WITCH FEVER

Moving to Manchester to do music, as the whole band seems to have done, they all discovered that things were sorely lacking in quite a few key things: a punk and metal scene, and women in music. “I was keen to be with girls and make loud

music,” lead singer Amy Walpole explains, and so WITCH FEVER was formed, and does just that to this day. Branding themselves as all-girl punk is important to them, she explains, but they still face issues as a band, as many bands do with one or all female

members, in the formation of genres simply in regards to gender. They often get placed on the same bill as bands who sound nothing like them, just because there’s a girl involved.

Just as others before them have experienced, they use their platform to talk about these experiences, amongst others in the same vein, but do feel the pressure from their peers and audience. “I feel like we’re scrutinized, like people are waiting for us to call something out or something, and they just want us to be a hypocrite,” Alex explains. Amy goes on: “Someone commented on one of our posts saying that we were the maidenhead for the ship of feminism. And as much as that’s really lovely and really nice, I read it and was like, oh god! I don’t want this kind of responsibility, because sometimes it’s difficult because you’re trying to please every kind of feminist, every kind of woman or nonbinary person.” While using a platform is important for many,

it’s also incredibly important to remember that music is what these bands are doing, and they can’t be expected to cover everything, without any mistakes; they are human, too, after all.

Recently, though, the band did use their platform to call out behavior at an all-dayer in Bristol. It seemed like classic behavior for men towards women in a band, only to a whole greater extent – quizzing them on whether or not they knew how to use their equipment, asking them to take off their shirts and give the crowd members lap dances, saying they were going to wank off at their set – but what was so shocking to them was how “it was such a large amount in such a short space of time,” explains Amy. “Usually, it’s just one incident a gig, but it was so many all at the same time.” Alex agrees: “It felt like a really negative space.”

“It just seems that as soon as women onstage show any part of their body, they’re considered a sexual object in some light, or

people immediately start to think about shagging them,” Amy points out. “I get that you’re attracted to people and you fancy people, and that’s fine, but it’s not cool to come up to us and say you’re going to have a wank over us, because that’s just really threatening.” Many have shown their support for the band during this time, despite a few disrespectful comments on the post they made about the incident, but it’s occurrences like these that prove there’s far to go for women in the industry facing these wrongdoings.

WITCH FEVER are far from scared off from performing, however, and have a string of live dates lined up through the summer, attempting to hit as many cities as possible before they reenter the studio. An EP is in the works, Amy confirms, along with videos to go along with the songs, and an album within the next year (we hope!).