Okay, I get it. This is supposed to be a compliment. Somehow our minds have tricked us into thinking that if we take something negative and turn it into to a positive statement, we can exaggerate the compliment given. However, this sort of thing doesn’t tend to flatter me- it just makes me feel weird.

I’ve heard the compliment a few times from various people and almost always with good intentions. I appreciate the thought…but sometimes I just want to scream back in their face “stop with the woman hating!” but i don’t, because I know (at least I hope) that the sexism is unintentional. 

And this doesn’t come just from men. In fact, I’ve heard more women express this sort of compliment more than their counterpart. 

There are many preconceived notions about women in music. I feel one of my many responsibilities is to break that mold, raise confidence for other women to break through and encourage a more open mind about gender roles in music in general. So when you come to me and say that you aren’t usually fond of women in music doesn’t make me feel superior or flattered. And if you say it with sarcasm, I just want to punch you in your stupid mouth. 

My point here: try not insult a group of people just to compliment one. You don’t have to like a certain frontwoman or musician with an X-chromosome, but don’t disrespect them and judge an entire mass of people because of what the media has forced down your throat. We’re all people here. Don’t be a dick.

I haven’t been writing lately. I’ve been too busy, too set on the future with hopes high. My writing suffers when I do not and so (subconsciously, I think) I perpetuate this cycle of highs and lows. It seems that, in my world at least, without pain, I have no driving need to change the world around me. None of this makes any sense to me. I’ve been driven lately, though, right? No. I’ve been distracted from reality. Distracted by nothing that I can surely grasp. I blame my hormones for my mood swings…but why can’t this just be normal? Understood? Why can’t we all just know how to deal with this? 

I am an absolute control freak. I must know and understand all things. I must also handle everything because “if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” 

I never thought I had issues with trust until now. It has nothing to do with jealousy in love and relationships…I completely trust that my husband will be faithful to me. I’ve trusted each of my prior boyfriends until they have blatantly wronged me. So why is it so easy for me to trust in fidelity and loyalty but not in capability? Why do I have  constant anxiety about not being listened to, heard and understood? Why do I always turn to blaming sexism? I’ve been surrounded by great men my entire life. I was blessed with a strong connection to my father, was close with my older brothers, their friends and was constantly ganged up on by my girlfriends. I didn’t have substantial relationships with many women and so in turn, I grew very close with the men in my life and these men would lay down their lives for me. I was ALWAYS protected. So why in the world would I have any reason at all to jump to sexism each time a man wrongs me or seemingly has his own interest at heart? When women betray me, I pass it off as typical misbehavior…

…am I the sexist one?

Dammit. 

For something that I have preached so much about, it turns out that I am the culprit of my own malevolence.

The clouds sure do turn darker when you realize that you’ve constructed them by your own hand.

I’m just generally angry about the lack of respect in the music industry. In performers. In listeners. In general. I’m angry that some so called “musicians” in these trendy metalcore bands are all the rage. And you know, some of these musicians are tremendously talented and intelligent, and they may even desire to take a different approach to their music, but the vast majority of them follow this trend because they know it will put them in the spotlight. They know that their merchandise will be put up on Hot Topic’s wall as soon as you can say “sellout”. 

The other huge wave that has been devouring our bars and clubs in the last few years is indie folk pop. I actually enjoy a lot of these acts, but how many of them sound EXACTLY the same? 

And punk…I don’t proclaim to be an expert in this subject (i know how touchy you hardcore kids are) but I could go on for days about the new wave of punk and hardcore emerging above ground these days. And now with the reunion of Verse, Refused and At The Drive In, (and maybe I’m over-ambitious when I say this) the punk scene has potential like we haven’t seen since the genre was born in the early 80’s. I owe so much of my inspiration to bands that stem from this, but the fact that respect is near to non-existent in this community for other genre’s of music or bands in the SAME community makes me want nothing to do with this highbrow crowd. 

The punk kids hate the metal kids. The metal kids hate the punk kids. The folk-inspired hipsters who are hung up on these God damn bands that have predominantly tried to recreate the 60’s while fashionably representing the early 90’s snub and talk shit about everyone who isn’t like them. Fuck you. Oppress your feelings, pretend like anger isn’t an emotion that you were doomed with and keep your intellectual noses in the air under your thick rimmed glasses, spitting on anyone who has the nerve to admit that they really didn’t see that one band in that one basement before they were mentioned in that one magazine. By the way, your “subculture” is obviously not so alternative if half of your generation looks like you. 

