuality, but it wasn't that we owned it. It was some kind of freakshow or something. Like everybody was waiting for us to do something outrageous, but not because it was good for us, just because it was good for them."

Q: You’ve said a few years that if you had a reunion with the Runaways, the worst thing would be if you all did get along and decided to go out on the road again. Why would that be so terrible?

Jett: "To just to have taken so much crap the first time around, and people being curious and never having seen it, and then doing it again just for whatever reason we’d do it, and then having people say, 'See? That's why they didn't make it,' or 'Look at these old broads trying to recapture their youth.' It's more the idea that was so revolutionary, and still is, because it's still not a mainstream thing, seeing girls playing hard rock and roll. My theory is that rock and roll is a very sexual thing. And to allow girls playing rock and roll means that they're being blatantly sexual. And in America, girls and women aren't allowed to be. That's why you still don't see it. The pop thing is huge, but people love the illusion of that rock rebel thing. It's a little bit dangerous. So therefore now all these people rock. You know what I mean? When they're using a descriptive word, they use the word rock, and that's very offensive to me."

Go to this location for the complete interview.