Are there such things as ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ music?

Is music gender specific? In many artists, including mainstream artists such as Madonna for example, have created a feminist profile within their music; using slow, grinding beats, or chimes, whispering vocal effects and sexy dance rituals, it can be said that Madonna is purely a feminine icon, and even looks to empower the female population. According to some, heavy metal is extremely male dominated, even stretching back to the days of Led Zeppelin, Deep purple and The Rolling Stones, and portrays a more carnal, aggressive and chauvinist influence to the music. But within this essay, I wish to discuss the ever-growing topic of gender identity, and whether the connotations derived express a male or female attitude through music, lyrics, and visually dominated lifestyles or has it now been blurred? Is music, especially hip-hop, becoming tailored towards a ‘Unisex’ notion? I think that to tackle this, to start, we need to address the ideas of identity and social construction, and the placing of ourselves in the world through Myth.
The ideas of Femininity and Masculinity are socially constructed ideologies, or more commonly known as identities. Identities are formed from our place and view of ourselves within society, and differ from each person.
That said, people will discover new meanings and different identities within certain music’s, depending on the listeners circumstances or other leanings such as race, gender, social class, age and moral beliefs; everyone’s own experience creates a social construction. If social construction is identity, then identity is about becoming rather than being, and everything is subject to change. Identity is portrayed and coupled well with music, as they are both polysemic systems, open to interpretation. ‘Freedom is knowing that nothing is fixed.’ Keith Negus, a musical historian has said in broader terms that:
‘..It concerns a shift from essentialist ideas about cultural identity- that is, the notion that individuals of a particular social type possess certain essential characteristics are found ‘expressed’ in particular cultural practices- towards the idea that cultural identities are not fixed in any way but are actively created through particular communication processes, social practices and articulations within specific circumstances.’(Negus; 2004: 100). I want to step away from growing essentialist attitudes in modern music, and will discuss this in more detail next.

Identity theories also examine the way in which the subjective activities of listening and performing are influenced by objective social, economic and political conditions.’(Beard & Gloag; 2005; 88). First, I want to compare the sexual ideologies of two types of music’s; heavy rock, looking at Robert Walser’s ‘Running with the Devil’ and, to start with, ‘classic’ hip-hop, particularly Death Row Records.
In the early 1990’s, the American Hip-Hop market exploded as rappers such as Tupac, Snoop Doggy Dogg and Warren G came to prominence. Dr Dre was also seen as a particularly influential artist with his eponymous debut ‘The Chronic’. This had seen a change from the early gangster rap days of the early 1980’s where, NWA, a hyper-masculine, aggressive hip-hop band, would frequently make violent,



Chauvinist and derogatory remarks about Women and life (you heard about the bitch that got shot? / Fuck her/ you think I give a damn about a bitch / I ain’t
A sucker’ spits Easy-E in flagship NWA tune ‘Straight Outta Compton’). Challenged in the late half of the nineties by more relaxed, socially conscious and feminine inspired artists such as A Tribe Called Quest and De La Soul, these groups provided an alternative for the lesser masculine men, and of course, women could join in with jumpy, frolic beats, fun lyrics and a deep sense of rhythm and cultural force within the music. A Tribe called Quest focused mainly on jazzy breaks, overlaid with samples of horns, basses and live drummers; this is opposed to the straight up funk break beat, and purely repetitive bass heavy rhythms found in the music of NWA that expressed a burning want and right to life in the poor southern states of America. An angry, male lead rebellion, underpinned by historical structures of persecution within the notion of the Black Diaspora, and has carried the culturally significant traits and elements of traditional African music.
It was when Dr Dre, formally of NWA, released The chronic and Snoop Dogg released ‘Doggy style’ in 1994 that the bridge was beginning to be forged; femininized slow, groovy soul samples being mixed with hyper-masculine, aggressive and challenging lyrics, into a polysemic form which could be enjoyed by both men and women in different situations, created by their different social constructions. The connotations of the lyrics were sexually and aggressively charged, but the beats are far more relaxed and smoother than those of NWA.

