Inspired by this post, I wanted to make a post asking about your favorite metal bands with women in them and maybe your favorite release from them too.
For me, that’d be Crypta. They’re a Brazilian Death Metal band made up of only women. Their Shades of Sorrow album is absolutely incredible with some really mean vocals and great riffing.
Throwing some support in for Nightwish. They’ve some good shit.
Ghost Love Score, the live at Wacken version, is top tier material.
I feel like “Once” is the album where filler tracks started creeping into Nightwish, but “Ghost Love Score” is the Nightwish song. It’s spectacular.
Gotta mention Spiritbox. Courtney is one of the most celebrated modern metalcore singers.
In the realm of epic/symphonic metal you probably can’t throw a stone without hitting an amazing female vocalist. Simone Simons from Epica, Nightwish’s Floor Jansen, Sharon den Adel (Within Temptation), and Zora Cock for Blackbrariar are the first that come to mind.
For folk metal there’s Eluveitie with two members and Folkstone with I think one.
Very worth mentioning is Alyssa and her harsh vocals, from Arch Enemy.
While she’s not been a member in a long while, I have to mention Vibeke Stene as the vocalist from Tristania, maybe my all time favorite.
For all female bands there’s Girlschool, and you could say Babymetal, even if they have more members playing with them since I don’t know how permanent they are.
Others that I know of but haven’t really listened much by would be Jinjer and Halestorm.
That’s what I can think of off the top of my head, but there’s so much more.
Edit: I almost forgot but I have to add: Amy Lee from Evanescence and Cristina Scabbia from Lacuna Coil.
Lmfao Arch Enemy was the first band that made me go “woah wait that’s a woman?”
Arch Enemy fucking rocks. Angela and Alyssa are both badass and are probably my first time seeing a woman do harsh vocals like that.
Outside of some other bands that other users have already mentioned, one band I’m aware of is a Swedish metal band called All Ends. It’s been a while since I’ve listened to them but I know about them because the lead singer worked with Crush 40 for the final boss theme from Sonic and the Black Knight.
There are some other bands that I’m going to mention but they don’t exclusively make metal (or at least I think, I haven’t heard all of their music yet). And yes, they are all bands who make remixes of music from the Touhou games, which their is probably more artists I could mention but I have either forgotten them or just haven’t listened to them yet.
The Other Flower, I almost forgot about this artist, Karma is great example of their music.
Akatsuki Records, Bloody Devotion is a great example of their music.
Undead Corporation, The Dream Of A Rabbit Singing In The Night is a good example of their music but I know that they do have music that is much “heavier”.
Get In The Ring, while the title says it’s “rock” despite the fact that it’s clearly metal, 祭炎 is a good example of their music.
Sound Holic, because I don’t use Spotify anymore, I have forgotten what the best example would be. The song I’ve been listening to the most that is at least partially metal is Grip & Break down.
A-One, while I know that they are primarily a eurobeat artist, they often mix other genres into their music. An example of a song that mixes metal with eurobeat is God Only knows, which is from Initial D the Arcade (2021).
There is one more that I want to mention but I don’t know if the example I have is “heavy” enough to be considered metal or if it’s just “orchestral rock”. It’s 蒼月の懺悔詩～Universal Nemesis by Yonder Voice. They might have heavier but as I stated earlier, I haven’t heard all of their music yet.
Spiritbox
Jinjer
Make Them Suffer
Arch Enemy
Lucrecia
Poppy
Within Temptation
Babymetal
Harper
Those are the ones I listen to, in no particular order
There’s a ton of great women in metal, I’ll drop two.
Mares of Thrace, Calgary AB based sludge/post/hardcore 2 piece, guitarist/vocalist is part of the original lineup, it’s heavy and catchy.
I really like Hulder, black metal solo project, some of her early demos are amazing, this version of Into The Crypt of Rays comes to mind, got a wall flag of the art from this in my office.
Year of the Cobra! A husband/wife stoner/doom distorted bass/drums duo. They just came out with their 3rd album last month. Surprisingly great for only having two members.
Singers:
Amanda Somerville (Trillum, Exit Eden, Kiske/Somerville)
Marcela Bovio (Stream of Passion, Mayan, Dark horse/White horse)
Bands:
Kobra and the Lotus - Heavy Rock
Stream of Passion - Progressive Metal
Tardigrade Inferno - Cabaret Metal
Volturian - Symphonic/Pop Metal
If you like Doom Metal you have to listen to Witch Mountain.
TL/DR: Elena Siegman’s vocals for the Call of Duty: Zombies soundtracks are some of my favorite metal vocals ever.
Not that Call of Duty needs more publicity obviously, but I love the story of how Kevin Sherwood and Elena Siegman got to be the names they are today behind the CoD: Zombies metal soundtrack.
Basically they were both audio engineers working on CoD: World at War and when it was decided (late into crunch time) that Zombies would be a featured bonus mode in the game, the directors wanted to add musical easter eggs into each of the maps, both the one planned for release and the 3 expansions.
Sherwood and Siegman got to work on writing the music and recording vocals respectively, but it wasn’t until they were working on the 3rd song that Sherwood decided they really ought to have some harsh, metal vocals in their metal soundtrack. He asked Siegman how they could manage that and if they would need distortion, and Siegman was like “I’ve never tried harsh vocals before, but I’m game.”
Thus, Beauty of Annihilation was born. Fast forward to later games and Siegman is a fan favorite element of the CoDZ series. My personal favorites are BoA, Coming Home, and Pareidolia
Babymetal comes to mind, but I also want to shout out Sandra Nasić of the Guano Apes for her appearance on Apocalyptica’s Path Vol. 2. Also highschool me would kill me if I didn’t mention Nightwish. Tarja Turenen was a formative part of my music taste, and 10th man Down, Kinslayer, Dead Gardens, and Creek Mary’s Blood all still sit in my favorites list
Sandra Nasić of the Guano Apes for her appearance on Apocalyptica’s Path Vol. 2.
This song came to mind for me too. Cult is Apocalyptica’s best album, but that song basically ruined my ability to enjoy it as it was made because putting it on straight-up I’m immediately disappointed by the lack of vocals in track 1.
There was another track from that album that they reworked to add a guest vocalist to, I think track 8, but that one didn’t hit me as an improvement over the original.
Visions Of Atlantis has two singers, male and female, with the female being the lead. I forget their names, and I know a quick google search would tell me, but I’m having trouble balancing this message and the steering wheel, plus this bowl of soup is REALLY hot.
I saw Visions open for Korpiklaani last May and quickly fell in love with them. Illumishade also opened, another band with a female vocalist.
That’s awesome, did they play Master The Hurricane? That song makes me speed in parking lots.
Some of my favorites are:
Delain (who I’m seeing live tonight!)
Nightwish
Xandria
Epica
Jinjer
Arch Enemy
The Agonist
Crypta
Blackbriar
Cellar Darling
Butcher Babies
Spiritbox
Eleine
In This Moment
Nervosa
Frantic Amber
Within Temptation
Infected Rain
Arkona - the best folk metal Hulder - great black metal
I’ll be seeing Arkona again in < two weeks!
Unleash the Archers, many good ones but I really like the album Apex and especially Shadow Guide and The Matriarch
A Sound of Thunder, Queen of hell and A Sound of Thunder might be my favorites but many greats imo
