One of my problems with female fronted bands in general is that the female front tends to -utterly- dominate the band's image, and beyond the frontwoman, in most people's minds, the rest of the band is essentially disposable. Hers is the only name mentioned, the only band member whose performance is given praise. Granted there are exceptions, but they are few. The band is the singer. In bands where this is obviously stated to be the case, no problem, but if it's just person A and a revolving door of musicians, don't call it a band.
But none of this is the fault of the band, nor the fromtwoman of the band. I have no problem with women being in charge, or front-and-center, and I wish more women would get into playing instruments and metal in general, My problem is with the double standard, and the fact that there being a woman at the front pretty much dooms the band to being "female-fronted" like some kind of subgenre regardless of the music style they're playing. YOu're no longer just playing metal, you're now playing "female fronted" metal.
When Delain played last year, I remember there being a lot of "She was so hot" "her voice was great.."comments regarding the singer, but very, very little about the rest of the band. Perhaps that's saying more about the music itself than I realize
Regardless;
Music has always been pretty sexual, and a woman in a band who plays up her sex appeal isn't doing anything new or all that shocking, but it really depends on the rest of the act. If you're singing about sex, then sure, it makes perfect sense to give everyone in the audience boners with your act, provided you're not marketing yourself to teenagers n' shit. Besides, everybody likes boobs. Everybody.
People take sex too damn seriously. Everybody does it, it's biologically wired into our being, and I don't think we'd hurt to be a bit more free/less neurotic about it in general. But I digress, If the women in the band are in bondage gear, then as long as the dudes are too, that's fine by me, it's when there's a distinct imbalance between the sexualized frontwoman and the totally diminished "other" band members, it's just annoying. Share the spotlight! Granted not everyone in the band is going to be sexy. In fact most people aren't 'sexy' by conventional standards (and good luck being a successful frontwoman if you're -not- sexy. That fact bugs the shit out of me.) but getting back on topic:
Is the woman's sexy an empowering "owning" of her own sexuality, or is it an internalization of male masturbatory fantasy?