Comparing this process of evolution to another completely different sphere of music, heavy metal is still looked upon by some as hyper masculine, performance led and visually dominated, just like it was back in the 70’s era of Led Zeppelin:

‘The story of how the sexuality expressed through the blues gradually mutated into heavy metal and hardcore rap is a long and curious one….the best and finest moments of blues-based white rock have arrived through creative misunderstandings of the subtexts of the music….Led Zeppelin come on like thermonuclear gang rape. The woman-who in muddy waters song is evoked as a real person with real emotions- is here reduced to a mere receptacle, whose sole function s to receive the great Zeppelin.’(Shaar-Murray; 2001: 75)

Focusing on a mutation of twelve bar blues structures, modern rock has taken the desires, heartaches and disdain that frequently appeared in blues music, and textualized it fully. But in disagreement to Murray’s heartfelt denunciation of rock music, I argue the birth of an identity, or a perception of ones identity is polysemic, just as the ideas and connotations that are derived from that music are. It is more about the politics, class boundaries and probably drugs and other social constructions that create Murray’s own perception of rock music. According to Robert Walser:
‘
Heavy metal articulates a dialectic of controlling power and transcendent freedom…. visually, metal musicians typically appear as swaggering males, leaping and strutting about the stage, clad in spandex, scarves, leather and other visually noisy clothing, punctuating their performances with phallic thrusts of guitars and microphone stands. The performers use hyper masculinity or androgyny as visual enactments of spectacular transgression.’ (Walser; 1993: 109)


In today’s modern metal scene, though, I feel that female interest has grown within the genre, adding female musicians and vocalists to the mix; the men wear baggy jeans, tight t-shirts and trimmed goatee beards, while singing about more universal problems and issues, all usually delivered in the vein of masculinity. In fact, persons whom some would describe as ‘deviants’ are also now accepted: ‘This can be seen for example, in the activities of the gay metal society, a social club based in Chicago…Gay fans celebrate metal musicians whom they believe are gay’ (Walser; 1998: 116). Speaking of women and their perception of this social construction of sexuality: ‘Female fans, which now make up half of the audience for heavy metal, are invited to identify with the powerful position that is constructed for them.’(Walser; 1993: 119) He goes on to elaborate,

‘Though Bon Jovi offered typical experiences of the metal dialectic of absolute control and transcendent freedom, lead singer Jon Bon Jovi also projected a kind of sincerity and romantic vulnerability that had enormous appeal for female fans….it helped transform what had long been a mostly male sub cultural genre into a much more popular style with a gender balanced audience’ (Walser; 1993: 120).

I want to digress slightly and to criticize Walser’s notion of subculture, as I do not believe that it was an ‘underground’ (sub) culture ever since the point in history when a certain person decided to make a sequence of noise. Applied to hip-hop, I do not think it was sub cultural after the funk parties being held in the warehouse district of New York became widely known. As soon as the records were released and the parties advertised, it absorbed into mainstream culture and was no longer ‘underground’. How can heavy metal have been a subculture before Bon Jovi, with the likes of Guns and Roses selling out world tour stadiums globally in the eighties?

Nevertheless, the main point is, in some cases, according to Mavis Bayton, author of ‘Frock rock’, that women are now performing more and more in popular music (its major explosion was the appearance of ‘riot grrl’ in 1991 in the states). ‘In the progressive rock period, instrumental virtuosity was required…punk simplified music…amateurishness and mistakes were in fashion. For this reason alone, many women who had previously lacked the confidence even to consider joining a band started performing…a key feature of ‘riot grrl’ was a confrontational attitude which challenged not only sexism but also the established political correctness of the 1990’s’ (Bayton; 1998: 64/75). Although Bayton is a woman herself, I do not agree with her essentialist view that women were naturally ready to be involved in a certain identity, but I agree with the idea of their personal constructions of society, forging a new style of rock music and cultural identity.
In the words of Keith Negus, who praises Walser, speaking of the riot grrl ‘sub’ genre: ‘Gottlieb and Wald have argued that rock cannot simply be referred to as a male form because the music has no essential characteristics.' Walser continues, critiquing Robert Fisk’s previous study of male ideologies in television programs:

