My Top Ten... 80's Rock Queens.

 Thanks to work and a few health issues blogging hasn't really been a priority lately. Sorry about that.

Anyway, I haven't done a Top Ten in a while so I thought I'd introduce you to some cool music.

  Now I'm about to do something most female musicians absolutely hate, which is lump together a disparate bunch of  artists based purely on their gender. I apologise for that but I'm hoping the music will make up for it.  Some are well-known, some...not so much.
So, in no particular order, here's ten of my favourite 80s rock/metal songs that have female vocals.


I got told off for my AOR list not including Heart so..

Heart - Who Will You Run To? (1987)

The Wilson sisters seem to have disowned their "Big Hair and Cleavage" era and I think that's a real shame. This track, for instance, features a massive chorus, a spiffing solo and a typically faultless turn from Ann Wilson.

   Honour to: emimusic

From one of the all-time greats to a lady who really should have been a bigger star.

Joanna Dean - She's Been Hearing About Me (1989)

I always loved rummaging through the cheapo "10 for a tenner" box in 2nd hand record shops.
Granted, I had to wade through a zillion copies of Kylie's first album and godawful German Europop but I sometimes found some real gems. "Misbhehavin." - sadly Ms. Dean's only solo album -  is prime good-time, barroom rock with a wink in it's eye and a bottle of whiskey stashed behind the drumkit for later.She does a good  great version of "Gimme shelter " too.

 Honour to: Daemonja81

Warlock - Speed of Sound (1986)

There's plenty of young women who got into the pages of Kerrang through their looks and willingness to appear in their underwear. As most of them subsequently found, metal fans might buy the first album based on a pin-up but if the music sucked, they wouldn't be back for a second.

Anybody else remember Lisa Dominique? Susie Hatton?  Gypsy Queen? My point exactly.

Meanwhile Warlock's Doro Pesch - now solo - continues to make Metal to this day. 

  Honour to: minerka93

The next four bands are all-female outfits. I may use the word "underrated" rather a lot.

Let's start with one of the first all-female Heavy Metal bands. And they're British!

You know who I'm talking about.

Girlschool - C-mon Let's Go (1981)

A barnstorming track powered from the back by the underrated Denise Dufort while the late Kelly Johnson makes her axe growl.

 Honour to: ThrashMetal1988

Next up, we have more NWOBHM.

Rock Goddess - My Angel (1983)

Jodie Turner had a ferocious throat on her and, as we shall see, wasn't too shabby at the guitar either. 

Despite playing Reading Festival at least twice, Jodie and her gals never quite made the leap into the big time. Like I said, "underrated" is a word that comes to mind a lot during this post.

Honour to: englishnbloodyproudo

Alright, so you've probably heard of this lot.

Vixen - Edge of  A Broken Heart  (1988)

  I can actually remember the first time I discovered this band. Me and a mate of mine were wandering through town when we turned a corner and there was a bloody great poster promoting this very single. I'm not ashamed to admit, I spent several minutes gawping at it. 

 Mind you, I can also remember guitarist Jan Kuehnemund being quite well thought of as a musician. 

 The band released one more album, split, reformed minus Kuehnemund, split, reformed with Kuehnemund back in the fold but with a new bassist, fell apart again and last time I checked, Jan Kuehnemund and a gang of hired hands were touring as "Vixen" while the other three were set to play Nottingham's Firefest as "JSRG - featuring 3 original members of Vixen."

 I'd quite like to see any version of Vixen live but I'm hoping the original lineup will give it another go at some point.

Where was I? 

Oh yes. 

Listen to this. It's quite a good song.

Honour to: emimusic

Moving eastward now, and a group I discovered through the soundtrack

 to an anime I can't even remember the name of.

Show-Ya - Watashi Ga Arashi (1989)

   A band that never really caught on outside Japan but depending on who you ask, at home they were right up there with Japanese metal heavyweights Vow Wow and Loudness. 

  After my first selection fell off Youtube, it was an easy choice for the track to replace it. This rocking track is off the "Outerlimits" album and as a bonus, Miki Igarashi and Satomi Senba do that synchronised guitar spinning thing. I think it's cool anyway.

Honour to: MetalQueens

What's that? The bands I've put up so far aren't heavy enough for you?

Alright then, wreck yer neck to this:

Acid - The Day You Die (1984)

I'm not going to pretend I know a lot about this Belgian outfit. 

I've heard a few of their songs and this one I really liked. 

See what you think.

Honour to: musicload2

See if you can work out who produced the next track.

Romeo's Daughter - Heaven In The Backseat (1988)

 I was originally going to post "Cry myself to sleep at night" but that's a bit too mellow to hang with the others on this page. Whereas this song is...probably a bit on the poppy side for some tastes but I like this band and last time I checked, this was my blog. So arseholes.

In case you're wondering about the video, this song is off the "Nightmare on Elm Street V" soundtrack. I have no idea how.

Honour to: xxxxxSlyderxxxxx

And finally, a young lady who got to star in a film with Bob Dylan and Rupert Everett.

Fiona - Keeper Of The Flame (1986)

Out of Fiona's 4 albums before her long sabbatical from the music biz, my favourite is 1986 effort "Beyond The Pale", which has some real crackers.  Why somebody decided to ignore them and release the much weaker "Living in a boys world" as the single instead is beyond me. To add insult to injury, "Keeper of the flame" was relegated to the b-side.

 Fiona definitely deserved a more successful career than she got.

 Honour to: Michael Derek

  That wraps it up for another top ten. There's other songs I could have posted and certainly other artists. I just know somebody's going to ask why I didn't have any Pat Benatar. Then there's Black Lace, Femme Fatale, Precious Metal, Karen Lawrence, Princess Pang, Lee Aaron...

  

If you have any ideas for a top ten you want to see, just pop it in the comments box and I'll see what I can do. 

 That's all, folks.