Female Musicians: Eye Candy or A Whole Lot More?

First, I'd like to give my apologies for the rhetorical question in the title of this post. So, I'm sorry about that.

Anyway, onto the actual main content for this post. A list of the "Top 55 Beautiful Rock/Metal Female Singers" appeared in my news feed on Facebook this morning. It wasn't really what I wanted to see, since I now have the urge to punch seals in the face. Anyway, the list was shared by one of my musician connections on Facebook. Typically, the comments section is full of comments asking why this vocalist or that singer isn't on the list or who is hotter, blah blah fucking blah. Fortunately a few comments protested the list.

Anyway, the Page that created the list has gone onto to clarify that they made the list based on talent, the closeness between the bands and fans, as opposed to just picking them for their looks. But if that truly is the case, why did they call the list something along the lines of "The Most Beautiful Female Singers"? They could have named the list a bit better like "The Best Female Singers" or something to that effect.

Regardless of what their true intention was for the list, it does open up new realms of debate. Are female musicians just eye candy for men to stare at, the same way that they stare at topless ladies in lad mags? Or are they so much more than that?

My answer is obvious: They're more than just eye candy. Of course, I'd be lying if I said I didn't find some vocalists attractive - It's only natural to find some people attractive and I'm not going to deny being human. But to me, the likes of Liv Kristine, Simone Simons, Lena Abe, Doro and so forth are much more than just tits and ass on stage. They're also human and talented humans at that.

When I was first introduced to music by Epica and Nightwish, I had no clue what any of the members looked like, I only knew that they had female lead vocalists and I've found that to be a purer way of enjoying the music when discovering bands. Of course, everyone has their own preferences of how they like to discover bands - be it on radio, through YouTube or whatever.

But how often do we see "Hottest Rock/Metal Vocalists/Musicians" lists? I rarely see them. Actually, I can't even recall ever seeing one. Unsurprisingly, if you Google for those lists, the results for "Hottest Metal Female Musicians" outnumbers the results for "Hottest Metal Male Musicians". So, if less emphasis is put on the looks of male musicians, why do we, as a society, feel the need to put emphasis on the looks of female musicians and rate them solely on their looks, as opposed to their talent?

It's 2015. It's high time these beliefs or whatever you want to call them change.

Anyway, let me know what you think on this matter in the comments.

Also, no seals were harmed during in the writing of this post.

Sunset Symphony UK Tour - Day Two

So, day three is about to begin of the Sunset Symphony UK Tour so I decided it's a great time to write about Day Two.

We started the day off with breakfast and Alwaid teasing me about my alleged snoring and watching footage from Alwaid's performance on Wednesday as well as discussing plans for Day Two.

We set off early so we could head to Sherwood Forest and the Great Oak, where we did touristy things, had tea and lunch and just had a generally great chill out. After that we headed to Leicester, which meant time for a nap for me in the Alwaid van.

The Shed in Leicester is great little venue and all the staff were really friendly and just absolutely great. We got the gear loaded in and set up the merch tables and talked with the opening act, Alpha State.

Doors opened at about 19:30 with Alpha State on stage for about 20:00. They performed really well, so I'll be looking at getting them for a show or two in the future,

Lost Effect, Alwaid and Aonia all played stunning sets as well. After the show and loading gear back into the van, me and most of Alwaid headed to the nearest McDonald's for a quick bite to eat before heading back to Nottinghamshire for the night, where I ended up getting poked in the head by Alwaid's Marie because of my alleged snoring.

Tonight, we hit Dudley.

Sunset Symphony UK Tour - Day One

As I write this, I'm sitting in a strange and foreign place known as "Nottinghamshire", which is allegedly in the Midlands. To be honest, I could be in the middle of Lancashire (Gods help me!) for all I know.

So, the first tour I've booked is now in progress with day one finished.

I did some last minute packing this morning of the essentials - mainly some two bottles of some knock-off branded Jagermeister and two bottles of Leffe beer and a few clothes and other bits and bobs. I met up with Melissa (Aonia) and Marie (Alwaid) at Hull train station.

From their, we proceeded straight to O'Rileys where the rest of Alwaid already were along with Tim from Aonia.

This was my first show in Hull in just under three years. The turn out was poor but that was to be expected since the show was meant to take place in Bridlington originally.

Teras were the first band on the bill. They're a death/thrash metal act local to Hull and they blasted through their set with their usual ferocity. I managed to get a few good snaps of them which I'll post at some point.

Lost Effect - who are special guests on the tour alongside Alwaid - followed after and they were on top form. A thoroughly enjoyable set by them, as to be expected. Alice In Thunderland were third band on the bill and were also enjoyable.

Alwaid, whom are main support/special guests on the tour, were absolutely fantastic. They appeared to go down very well with the crowd, which is always good and they complimented the touring headliners Aonia very well, due to their similar sounds.

Aonia, of course, were just amazing, though some will say that I have to say that as I do PR for them as a rule. But biases aside, Aonia were amazing.

After packing up, I jumped in Alwaid's van to be taken to this mythical place known as Nottinghamshire, where we're staying at the moment. I've tried some French food they brought with them including some sort of savoury bread that has a chocolate filling.