I don’t get it. Where is the vision? Why are we still bowing down to unoriginal versions of the same band we’ve seen 467 times? I’m just angry and I won’t pretend that I’m above this. I’m not. We’re not.

And I’m still outraged by the gender issue. Just because I was blessed with a uterus does not mean that I can’t throw down. In fact, my estrogen gives me more fire than most of my male counterparts. My body was created to endure the pain of bearing another human being; I can handle myself. The fact that I am judged strictly because of my sex pushes me to work even harder to prove that maybe I am a maniac. 

The comparisions. THE COMPARISONS.

“You’re like Everytime I Die but with a chick!” Fuck you. We’re like Fine Fine Titans. Look, you may mean that as a compliment, and trust me, we love the music that band creates. However, I’m sure Everytime I Die would not appreciate the 12+ years they’ve spent evolving their sound to be used as an association to a band that’s only been together for a year and a half that actually doesn’t sound remotely like them. 

“Haley Williams” What? Really? A mainstream, pop-punk band with strictly clean vocals? I really adore her, but the only thing I have in common with Haley Williams is that we’re both chicks. WEIRD, RIGHT?! 

I get it. People tend to analyze music and correlate it to the sounds their ears have heard before. Vision also has a lot to do with this, unfortunately. We just LOVE to compare, contrast and criticize anything we think have a small knowledge base on. It’s human nature. I appreciate when people try to compliment us using identifiable bands, but I know the pendulum swings both ways. So seriously, stop comparing. Turn off that folder in your head that you’ve filed every band you’ve ever heard in and stay in the moment with us.

Sure, call me a hypocrite because I just said that a million bands sound the same and then yell “don’t you dare say we sound like this band!” It’s true. I’m a hypocrite, maybe. However, my goal is not to mimic the sound of other’s, so if it does, we’ve failed.

At least I’m trying. We’re trying. 

We must be listening to different worlds of music. What I get from this is that Metal is solely based around a grueling and an aggressive screaming vocal style, and outside of that, no other vocal style fits and will easily be grouped in with “nu-metal.” Maybe we should take a short look at Metal’s history?

Heavy Metal began with bands such as Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. Robert Plant set the stage with his melodic, upper-register powerhouse vocals. He was named the “Greatest Metal Vocalist of All Time” according to Hit Parader in 2006 (still very relevant) and various other sources such as Rolling Stone. 

As Aerosmith led the way and paved a path for Hair Metal in the 80’s, bands such as Poison, Twisted Sister and Warrant took over the scene with their glam rock style, power ballads and music that offered melodic vocals. Not only did a lot of these bands LOOK like girls, staunchly covered in layers of makeup, long, delicately styled hair and tight feminine clothes, but some of the vocalist actually could have been confused for women due to their high-pitched vocals.

We enter the 90’s with Avante Garde Metal with the likes of (just to name a small variety) The Number Twelve Looks Like You with their spuratic, high-pitch shouts and screams, The Mars Volta with their melodic vocals, also mainly sung in an upper register, and Mr. Bungle.

What Mike Patton - the almighty God of Music - did for vocals (along with so many other aspects) in metal music is revolutionary. He killed a pre-conceived notion or standard in vocals with his effects ranging from operatic and heavy melodic swooning (hear: Pink Cigarette) to spuratic churping, screaming, shouting, and even Gregorian Chanting featured in “Goodbye Sober Day.”

With Mike Pattons direct influence in the forthcoming music, even his vocals in Faith No More, falling a bit short of Metal for the time, inspired the likes of Nu-Metal with his hip-hop vocals against screaming metal riffs.

Speaking of Nu-Metal…again, we may be living on different planets. With Nu-Metal making it’s wave in the late 90’s with bands like Limp Bizkit, Korn and Papa Roach, I can’t draw the connection to their rap-rock style and a female singing melodically against electric guitars.

When we take a look at sub-genres such as Death Metal, Doom Metal, Grindcore and Thrash Metal, there is no doubt that screaming/shouting/aggressive vocal styles take precedence against a more melodic approach, but many bands have bridged the gap and  still weave intermittently between the two, be it male or female. If you take a look at today’s very popular Metalcore wave, it’s everywhere. And many of these male vocalist sing, again, in their upper-registers, just as Robert Plant so diligently paved the way to do so.

So, no, I don’t believe this argument holds merit. Screaming, while valuable to metal and hardcore music, is not essential to it’s existence. And if you “can’t take it seriously” because it is a female singing, well that, my friend, is sexism.