Songfacts®:

• In "Even It Up," it sounds like Ann Wilson is letting loose on a selfish lover, but she had something different in mind. "That song was written in about '79 or '80, and it was definitely a response to being obstructed as women in the rock field," she said in a Songfacts interview. "There are so many systemic things that get thrown up in front of you, different glass walls and stuff. We were speaking out against it then."
  
  Heart was a rare female-fronted rock band in the 1970s, a time when many bullheaded men in the industry thought the only roles for women in rock were as backup singers or groupies. Heart's frontwomen, Ann and her sister Nancy, powered through it, blowing away most other groups in the process. Crucially, they wrote their own songs, which they sometimes used to channel their frustrations.
• "Even It Up" was the lead single from Heart's fifth album, Bebe le Strange. By this time, Ann and Nancy Wilson had asserted control of the songwriting and image of the band, leaving the three other members (all guys) on the margins. They were always the visual centerpiece, but on this album cover it went a step further. The sisters are the only band members to appear on the front cover, in a tight photo where they're looking right at the camera. On the back cover we see the other three members standing in front of the backs of their heads, within their hair.
  
  Roger Fisher, the lead guitarist in the group and longtime boyfriend of Nancy, was fired while they were making the album along with his brother Mike, who started as a guitarist and became the group's sound engineer. Mike and Ann were a couple for about nine years.
• Like most of the album, this song was written by Ann and Nancy Wilson with help from Sue Ennis, a friend they knew from childhood growing up in Bellevue, Washington. Ennis started playing guitar and singing with them when they were teenagers, and after Heart formed, Ann and Nancy often wrote songs with her. "Even It Up" came during a songwriting retreat at Ann's place on the coast of Oregon.
• Heart made a music video for this song, but it was just a performance clip. When MTV went on the air a year later, they favored concept videos or more current hits, so Heart was left out. They didn't make much impact on the network until the mid-'80s with videos for songs like "What About Love" and "Never."