Next stop is Leicester at The Shed!

#Adamgate - Should age and gender be a deciding factor in band applications?

Some of you may seen a screen shot of a band's reply to a applicant recently on Facebook doing the rounds, originally posted by Lauren Hutchinson, owner of The Rock Fairy blog. For those who aren't familiar with her work, Lauren is a music writer and a DJ for TBFM. Recently, Lauren, applied to sing for a band via Gumtree that's going for the stoner vibe with their music.

Her email to the band and the main contact: Adam, reads as follows:

Hi Adam. I’ve seen your ad on Gumtree and I’d be interested in auditioning for your band. I know you said you were looking for up to age 28 but cards on the table, I’m 30. That being said, I’ve only just turned 30 so not too far off! I can’t see any links to your material so I’d love to hear it to see if it fits in with what I’m looking for rather than waste your time. If you want any links to my material then I’m more than happy to send these over too. Look forward to hearing from you. Lauren.

 And here's the email that Lauren got in return:

The reply is nothing more than blunt, rude and narrow-minded. I understand why some musicians/bands would want people within their age range but to send a reply like that is taking the absolute piss. Lauren hasn't named the band in question, which is completely understandable and the rest of the band shouldn't suffer because of Adam.

I'm not quite sure why 30 is too old - I mean look at AC/DC and Iron Maiden - All their members are knocking on in the years but they still rock pretty damn hard. Looking at female musicians, there's Doro Pesch (ex-Warlock), Liv Kristine (Leaves' Eyes) and of course Girlschool who all also rock damn hard and are no doubt at least 30 years of age or older and plenty more examples that I could list but I'd be here all day, otherwise.

So, with those musicians in mind, age shouldn't be a factor? Nor should gender, right? Well, according to Adam they are factors, though I'm not sure what evidence he has for this. I know a number of unsigned bands with female members over the age of 30, so I'm guessing that this Adam fellow doesn't get out of the house much. His ideals are very archaic and it's attitudes ;like that that contribute to the idea of female musicians being inferior to their male counterparts.

Unfortunately, this is an attitude that can be found within several areas of the music industry but it is an attitude that is dying out as there are more progressive thinkers in this day and age, compared to say 40 years ago when female musicians in rock and metal were virtually unheard of.

The thing I find most disgusting is that Adam didn't bother to request any examples of Lauren's talent.

Personally I commend Lauren on her bravery for posting the screen shot of the email and for starting the debate that's been spreading like wildfire on Facebook and hopefully this hasn't put Lauren off joining or forming an original band.

What do you think of this? Let me know down below in the comments.

In search of Sunken Treasure

So, after a stressful time of constant emailing and begging, I'm proud to announce that Red Rum's Sunken Treasure UK tour is a go. Unfortunately Wales is a no-go for this tour as promoters were either not interested or just couldn't book it.

This was a surprisingly difficult tour to book, despite Red Rum's rise in profile following their UK tour with Alestorm last year. However, it should be an interesting tour and I'm happy to have managed to snag the band for a Bridlington show as well. Scotland - Glasgow to be exact - was a difficult one to score for the band but I persevered and succeeded in the end. And perseverance is an important thing when it comes to booking tours as I found out with the Aonia/Alwaid/Lost Effect UK tour that will be taking place next month.

If you've not heard Red Rum before, just listen to their brilliant cover of "They're Taking The Hobbits To Isengard".

Now, I'll go back to pretending to book bands for Valkyrian Festival.

"Female-Fronted" isn't a genre

I've had this argument - maybe discussion is the more diplomatic term? - on many occasions on social media and in real life. At one point, I used to use the term religiously to describe any band fronted by a lass - Be it in my reviews, when promoting my gigs and so forth. However, as I discovered more and more bands fronted by women, I began to think maybe it's time to stop using the phrase "female-fronted" as women in metal aren't as rare of occurrence as I had originally thought, although the number of female musicians is still vastly outweighed by male musicians.

Earlier tonight, just after watching the first episode of the new Game of Thrones season, a friend linked me to a Blabbermouth article which basically quotes Floor (ReVamp, Nightwish vocalist) saying that it's time to stop using the term "female-fronted".

I personally salute Floor for those comments. The term is over-used and outdated. How can bands such as Epica, Arch Enemy, Huntress and Benedictum, Paramore and so on, all be apart of the "female-fronted" genre when they each sound completely different to one another? A dictionary definition describes the word genre as meaning:

a class or category of artistic endeavor having a particular form,content, technique, or the like:
the genre of epic poetry; the genre of symphonic music.

I'm pretty sure that Arch Enemy and Epica don't have the same particular form or technique - one being death metal, the other being symphonic metal.

The "female-fronted" tag, in my opinion, makes the bands sound as if they're going to be a gimmick. More and more women are becoming musicians - not just vocalists, but drummers, guitarists, bassists and more as well. But does it really matter what sex the members of the band are? I'd sooner listen to a band for their music than whether their members have a pair of balls or a pair of tits. If you want to support women in metal, that's cool but try not bring their gender into it. Enjoy the music, not the amount of pairs of tits that will be on stage.

