First, examine these three pictures:
All three are male. All three front hugely successful bands that, whilst recently experiencing some success in the mainstream music spectrum, have been largely through their careers obscure, cult-worshipped, and gradually, recognised as having merit that could perhaps be marketed to a small exploitable fan-base. In the music world, many of hard rock’s male musicians have been stereotypes and beacons of masculinity; as conveyed by the following examples:
The first three effeminate males are Davey Havok of AFI, Ville Valo from HIM, and Mana from Moi Dix Mois. The latter three are Henry Rollins formerly of Black Flag and now the Rollins band, Phil Anselmo (ex-Pantera, currently Down, Superjoint Ritual, and others), and Glenn Danzig (former Misfits and Samhain founder, now just Danzig).
Every one of these males is a unique and talented performer; they’ve each had their share of struggles and successes, but the one thing that strikes me about each of these musicians is the intriguing paradigm shift in societal values. Danzig, Rollins, and Anselmo belong/ed to groups that saw their big success through the 80’s and 90’s, although all away from mainstream success (though Pantera and Danzig came close on some occasions).
Moi Dix Mois are hugely popular in Japan, where Mana has a substantial following due to his music activities, as well as his creation/consolidation of the “Gothic Lolita” Fashion sub-culture and its’ various offshoots. Davey Havok started with AFI as a punk band, hugely inspired by Danzig’s Misfits, and adopted much of the darker themes and imagery of the Misfits to his own band, to the point of utterly transforming them into their own unique entity. Ville Valo has been described in an Urban Dictionary article as “Finnish for sex on toast”; and has no doubt drawn many a young lady into a swoon with his messy hair and pouty visage.
How intriguing it is that in the space of ten to fifteen years, the once arguably testicular, angry, and muscular domain of hard rock and heavy metal has been converted to the sleek chic of the metrosexual, adorned in make-up and designer outfits, flamboyantly prancing about where others roared through blood and sweat of the might of men. One may even surmise that this could mark a new beginning for hard rock fans; as one of my colleagues discussed earlier music sub-cultures can often play a hugely influential role in young adolescents forming their self-concept and identity.
So, will society see a changing of the guard; where the tattooed biker-esque bad boys of rock slink into middle-age spread and mortgages as their youthful counterparts arrive, head to toe in skin-tight black clothing, lacquered, manicured, and dripping with feminine mystique? Semiotically speaking, hard rock needs to be careful it doesn’t swap one bad stereotype for another, albeit softer, archetype.
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The men in the first three pictures would be hard to “market” to mainstream popular music fans because of the androgynous nature of their appearance. Gender identity in our society relies upon being able to be categorised as a man or a woman. These men do not fir in with societal expectations of whet a man “should” look like and thus, don’t appeal to the homogeneous norms of masculinity. Although gender performance (see Butler 1990), is reiterated throughout the lives of men and women it is not encouraged to perform outside the gender norms. These men exemplify the alternative ways masculinity can be performed, however, our society is still to set in the binary of normative masculine and feminine ‘looks’ to be able to appreciate the challenge these men pose to mainstream maleness.
I think that society goes for the men portrayed in the first 3 pictures because they feel they can relate to them, because of their attitude as represented by the media, and also the bands that they front.
I with there were more men like the later pictures you posted in the top 40, to take away from the marketed stereotypical people that exist there today.