Folterkammer’s Andromeda Anarchia on the 10 Badass Women That Inspired Weibermacht

Looking back through human history, women have been many things to the art world. Performers, artists, muses, inspirations… the fairer sex has always played a key role in human expression and the art we all come to enjoy.

With today being International Women’s Day, we asked one woman in metal — Folterkammer‘s Andromeda Anarchia — to outline some of the women that have inspired her not only as an artist, but those that inspired the band’s latest album Weibermacht. From Greek heroines to modern opera singers, Anarchia’s list reads like a who’s who of crazy inspirational women throughout time.

So take a moment to recognize the greatness of the women in this list. And while you’re at it, preorder Folterkammer’s upcoming album Weibermacht, coming April 19.

Elektra
(Ancient Greek,’the radiant one’)

Elektra is the daughter of the King of Mycenae, Agamemnon, and Clytemnestra, as well as the sister of Iphigenia, Orestes and Chrysothemis. She helped her brother Orest to plan and finally carry out the blood revenge on their mother and stepfather. Composer Richard Strauss wrote an opera about it.

In our song “Algolagnia,” I paraphrase a passage from this opera. This opera is fantastic for singers with a dramatic voice type. Elektra is a fierce and provocative female character who stands her ground. The lyrics read as bloodthirsty as black metal song lyrics in places. Highly recommended! My favorite performance of Elektra is by the fantastic dramatic soprano Birgit Nilsson.

Julie d’ Aubigny
(“La Maupin”)

Probably the most provocative character of all, especially because she existed. Julie d’ Aubigny was a famous French opera singer; she was queer and was an excellent sword fighter. Search for her name online and you’ll be left speechless as to what she was all about. Her stellar career as an opera singer in Paris ended when she attended a ball disguised as a man, is said to have kissed a woman there and was challenged to a duel by three men, which brought her to her knees.

In total, she is said to have killed more than ten men in fencing matches during her life. In a related court case, she was sentenced to death a second time, but in this case she also managed to obtain a pardon from the king. We dedicated a whole song (“Herrin der Schwerter”, mistress of swords) to her on our album.

Wanda of “Venus im Pelz”
(“Venus in Furs”)

The story of a merciless love, Venus in Furs is a novella (1870) by the Austrian writer Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. Masoch became famous for his imagination and art of aesthetically formulating the instinctive desire for pain and submission. He was a widely read, popular writer in his day. The psychiatric term “masochism,” which was later introduced to describe a sexual preference, is an allusion to his name Masoch and the eroticism he depicted.

Venus in Furs is a novella that was obviously strongly inspired by his own life. In it, Sacher-Masoch describes the extreme rollercoaster of emotions that the “slave” Severin experiences at the hands of his mistress Wanda, who, in her feminine-dominant role as Venus in furs, drives him to his physical and mental limits before finally leaving him – either because of his own unsatisfied longing for submission or to cure him of his masochism.

Wanda is a kind of prototype figure for a dominatrix and the relationship between her and the submissive Severin is a successful portrayal of a kinky FLR (female-led relationship). I love this book and read it again enthusiastically during my album preparation time. We also recorded the song “Venus in Furs” by Velvet Underground as the only cover song (and the only song sung in English) on the album.

Emma Peel
(TV series The Avengers, performed by Diana Rigg)

The Avengers (1961-1969, 1976-1977) was a British television series that combined crime, spy, science fiction, action and thriller elements. Diana Rigg played the beautiful and fierce Emma Peel, one of the protagonists, an amateur agent for the British Secret Service.

Emma Peel stands for a particularly strong and emancipated type of woman that developed in Europe in the late 1960s. I read that origin of the name lies in “M-Appeal,” a short form of “Man Appeal”. Emma Peel is a scientist, very intelligent and, as an agent, a match for any man; she is as proficient with firearms as she is with martial arts. The German press also referred to Diana Rigg in her role as Emma Peel as “Karate Emma.”

The fashion Diana Rigg wore in the series was a trendsetter, including a leather corsage with a spiked collar in a sado-maso look in episode 99 “The Night of the Sinners”, which even led to the episode not being allowed to be broadcast in many countries. But she also wore leather jackets, vinyl suits, leather catsuits, overknee boots, i.e. many things that are often fetishized in the context of BDSM. The actress Diana Rigg died during this time, where I’ve been working on the research for the new album theme for Folterkammer and I took this as an opportunity to binge-watch the series “The Avengers” one more time. The role of Emma Peel is iconic, and she belongs on this list.

Nina Hagen

My absolute favorite singer and my biggest inspiration, Nina Hagen paved the way for the mixture of classical singing with modern vocal styles such as punk, rock and soul. And for all those who unfortunately don’t understand German: she is an absolutely brilliant songwriter! Her lyrics are clever, funny, cheeky, and very skillful.

She inspires me both as a singer and as a lyricist. She has an amazingly versatile and strong voice with a huge vocal range. She is an exceptional artist who comes from a family where women of all generations stand their ground.

Eartha Kitt

A wonderful, provocative American singer and actress. She was also called “the queen of nightclubs”; a wonderful voice and presence, and great sense for humor; have a look at the interviews with her: She never minced her words, was charming, funny and very self-confident as a woman. A great, very intelligent and emancipated artist. She’s also known for her outfits and men-challenging, cheeky way of talking. A true inspiration for Weibermacht.