Hopefully, with a vocalist as well known and as established as Floor Jansen stating that it's time to get over using the "female-fronted" tag, more people will take heed.

If It's Too Good To Be True...

Recently, while browsing Facebook, I came across a post in one of the groups. The gentleman, as you can see below, is looking for supports for a supposedly really big (possibly massive, even!) international act. I've seen a lot of people jump onto the post offering their band up as support, no questions asked. It all seems very suspect to me.

Fortunately, I wasn't only the only one to notice several things wrong. No location or genre mentioned. Now, last time I checked, saying either of things wouldn't give away the supposedly big band's name. As I mentioned, there's been a lot of bands jumping on the post, offering themselves up as support - bands from the folky punk side of the spectrum to the heavier, grittier metal side of the spectrum.

It's not wrong that these bands are offering themselves up as support but some curiosity wouldn't go amiss. Some people had asked for details and what not, such as genre and date and location, but the gentleman who is seeking a support this "big international act" responded with the following:

Still smells fishy to me. I can understand him making a post, asking for supports, if the date was confirmed. I've done it before when I've had some well known names in the past, such as Hecate Enthroned but without a date confirmed, despite the band in question allegedly being on contract, this really comes across as a poor attempt at building up a database of bands - Well, I say poor but it certainly garnered him a lot of interest.

After searching for the gentleman in Google, it appears that he mostly deals with DJ club nights and the like. No issues here about that if he's wanting to work with bands but he could offer up a few more details to avoid coming across as "not so legit" or whatever the cool kids say these days.

All I can say is that if you're a band and you see something like that and it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Details are important before jumping onto something like this.

Northern Symphony Festival

So, it's been over a week now since I hosted Northern Symphony, the UK's first symphonic metal festival, in Selby and I'm still buzzing from it. Yeah, there were some issues during in the day but they were resolved soon enough.

A few people have asked me why I didn't do it in my hometown where I usually promote. Aside from the major lack of symphonic metal fans in Bridlington, I just fancied doing something outside of Brid. I used to promote in Hull until mid-late 2012 and so Northern Symphony was a breath of fresh air for me.

How did the idea came about...

I wrote a guest article last year, under the pseudonym Jarl Solheim, for Femetalism about the symphonic metal scene in the UK. The article can be read here. While I was drafting up the article, I began thinking about organising something that was just totally symphonic metal and touched on as many areas of the sub-genre as possible.

It was obvious the idea would never work out in Bridlington, so I began scouting for other areas to do it. The midlands and the south were too far away and awkward to get to with me being reliant on public transport, so a venue in Yorkshire was the best option for me. Eventually, after a couple of weeks of scouting the internet and some posts on Facebook, it was suggested that I try use The Venue in Selby - Which I must say is an absolutely fantastic venue. After some discussion to the owner, the date was fixed in for 4th April 2015.

The preparation and the lead-up...

With the date booked in and The Venue confirmed, I began short listing bands for the festival who I then proceeded to contact to book. The response from UK bands was exciting, surprising and confusing as well. Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of decent symphonic metal bands in the UK but the amount of times I got an email from a thrash band or an old school power metal was ridiculous.

The first two acts I confirmed were Quietus and Scandelion, the latter of which was introduced to me by a musician I've know for a while and of course it turned out he plays for them! Securing the headliner was the hardest part of the booking process for NSF as it seemed like everyone I asked to headline was unavailable. Eventually I found the ideal headliner in the form of Winter In Eden.

As the weeks went on, I eventually booked a second venue (The Riverside in Selby) to serve as a second stage so I could try touch down on the various forms of symphonic metal like I originally hoped to do so.

The day itself...

When the day of Northern Symphony itself came, I woke up with a sense dread, all sorts of negative thoughts running through my head such as No one will show up and my personal favourite It's all going to go tits up. No one will work with me again. Of course, it didn't help put my mind ease that an event of a similar nature was happening the day after Northern Symphony and said event cropped up some time after Northern Symphony had been announced.

By the time I got on the train to Selby, I was on the verge of becoming a nervous wreck. To make matters worse, I was heavily hungover.  Not a good idea.

When I arrived at the venues, everything seemed to be running smoothly, so I flitted between the two talking to bands and letting them know what the crack was. Soon enough, doors opened and the first band of the day, A Clockwork Opera, were on stage. They were the only band I saw a full set of since they didn't clash with any of the other bands and they were extremely impressive, especially for their debut show.

Disaster struck on the main stage, which was being hosted in The Venue, some issues occurred that causes the schedule to be delayed, leaving me and others concerned that Winter In Eden wouldn't be able to play their full set. Fortunately, as the day went on, we almost caught back up with the schedule and WIE not only played their full set but a couple of encore songs as well.

As the day went on, I flitted between the two stages, catching what I could of every band's set and getting feedback from people about the event. It;s safe to say that Northern Symphony 2016 is on the books, so watch this space.

Photo credits: Craig Andrews - Femetalism.co.uk