Jill Sobule, the singer and songwriter whose gay anthem “I Kissed a Girl” and hit “Supermodel,” heard in the movie “Clueless,” were followed by three decades of touring, advocacy and a one-woman musical, died on Thursday morning in a house fire in Woodbury, Minn. She was 66.
Her death was announced by her publicist, David Elkin.
The Public Safety Department in Woodbury, a suburb of St. Paul, said that firefighters had responded at 5:30 a.m. to a report that a house was engulfed in flames. The homeowners said one person was possibly still inside. The department said that firefighters found the body of a woman in her 60s inside the house. The Woodbury Police Department confirmed that the victim was Ms. Sobule.
The cause of the fire is still under active investigation.
Ms. Sobule was scheduled to perform songs from her autobiographical one-woman musical, “F*ck7thGrade,” on Friday at Swallow Hill Music, a venue in her hometown, Denver, said Mr. Elkin said, who added that she was staying with friends in Minnesota while she rehearsed for the musical.
A free informal gathering will be held in Ms. Sobule’s honor instead.
On her second album, released in 1995 called simply “Jill Sobule,” Ms. Sobule, who was bisexual, featured “I Kissed a Girl,” which tells the story of a woman who kisses a female friend:
I kissed a girl
Her lips were sweet.
She was just like kissing me.
Kissed a girl, won’t change the world
But I’m so glad,
I kissed a girl!
The song came out when it was “dicey” to be a queer musician, Ms. Sobule once recalled. But it broke into the mainstream, making its way onto the Billboard charts. It reached the Top 20 of the magazine’s Modern Rock Tracks chart, then known as the Alternative Airplay chart, and was the first song with an openly gay theme to reach Top 20 of any Billboard chart. (It also reached No. 67 on the Hot 100 singles chart.)
“Supermodel,” a rebellious rock song from the same album, was included on the soundtrack of the romantic comedy “Clueless” and further cemented Ms. Sobule’s popularity — although, unlike most of the songs she recorded, she didn’t write it.
“People call me a one-hit wonder,” Ms. Sobule said in a 2022 interview with The New York Times. “And I say, ‘Wait a second, I’m a two-hit wonder!’”
Her next albums were creatively daring and difficult to pigeonhole and did not reach the same level of mainstream success. But they had a loyal following and received positive reviews from critics.
“Now she sings about dumb boyfriends, weight-obsessed women, Alzheimer’s disease and the failings of a long list of celebrated people,” Robbie Woliver wrote in The Times in 2000. “With a wicked wit and pliant facility for candor, Ms. Sobule is an artist whose talent goes well beyond whom she kisses.”
Jill Susan Sobule was born on Jan. 29, 1959, in Denver to Marvin Lee Sobule, a veterinarian, and Elaine (Kramish) Sobule, a musician (who later remarried and was known as Elaine Dillon).She joked that when she was growing up, her only queer role models had been Miss Jane Hathaway, the very proper secretary played by Nancy Kulp on the sitcom “The Beverly Hillbillies,” and her gym teacher, “who looked like Pete Rose.”
Decades later, she wrote a musical, which she called “kind of this universal story of a weirdo growing up,” in which she sang about the frustrations she experienced in middle school. She recalled being called a homophobic slur, feeling out of place among the other girls and having an unrequited crush on a girl.
She began to display talent on the guitar in the eighth grade, and she eventually dropped out of school to focus on music. Her recording career began in 1990, when she released the album “Things Here Are Different.” A single from the album, “Too Cool to Fall in Love,” received some radio play.
Five years later, “Jill Sobule,” her second album, catapulted her career to greater heights.
“I Kissed a Girl” made its way back into headlines again in 2008, when Katy Perry released a song with the same name that achieved much greater success. In one interview, Ms. Sobule later recalled being “jealous” when Ms. Perry used the title. In another interview, with Entertainment Weekly in 2008, she said, “I don’t feel precious about the title, but I’ve gotten tons of emails from annoyed fans.” She added: “Katy Perry’s song is a kind of catchy party song, although I will admit that I do smile when a critique mentions my version in a more favorable light. Is that wrong?”
Ms. Sobule’s survivors include her brother, James.
In addition to performing, Ms. Sobule was outspoken about a variety of political and cultural topics, including the death penalty, anorexia, reproduction and, perhaps most notably, L.G.B.T.Q. issues.
“She literally created a path for queer people and women in music,” Sarah Kate Ellis, the president of the L.G.B.T.Q. advocacy group GLAAD, said in a statement.
Interviews by The Times in 2022 about her musical, Ms. Sobule emphasized that her goal was to reach a broad audience of people who felt like outcasts.
“We wanted to make sure that the show wasn’t just for people interested in my career because most people could give a [expletive],” she said. “I’m not that famous. It’s kind of this universal story of a weirdo growing up.”
Caryn Ganz and Ash Wu contributed reporting.
Hank Sanders is a Times reporter and a member of the 2024-25 Times Fellowship class, a program for journalists early in their careers.
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