‘..Metal’s Negotiations of the anxieties of gender and power are never conclusive; that is why, as Fiske says, these imaginary resolutions of real anxieties must be re-enacted over and over again. In fact, since around 1987, concert audiences for metal shows have been roughly gender balanced’ (Walser; 1993: 111)

To compare a polysemic, and often sonic medium to a controlled program of visually dominated sequenced events such as television, is not uncommon, as Walser is right to point out, that to keep the male desire and prominence burning, he must have an outlet to engage with and relate too. But as he goes on: ‘Head bangers ball’, the three-hour MTV program devoted to heavy metal, is quite popular with fans, but it is hardly the most important aspect of their involvement with metal. Concerts, records, radio, fan magazines and quite often playing an instrument figure as primary components of metal fans’ lives.’(Walser; 1993: 113) This is opposed to hip-hop which is more visually led through the medium of film, video and television

The world of popular music is highly structured in terms of gender. Traditionally, women have been positioned as consumers and fans, and in supportive roles, rather than as active producers of music: Musicians’ (Bayton; 1998: 2). As we have seen, metal music is primarily masculine, but we have also seen that women have taken an interest in sexual anxieties as well, and as we saw, have even started actively participating within them too. I now want to relate this to the evolutionary music known as hip hop, and how it has incorporated new social constructions and boundaries, that have stemmed from a later sound of American rap, known fondly as ‘Dirty South’ or ‘Crunk’.

To start, I want to quote Simon Frith, from his essay ‘Afterthoughts’, about the perils of following essentialist ideas of cultural constructions:

‘…Our account of how music carries sexual meaning now seems awfully dated. We rejected rock naturalism but we retained the suggestion that sexuality has some sort of autonomous form, which is expressed or controlled by cultural practice. We are reminded that ‘cultural production occurs in relation to ideology and not to the real world’; we were instructed that rock is a signifying practice through which a particular discourse of sexuality is constituted. The task of criticism is not to show how performers articulate a predefined ideology, but to trace the way sexuality is constructed by the performing conventions themselves, by the responses they compel listeners to make.’(Frith; 1990: 421).

As we can see, Frith is arguing against essentialist ideas, saying that ones ideological connotations are his own, and the source of cultural production of identity comes from the music and visuals themselves, helping to make up peoples identities in relation to the performance of a certain song and the subtexts that are read beneath them. In this context, dirty south Hip-Hop, or by some known as ‘Crunk’, has challenged and left the idea’s of Hip-Hop being purely male dominated behind. Like Frith said previously, women in rock, as in rap, are aware of the power and regard held for them, and men are also aware of this fact too.

It did, of course, come to prominence a few years before ‘Crunk’ when ‘Missy Elliot’ became a household name, due to her brash, loud vocal techniques, aggressive
delivery and tough bravado, in a manor which would make commentators like Mavis Bayton proud. She adopted many styles from male rappers, in an attempt to position herself within a male-dominated framework, saying ‘I’m also part of this- I am a woman.’ However, through doing this, she inspired many female admirers of rap music to get more involved, and created an identity through her music and visual mediations, such as her music videos: she also confronted myths to do with appearance and identity, admired by many a feminist for her ‘large’ size and androgynous body language.
With Crunk, the focus is not on the lyrical delivery itself, or even the message, but about the beats rhythms and dirty timbres connected; the days of slow and simple 4-4 structuring and fast lyrical delivery have now fizzled away, as the hip-hop now is more club focused, the essential shift being one that moves away from gender categorization to dancing and having fun. ‘Music and more particularly dance provide an arena for pushing back boundaries, exploring the zones that separate male from female. Whilst dance is an enactment of masculinity and femininity at ritual occasions such as weddings, it is also an arena in which gender categories can be fully contested.’ (Stokes; 1997: 22)
The representations of a poor, ‘Diasporic’ and marginalised class in America are still apparent; in any ‘Lil’ Jon’ videos, we are offered enough cars, jewellery and money to retire on, an excessive ‘bling-bling’ wealth which even appears in the Artists teeth. Gender and sexuality are still represented more or less the same; scantily clad Women, homeboy men and constant reference to sex still hang over the music. Sexist remarks about women still remain, but women are rather seen as more of an attribute (a prize, of value), than the dismissive attitude and distrust displayed by ‘rappers’ such as Ice Cube or Notorious BIG in their videos and music.

