Saturday Shuffle: Doro, Skid Row, Skynyrd, III, Manowar

Returning to the shuffle after a while with some good old-fashioned metal, a nasty hard rocker and some Southern flavor, as well...


Doro, “Revenge.” From the album Raise Your Fist (2012). I don’t know why I don’t listen to Doro more. I loved her work with Warlock, and it seems like I enjoy her solo work when I hear it as well, but I just don’t listen all that often. “Revenge” is just a driving, old-fashioned traditional metal ripper, pretty much what Doro does.

Still Spinning: Warlock, "Triumph and Agony"

Though often overlooked and rarely talked about, Warlock must be acknowledged as a pioneering band in metal.

Looking around the metal landscape these days, women are almost as plentiful as men. Gone, too, are the days of women writhing around on the floor in their videos a la Lita Ford’s “Kiss Me Deadly” to appeal to the male-dominated fan base. These days, to suggest something like that to some of the women in metal might get you a punch in the nose … or a swift kick somewhere else.

During the early to mid-1980s, though, women in heavy metal were a rarity. You had Joan Jett doing a heavy-rock style that was close, but not quite metal. Lita Ford was laying down some heavy licks, but it was still a few years before her 1988 breakthrough album Lita would blow the doors open for ladies in metal.