Canadian 'Metal Queen' LEE AARON Talks About Touring In '80s, Singing Backup For SCORPIONS

Full In Bloom Music recently conducted an interview with former Canadian "metal queen" Lee Aaron. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

Full In Bloom Music: What's new, what have you been up to lately and what's in the future?

Lee Aaron: "Well... 'Beautiful Things', my 11th disc, was released in 2004 and I toured in support of that right up until I gave birth to my first child in June 2004. Since then I've scaled back and have only been doing selected dates. I've been writing and have a new album in the works. My husband and I are also expecting our second child in February 2006. I always wanted to have a family but spent so many years on the road and focused on my career that there was no time. Now is right time for me. With that said, I still plan to record future albums."

Full In Bloom Music: What was it like for you to be playing in a mostly male dominated genre? Did you ever feel you were treated differently, or did you feel you had an advantage?

Lee Aaron: "Being a woman in the genre of rock in the '80s was a blessing and a curse. A blessing because you were an anomaly... there weren't very many of us... and even fewer that were actually good. That quite often worked in my favor in terms of getting media attention. A curse because the '80s were an era that totally objectified women.... almost every video featured long haired pretty boys with eyeliner and pointy guitars playing crotch rock with scantily clad, tight-assed girlies dancing about and fawning over their psydo-maledom. So there was constant pressure — from the labels' marketing standpoint — to be a tight-bottomed scantily clad chick too, which tends to eclipse the fact that one has talent or not. After many hits and the release of my sixth album, most of the industry still didn't realize that I actually wrote those hits. Plus I was part of an industry machine that sold the idea to other young girls that to be worth anything you need to look like this."

Full In Bloom Music: In 1988 you did back up vocals on the SCORPIONS song "Rhythm of Love". What were your memories from that session and how did that come about?

Lee Aaron: "Virgin Records had hired [producer] Dieter Dierks to record one of my concerts in Manheim in 1987. At the time the SCORPS were recording 'Savage Amusement' and needed a high backup vocal on that particular tune. Don Dokken and Udo Dirkschnieder had both attempted it without success. I guess it had never occurred to anyone involved to have a female singer try it. When Dieter heard my voice he approached me backstage and asked me if I would extend my stay in Europe and join the boys in the studio to give the tune a try. I did, and the result is the song as you hear it today. My road manager (a lovely German lady) accompanied me on the trip. Rudy [Schenker] and Matthias [Jabs] took her next door to a local pub while I was recording and got her absolutely wasted on a drink they had invented called Tequila Bang. When the session was over I had to babysit her and get her back to hotel safely, which was quite funny because it's normally supposed to be the other way around — road manager babysitting rock star."

Read the entire interview at FullInBloomMusic.com.