The ideas of modern gender relations and their importance now apply to both sexes: there are plenty of female rappers and ‘crunk’ producers emerging, and a certain amount of cross gender androgyny is arising. For example, the gold cases on the teeth of performers; not only has Lil’ Jon decked himself out in these but female rappers have too, La Chat of the ‘three-six mafia’ crew is also known for flashing the gold in her teeth, as well as chunky timberland boots and puffer jackets. In the words of Whiteley, an academic in popular music: ‘In addition to the careful mixing of vocal/visual, it is equally apparent that the ordered sequences open out and make sense of the narrative exposition of events in the song’ (Whiteley; 1997: 269).
For example, Brook Valentine’s video’s express a sexual mannerism, especially in the classic ‘Girl Fight’. As well as wearing items like teeth casings that could have once been associated with male rappers, is now expressed by the female in terms of power, especially as the main action sequences are literally a girl fight, with hair pulling and scratching. The female rapper is shown to be just as powerful, streetwise and as talented as her male counterparts.
In this instance, the sexuality of southern hip-hop is being defined by the actions of the artists; (no-one is genetically made for a music type, music does not stand alone) and in turn we are coerced into building our own sexual construction of identity from them, such as the influence of music video’s for example. (In rock, it can be extended to the live concert). My idea is that southern hip-hop has moved away from ideas of sexual identity (masculinity and femininity) and is more concerned with corporeal elements of the music. In a form where the female is as powerful in her own way, for women and men alike, as the male is, all sexes are welcome and not extradited, rebelled against or seen as threats. In most videos, the two sexes are usually dancing next to each other, much to both subjects enjoyment, instead of segregation and gangs of men cruising together, as stereotypically once associated with.
For Stokes, this process of reclassification is seen from a Marxist perspective:
‘
The fact that musicians preside over controlling the flow of the socio-musical space makes them powerful and problematic figures for the society at large…the moral order of many societies is entirely predicated upon the separation of gender and the control of sexuality; behaviour which threatens this is complicated and conflict ridden. Culturally desexing the musicians is one way of affecting this control’ (Stokes; 1997: 23).

To conclude, my answer could be read as yes, there are plain differences between masculinity and femininity, and they do occur through the sound of music. But they are social constructions, just like all issues of racial identity and political identity. The fact that blatant representations in mediations and music have been dumbed down or sidelined is seen as a controlling method of desexing these ‘cultural figures’, in a way in which we can gain meanings to help us blend into society. If the world was full of ‘Madonna’s’, or people who have complete control and knowledge over peoples perceptions of their cultural representations, then there would be no room for manoeuvring around anchored down stereotypes, placed by society. Modern society has instilled certain principles and notions concerned with gender and sexuality.
Modern music forms, such as dirty south hip-hop or nu-metal are more polysemic, and, thankfully, harder to categorize and define. ‘Crunk’ demonstrates that social constructions are being crossed between boundaries of gender and are down to an individual taste. Everyone is included and catered for, regardless of whether they are male or female; in short, some of the myth’s linking sexuality and music are gradually being eroded away