Metal Queen

For my return to blogging, I have decided to revamp a few of my older blog postings which came from my original blog over at myspace. I recently shut down my myspace account but saved all the blogs, as that was my main purpose of even having it. It pre-dated facebook and was the original way to reconnect with old friends and extended family.

However, this year I decided to cut way back on social media. Using social networks for business purposes is one thing, but too many old friends, acquaintance connections and some disgruntled family members just did not really have a place in the viewing of my life. I narrowed it down to the people I really want in my life and gave others the option to contact me through postal mail, if they so desired. So far I haven’t had any letters! So I feel I have made the right choices.

Many of these deleted connections laughed at me or made fun of me and my metal queen alter-ego. It is their right to laugh all they want, but I sure don’t want anyone who mocks me or finds any of my personal passions to be laughable in a not-so-nice way, to have any connection with me on a social networking level.

But for those who do, and those who are curious, here is one of my blogs I posted on myspace back in 2007, explaining all about how I got the name of Metal Queen…

　

25 Jan 2007

How I got the name Metal Queen....

Many people ask me.....how did I get the Metal Queen handle?

Well, it is an interesting story which I shall share...

Many moons ago, I was the lead singer in an assortment of hard rock/metal bands in the town where I grew up, Moncton, N.B. After leaving Moncton at age 21, I also sang in bands in Toronto for a brief time before moving permanently to the west coast.

In my bands I rocked out, singing Maiden, Priest, Metallica, Skid Row, Poison, Bon Jovi, Def Leppard....basically if they had hair and great vocals/melody lines, I loved covering it! :)

I would have loved to sing some more female driven music but in the 80's and early
90's, the whole rock/metal world was a boys club and I was lucky to even find a place in it at all. I did manage to get a Tiffany song onto our set list with my band Savage, ha ha....thank you Steve for rocking the Tiffany for me! :)

THE Metal Queen of course is Canada's own, Lee Aaron, and I have been fortunate to see her own the stage live, back in 1992 in Vancouver. I have never had the chance to cover any of her stuff but I sure would love to, as she has an amazing voice and truly is the Metal Queen and I am honoured to be able to borrow her name.

When I was older and in the working world in Vancouver in the mid-90's, I got connected to a very cool dude named Nardwuar, thanks to my good friend Mark Gaudet in Moncton (of Eric's Trip and other notable Moncton bands). At the time, Nardwuar and I happened to work in the same building at UBC...he was in the radio station on the top floor and I was in the basement, scratching out a living as a travel agent.

Upon my first meeting with Nardwuar, he enjoyed hearing some of my more colourful metal stories of bands I had met and the music that I loved, and from then on he christened me Metal Queen, and the name stuck .

He went on to interview me on his radio show, which for me, laid out the beginning ideas and background for my book of Moncton metal memoirs which I have been working on for over 15 years now. It was fun to talk about all the hair-bands and metal bands I had met and sang covers of, as well as many of the adventures I'd had within that whole crazy scene.

I did some work with Nardwuar and interviewed with him, many of these metal bands of yesteryear, which was a lot of fun and eventually some of these interviews were covered in Chart Magazine.

So that is how I gained the title of Metal Queen....I feel more like Metal Mum or Laundry Queen these days but thanks to Nardwuar, the name always makes me feel eternally connected with my notorious past, which one day hopefully will be in print for others to enjoy...or cringe at! :)

Rock on!

Metal Queen


Link to my 2010 interview with Nardwuar, catching up on all things Metal Queen:

http://playlist.citr.ca/podcasting/audio/20101210-153601-to-20101210-170314.mp3

Back To Blogging

I honestly do not have time to blog. Blogging time should probably be time spent working as much as possible. Either on housework, parenting, cooking or my writing and website business. But every now and then I want a little break and I don’t really want to think much. I don’t always feel like picking up my pen and journaling. I want to be at the computer so I can listen to music without waking the baby, and do a little surfing for entertainment value. So in that respect, blogging is a good exercise for my brain while having some down time.

I took a blog break for awhile but the time feels right to return to a sharing of my thoughts and feelings with the world. My hope is to attract only positive people with positive thoughts towards me and my words. I know that won’t be the reality of course, but I feel ready again to try and put myself out there. I have some strong and firm opinions and a deeply compassionate heart, which I don’t want to be afraid to share.

I hated having to moderate comments but I also don’t want a lot of battling on my blog either. Debate is good...thoughtful differences of opinion are fabulous. But belittling, cruel judgements, taunting or being sarcastic just doesn’t do anyone any good. But I guess it is part of blogging...taking the good with the bad. I have browsed quite a few other blogs over the past few months and I see that many other people who blog also have to endure the “haters” if they choose to be public bloggers.

For a long time I believed I was a full on extrovert and was welcoming and eager for all attention, negative or positive. But I have come to discover that I am actually far more introverted and filled with so much emotional energy that I don’t withstand hatred or negativity too well.

The fact that I am adjusting to life as a single mum and proceeding with a heart-wrenching divorce, likely adds to my emotions too. It is a journey though and I love a good journey filled with adventure.

But if I am to put myself out there as a writer and embrace this next phase of my life and my creative career, I have to thicken the skin that is far thinner than I ever realized.

So it’s time to put on my leather jacket, dust off my backpack, lace up my hiking boots and tease up my hair…I am ready world. Metal Queen is ready to crank the tunes, plan some car-free trips, share some life opinions, and most of all, kick some ass. :)