Hired Guns: Portraits of Women in Alternative Music is a look across several decades of the music industry through the experiences and careers of a selection of professional female musicians.

Hired Guns looks across several decades of the music industry through the experiences and careers of ten professional female musicians. Those women profiled are members of influential, acclaimed bands and touring musicians with major acts; they each represent important music scenes and movements, having respectively emerged from and thrived in seminal moments of music such as the California hardcore punk scene, the Minneapolis alternative boom, and much more. This book presents a frank and unique female perspective on the music business, charting their professional challenges and triumphs, providing an insight into the machinations of the industry, and offering a glimpse into the education, work, and lifestyle required of such professionals. Musician Amanda Kramer and author Wayne Byrne together conduct candid interviews with their subjects and compose an insightful cultural and historical discourse, drawing readers into the artistic, social, and industrial contexts of several seminal musical movements as they give voice to these female road warriors who have enthralled millions of fans across the world while remaining largely anonymous to the public. Kramer and Byrne bring them center-stage to tell their story.