Top 10 Female Fronted Metal Bands

It doesn’t exactly take a brain surgeon to figure out that traditionally speaking, Heavy Metal has been a men’s sport for the most part. Throughout most of its early years, females were relegated to either some kind of groupie status or as eye candy in music videos. These days, bands like Arch Enemy, Nightwish, and Light This City are getting as much fan and critical attention as their male counterparts. In other words, the scene has come a long way from having women just being hood ornaments in videos. The Gauntlet has compiled a list of the best female fronted metal bands of the last 30 years. We are fully aware that these things are subjective but we probably know more about it than you do. So go ahead and send your hate mail our way!

Hellion

Fronted by Los Angeles firebrand, Ann Boleyn, Hellion played the kind of straight-up Metal that brought buzz for bands like Warrior and Armored Saint in the early 1980s. Songs like "Bad Attitude" and “Break the Spell” sparked with slow-burning guitars, hook heavy choruses but it was Boleyn's voice that made their material so memorable. The singer was even a D.I.Y. pioneer. After the band's record deals started falling apart, she took actions into her own hands by launching New Renaissance Records. The label helped launch the careers of Flotsam & Jetsam, Prong, and Sepultura among others in the process.

Warlock

You have to give Warlock credit, when the band started out in 1980, having a female fronting a Heavy Metal band was a pretty unorthodox and tough thing
to pull off in the scene's obviously macho climate. When the band did start getting attention from the Metal press, it was usually directed at lead singer, Doro Pesch's looks. That quickly changed when they released their Burning the Witches album in 1984. Suddenly, the German band was garnering raves for their Judas Priest and Scorpions informed songwriting and not just Pesch's T&A. Too bad her later solo output failed to deliver on Warlock's promise.

Fuck The Facts

Fuck The Facts' Mel Mongeon doesn't really qualify as a singer. Her shrieking vocal style comes off more like the sound of a pig getting strangled with barbed wire (if you can even imagine that) than it does actual singing. Luckily for her, she sings for one of the most twisted tech-grind bands lurking the underground today. Fuck The Facts' upcoming Disgorge Mexico album should put them in the same league as Grindcore greats like Assück, Pig Destroyer, and Brutal Truth.

Lacuna Coil

Yeah yeah, we know Cristina Scabbia is gorgeous! How can you miss her with all of the magazine covers she's been plastered on in the last five years. But what gets her and Lacuna Coil on this list is their winning sound clash of Scabbia's arena-ready vocal melodies and Cristiano Migliore and Marco Biazzi's down-tuned guitars. Look no further than 2002's "Heaven Is A Lie" if you don't believe it.

Détente

In the late 1980s, practically every Heavy Metal magazine was singing the praises of Détente. The band's no-nonsense brand of mid-tempo Thrash was competent enough but it was Dawn Crosby's Punk-informed vocal snarls were the key to their power. After their Roadrunner Records debut failed to succeed in the charts, the band splintered with members going on to form Fear of God who never really did anything spectacular in any regard. Guitarist, Ross Robinson went on to produce headliners like Slipknot, Korn, and The Cure becoming a millionaire in the process. Sadly, Crosby died in 1996 from liver failure due to years of alcohol and drug abuse.

The Gathering

This Dutch band's 1995 release, Mandylion, helped spearhead a movement. For better or for worse, it helped inspire a movement of female fronted Metal bands that mixed elements of Goth Rock’s lyrical and visual feel, keyboard heavy melodies, and Prog Rock pomp. But don’t hold that against The Gathering. Lead by new singer, Anneke van Giersbergen, the band took their by-the-numbers Death Metal into a whole new original and thrilling direction on Mandylion. Anneke’s ethereal singing style was a revelation and lifted the arrangements beyond any categorization limitation. It’s not their fault bands like Nightwish suck so badly!

Black Knight

This obscure Canadian band never really made an impact in any commercial sense but it wasn’t because their music didn’t deserve the accolades. Their Ronnie James Dio era Black Sabbath influenced Master of Disaster is brimming with anthemic Metal of the highest order! It’s a shame that singer Lori Wilde didn’t front another band after this as her voice was built for this kind of stuff.

13

This Brooklyn, NY band not only sounded just like Eyehategod, their vocalist, Alicia Morgan even dated their singer Michael Williams. Wait, the connections don't stop there! The bands shared a split 7" and Morgan went on to pen the liner notes to an Eyehategod compilation album. Either way, 13 did what they did so fucking well; you can't simply dismiss the band because of the hero worship. Besides, they weren't the only band in the early 90s who ran with Eyehategod's formula. What set them apart from the pack was the utter conviction and disdain in Morgan's death-grunts.

Girlschool

I could go on about how stellar their Running Wild and Demolition albums are but I'll just say that Lemmy loves them and that's enough for us!

Acid King

When you name your band after a satanic killer's nickname, (check out the book Say You Love Satan which deals with the Judas Priest suicide scandal) chances are you're doing things right! Acid King's potent marriage of Black Sabbath schooled guitars and anvil-like Doom Metal makes this power-trio a must for any hesher's CD collection. Lead-singer/guitarist, Lori S. is like Stoner Rock's female version of Wino of The Obsessed/St. Vitus.

Date: Jun 06, 2008
As Reported by: Carlos Ramirez

Tags: top 10, female fronted bands, lacuna coil, warlock, female

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Comments

igb - 2008-08-25 14:42:32
What about Joan Jett?

Dorian - 2008-07-06 11:08:16
where is kittie

Roman - 2008-06-22 10:50:02
Yeaaah!! Acid King!!!

Joe Mexican - 2008-06-09 22:34:33
where the hell is otep and arch enemy

snowy white - 2008-06-06 23:32:47
No, I'm not gonna be too critical of your list as you're about 60% accurate. Obviously GIRLSCHOOL, WARLOCK,DETENTE,HELLION, and LACUNA COIL deserve to be any list such as this but some others just haven't accomplished enough just yet. To the KITTIE haters here, remember they do have a gold album, which more than qualifies them. You're also missing the elephant in the living room, The RUNAWAYS. Finally, don't get too cocky with the "we know more than you" crap. Check out my podcast at www.radioactivemetal.net and check out the latest episode. They're not called "Snowy's Angels" for nothing.

kornkrazed - 2008-06-06 14:07:38
what the hell! where's Arch Enemy, Walls of Jericho, and Evanescence? that's just messed up!

steiner666 - 2008-06-06 12:56:34
Right, I get that it's just a matter of opinion(s) for the most part, but there has to be some statistical way to judge a bands greatness that's universally accepted. I mean, back to the baseball comparison, you'd have to have stats of some sort... (number of games won, points scored, RotY player numbers) to be able to compare and the top teams with. And I think some of these bands would be more along the lines of little league...

chief_wiggum - 2008-06-06 11:38:14
Arch Enemy is a run of the Mill band. They are good, not great. With a list like this being an OPINION, one needs to take with a grain of salt and not as fact. Besides, me being a Red Sox fan, i'd surely leave the Yankees off a list of top American League Teams.

steiner666 - 2008-06-06 11:21:15
How the FUCK do you list Lacuna Coil and fucking Girlschool in the "Top 10" and only mention Arch Enemy in passing and completely leave out Otep? Some of the listed bands can hardly even be considered "metal". They're tin foil in comparison to the lead-heaviness and melodic brutality of Arch Enemy. I know we're all entitled to opinions, and I've usually agreed with you on most of the other "top 10" lists on the gauntlet, as well as on some of the other more subjective/opinionated articles. I just think this ones atrocious. It's like making a list of the top american baseball teams and leaving out the Yankees just to piss off the fans.