Would you agree that female vocalists, and female pop artists in general, are always so...dare I say it...vain? It's not a function of being female, though, it's a function of having an over-bloated sense of self-entitlement. It just seems this happens amongst female vocalists than it does male vocalists.

I mean, c'mon, think about it. Beyonce, Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, what do they all have in common, side from the fact that their music is all manufactured? They all go by their names - or stage names. No significant mention of anyone who's working in the background, doing all the instrumentation, if you can even call it that; you have to check out the liner notes to find out who worked 'behind the scenes.' They're like, "It's all about ME, bitch!"

Contrast that with groups who have females in their groups, as vocalists, but consist of other members who actually play instruments as well, E.g., say, Cobra Starship, or Nightwish. They have female vocalists, but plenty of other male instrumentalists, who probably tell their vocalist, "Hey, it's not just about YOU, it's about US!"

I don't know, what do you think? What's a determinant whether vocalists go with their names - or stage names - or end up going with a group name?

Totally, let's talk about Nightwish's Tarja Turunen. Her leech of a husband and manager (who she was stupid enough to sign her power of atorney over to) basically destroyed Nightwish from the inside out until they fired her. I totally believe Tuomas and the other band members take on what lead up to it and how Tarja thought more about what Nightwish took away from her than gave her. Who would even know the name Tarja Turunen if it wasn't for Nightwish?

Also, to those people who said Nightwish couldn't survive without Tarja and that she was the band - &^%$ you for underestimating the importance of Tuomas' songwriting had in their success. You can't be a hero without a fool to fight.

I saw them in concert (the 2004 Once Tour) before Tarja left so I'm glad for that, but once she said she didn't want to tour the US again because they didn't make enough money to justify it, I was totally done caring about her.

Yeesh. Yeah, I'd forgotten all about that *dark* business surrounding Nightwish (no pun intended); so many mainstream groups have such falling out with each other, especially within the genres of punk, heavy metal, and rock in general, so it seems, 'cuz they're always so passionate as musicians.

And, Tuomas, hasn't he since passed on? I remember in the first track of Dark Passion Play, they mention the death of a Tuomas...I remember that, after I got that album, I liked them so much that I actually bothered to look up their biography!

Tarja's since gone into making music by herself, as I understand, just using her own name...

I like Annette Olzon though, she's good vocalist.

this post is incomplete without mention of Gwen Stefani. She has seen success in a band (No Doubt) and with a solo career.

I also think she's a great singer and her work in No Doubt is awesome.

This thread has reminded me that the Joan Jett-produced biographical film "The Runaways" is coming soon.  Early reviews from Sundance appear to be quite positive -- THR's review, for instance.  Cherry Bomb!

That reminds me of the only thing I've read about the film so far:

http://jam.canoe.ca/Music/Artists/R/Rus … 1-qmi.html

I find it a bit challenging to imagine the guys from Rush seriously picking on anyone else, but I guess there's always someone lower in the pecking order

No dude, Tuomas is still among the living; the following is completely methaphorical:

"Today, in the year of our Lord, 2005
Tuomas was called from the cares of the world
He stopped crying at the end of each beautiful day.
The music he wrote had too long been without silence.
He was found naked and dead,
With a smile in his face, a pen and 1000 pages of erased text."

I think the above lines have to due with the fact that Tuomas considered Dark Passion Play "the album that saved his life."

But yeah, their biography is on my nightstand. I've yet to get to it since I'm so tied up in Breath of Fire III at the moment.

Well, there are plenty of male vocalists that carry the name of their band as well.  Look at any American Idol contestant (e.g., Adam Lambert, Daughtry, David Cook), Justin Timberlake, most rappers, etc.  Heck, "Weird Al" Yankovic has had a relatively fixed set of bandmates for years, but it's his name on the label.

As an aside, what does "solo career" even mean these days?  Does it mean that you work with session musicians instead of a fixed set of band members?  Or are you actually doing everything yourself (songwriting, instrumentation, vocals)?

i remember one of the guys in weird al's band was credited as John "Bermuda" Schwartz,,('83-'87,, don't know or care about now)

This is how I go about defining this:

If a group carries the name of its most prominent member (which is usually the singer) they're an "artist" - not a "band." "Artists" may have permanent musicians they record and travel with, but no one really cares about them - thus "band" is too generous. There are exceptions to this, like a well-known player like Zack Wylde being on most "Ozzy Osbourne" albums after a certain point, but then he's got his own stuff like Black Label Society.

"Bands" are groups of musicians where the fans actually know the names of all the players. Again, there may be prominent musicians that are more or less are the band - like if Tony Kakko left Sonata Arctica that would be the end of Sonata Arctica since he writes 99% of the material - but fans actually come to know everyone by name, and when someone leaves, it's actually a big deal and talked about.

Bermuda has been there pretty much since day one, and there've been zero lineup changes unless you count adding Ruben as a full-time keyboard player.

Yeah, I can go along with that. Problem is, the number of bands with a stable member line-up is extremely limited in number, past and present, so I tend to listen first and then get attached to individual members for the albums they show up in. I've had a lot of fun following the members of Deep Purple recently. >_< Then again, most bands, the only components I usually care about are the singers and the guitarists (occasionally the drummer, but outside of the famous Cliff Burton and Michael Anthony examples -okay, MAYBE Dave Ellefson, glad he's back in Megadeth recently-, no other bass players come to mind).

I would just like to point out that not only does Justin Timberlake not have a "band", but he writes his own music, does his own vocals, plays piano and guitar, and dances on top of it all.  I'm pretty sure he has a very heavy hand in the entire performance of all his shows.  In a pop industry full of talentless garbage (Lady Gaga?), he is probably the one true musician in all of them.  And on top of that he's a pretty solid comedian/actor (Saturday Night Live stuff with that Lonely Island guy, SNL skits, those Sony commercials and Alpha Dog was actually a really good movie).

I don't really agree with the vanity idea either.  The reason these artists go with their stage name is because they ARE the performance.  You can argue that pop music may not be good right now, it's overproduced, what have you.  I won't argue that.  But all the behind the scenes work is second to their performance.  Dancing and singing (or even lip syncing) are pretty much the total package.  Sure, you can appreciate the choreography or the guy playing the drums or guitar in the backdrop, or maybe the visuals in the video, but what it comes down to is that one person is selling the music (product).  I can come up with tons of examples off the top of my head of artists who use their name and are actually good musicians and business people.

Michael Jackson (The Jackson Five, then solo)
Bruce Springsteen (Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, and solo)
Gloria Estefan (Miami Sound Machine, then solo)
Whitney Houston (solo only afaik)
Mariah Carey (solo only afaik)

The list goes on.

I think that it really just comes down to a matter of what it really consists of.  The people mentioned above hit a point in their career where they realized THEY were the band.  There is nothing wrong with breaking off and doing your own thing or just dropping the band title and continuing to make music.

Oh, snap.

I just find it funny that for all the reasons he likes Timberlake (basically, he can make his own music), he has the balls to call out Lady Gaga, who *gasp* ALSO WRITES HER OWN MUSIC.

Did you not know that before Lady Gaga had her own career, she was a songwriter for a number of other artists. The girl can write her own music, and she can dance well, and she's got her own thing going. Don't hate.

I actually thought it was pretty funny, although I was thinking about some of those weird-ass get-ups she wears looking like garbage.

Sebastian Bach (skid row) is on celebrity boot camp.. man he looks like ass now...
that's what 40 years of drinking and smoking will do to you...

True, too bad Skid Row is nothing without him... "you can't be the king of the world if you slave to the grind"