It seems like for every female-fronted rock band you come across, there are 50 male-fronted bands. You don’t see very many of them in such a male-dominated industry. I give a lot of credit to Amy Lee for setting a standard and sticking to her guns over how she wants her music to be done, and in a recent interview with Billboard, she admits she has “fought so many fights” and she feels like she’s “won most of them.”
Getting started in the industry as a woman wasn’t easy for her. From Billboard, she explains,
“It was sometimes difficult to distinguish the difference between just being treated like a young idiot – you know, ‘You’re just a kid, everybody knows better than you’ – and being treated that way because I was female,” recalls Lee of her beginnings in the industry. “I learned as I got more experienced, and a lot of it was because I’m a female. People naturally see us as the softer sex that’s going to step aside and let the men do the real work, so there’ve been plenty of times when I’ve had to look at that, recognize it, and go, ‘No, this is what’s going to happen, because I’m positive that I’m right, and it’s my art and you’re not going to change it.’ ”
And because of this attitude and mindset, she’s become a success, and has been for the last fifteen plus years.
Not only she’s set an example for women everywhere, but other successful female rockers. From Billboard, a couple of our favorites:
“The fact that she’s still [recording] and still dominating the rock world is amazing. She took rock n’ roll and she put a female voice in it and didn’t try to be anyone else. She really created her own identity, and that’s something any woman should look up to. She mixed pop to rock to opera to metal, [combined] them and made a really unique balance that hadn’t been heard before.” -Taylor Momsen
“She showed me an open door — no pun intended — because up until she blew up the radio, I was largely the only female rocker in my area. A lot of industry folks just didn’t believe a girl rock band could get on radio. So when Amy proved them all wrong, it showed everyone that I wasn’t crazy for pursuing this career.” -Lzzy Hale
Great interview from Billboard here. It’s very inspiring to hear her words and realize that she stood her ground. Give it a read!