I’m a big fan of cabaret music, of everything related to comedy and satire, and I love singing cabaret myself (the cheekier and more theatrical, the better). For me, Eartha Kitt is one of the very greatest cabaret singers, simply fantastic. The humorous and theatrical is also a strong component of Folterkammer and in this respect Eartha Kitt definitely has to be mentioned in this top 10.

Phyllis
(From the Middle High German tale Aristotle and Phyllis)

The tale was written by an unknown court poet. It depicts the motif of the wise man who is seduced, tricked, and exposed by a beautiful woman. Two German versions are known, the so-called Strasbourg version and the older Benediktbeuren version. “Aristotle and Phyllis” was written between 1260 – 1287 in the area of the Upper Rhine cities of Basel and Strasbourg.

Roughly summarized: The beautiful and charming Phyllis seduces, outwits and humiliates the intellectual, educated Aristotle in front of an entire court in revenge. As a result, Aristotle is exposed to ridicule and disgrace and flees. In a distant land, he meditates on the perniciousness of women’s cunning.

The motif of a superior woman demonstrating and humiliating the wise man has been known in world literature since the 5th century and was particularly widespread in Europe from the 13th to the 16th century. It probably came to Europe from the Orient at the time of the Crusades.

In Western tales, the role of the sage was assigned to the philosopher Aristotle. Other of the numerous examples in which the female cunning motif is used in literature are Hugo von Trimberg’s “Der Renner”, Lamprecht von Regensburg’s “Tochter Syon”, Heinrich von dem Türlin’s “Crône”, etc. There are various explanations for the popularity of this motif, one of them is that it is assumed that the depiction was intended to appeal to the audience as a warning against the wiles of women and was therefore particularly popular in a church context.

Thematically, this plays nicely into our hands (as a black metal band). In addition to the textual evidence, this motif was also widespread in the pictorial representations of the late Middle Ages. Depictions have been found on everyday objects such as knife handles, combs, and stove tiles. Sculptures and façade reliefs in various churches and cathedrals have also been documented. In art, a variety of design techniques were used to depict the motif. In addition to sculptures, drawings, copperplate engravings, woodcuts, ivory carvings etc. are also documented. A concrete example is the woodcut “Weibermacht” (from 1513, by Hans Baldung Grien). It is obvious that we have also been influenced by these graphic aesthetics for our album cover (painted by Eliran Kantor) as well as for our merchandise.

There are several variations of this “Phyllis and Artistoteles” tale in German-speaking countries and even today it still exerts a certain fascination and inspiration. We wanted to create a contemporary, metal version of it and dedicate a song (“Die Unterwerfung”, the submission) to this story. As a musician and especially as a singer/songwriter you are a kind of storyteller too, and so you can keep such traditions alive. In it, we also quote a passage from the Strasbourg version as well as a passage from the Benediktbeuren version in the intro of this song.

Mistress Iris

She is an internationally established dominatrix and art director working in photography and film. She is a wonderful artist. She portrays the lifestyle of femdom very artfully, in films and photography. She is a remarkable personality and a very interesting woman. I particularly like her distinctive sense of elegance and strong contrasts. She manages to stage fetish as art, to present obscene practices as a beautiful, artistic installation. Art is always contrast and she is a grand master in dealing with it, very remarkable! With her work, she inspired me to transfer the themes of femdom and strong contrasts to singing, to artfully highlight the elegant element of bel canto with the rough and raw of black metal. I have written the vocal melodies on this album (compared to the last album) in a much more refined way, with the intention of bringing out even more vocal challenge and contrast in our music. Mistress Iris seems to pay attention to every detail in her art and that’s exactly what I wanted to do here, too.

Shirley Ann Jackson

Shirley Ann Jackson is an American physicist who carried out groundbreaking research that greatly advanced the development of telecommunications. Jackson received several honors and awards throughout her career in recognition of her contributions to research and education. She is the first African American woman to have earned a doctorate at the MIT in Theoretical Elementary Particle Physics, and the first African American woman to have earned a doctorate at MIT in any field. She is also the second African American woman in the United States to earn a doctorate in physics.

What a great and remarkable scientist! In this top 10, she is representative of all the courageous and committed female scientists. Science is so inspiring! And where would we be without the work that scientists do? There are various platforms that specifically feature women in science and their respective fields of research, for example on Instagram you can find “women.doing.science.” or “womeninoceanscience” etc. Check it out, it’s very interesting!

Joan Sutherland

My favorite opera singer, Joan Sutherland could simply sing anything. In my opinion, the greatest dramatic coloratura soprano ever, both vocally and artistically. A fantastic singer. She was one of my main inspirations for this album production. My favorite is when she sings Verdi. Verdi’s melodies are often written for dramatic, strong female voices, technically demanding and yet musical and poetic.

Joan’s interpretations are masterpieces that are second to none. She is my greatest role model for bel canto singing. As the main inspiration for my vocal melodies on Weibermacht, I listened to a lot of Verdi (sung by Joan Sutherland) and Strauss operas.