Submitted for your discussion: Women and Emo

[blue-russian.livejournal.com]

Someone in The Other Place noted with disapproval the absence of women on the bill at the Reading Festival this year, (compared to women and mixed-gender bands from, say, a decade ago) and discussion quickly devolved into one aobut sexism in music.

I don't follow emo at all, but based simply on my scanning of music mags, the web, etc., it suddenly struck me that one reason for the lack of women is probably the fact that emo bands are so popular now, and every one of the bands that jump to mind are all-male. Is this just my ignorance of the scene? Or am I correct in somehow thinking that emo is a VERY male music?

Comments

[juror8.livejournal.com]

Opening post would be to suggest that although emo is one of the most masculine genres in terms of band membership for a very long time (since nu-metal, at least), it also has probably the highest female listenership of any genre (Kerrang is the only music magazine with more female readers than male). So perhaps we're looking at the same correlation as we did with boybands in the mid to late 90s. Teenage girls don't want to listen to slightly older girls.

[poptasticuk.livejournal.com]

That's exactly what I was about to say, emo bands are to my 15 yr old sister what boybands were to me at that age (well, younger really but emo fans are getting increasingly younger too). Her room is covered from floor to ceiling in posters, she spends all day gossiping with friends about which is the hottest band member. It's scarily similar, and very depressing - if this is how these kids think music is supposed to sound then how awful is the music industry going to be when they're old enough to get jobs in it. Definitely moving to Sweden after that thought.