Doro: Heavy Metal’s Conqueress
Country music has DOLLY PARTON. Soul has DIANA ROSS. And heavy metal has DORO. Few acts from the eighties have stood the test of time, yet DORO is still standing tall, flying the flag for fostering deep friendships and fighting the good fight. As the 40th anniversary of WARLOCK’s debut album, Burning The Witches approaches, the metal queen is looking back on a life in music – one she didn’t expect to last.
“I thought maybe I’d do it five, six, seven years, but no, it’s 40 years and more!” DORO beams from her home in New York. “In the beginning, we were just having fun, then later on I found out it makes people feel really good, and you can give something to people that makes them overcome difficult situations.”
Having dreamt of “becoming a musician since I was three years old”, DORO overcame her fair share of difficult situations to reach the top of the heavy metal mountain. In 40 years, she’s “never took a break, never one day off, never vacation”, opting to “always go full force for all these years”.
She made a conscious decision in her early twenties to trade life’s milestones, like shacking up, settling down, and having children, for an adventure in music, much like Alice In Wonderland, or Dorothy in Oz. “I made the decision that I wanted to dedicate my life to the fans and to the music, and ever since, I feel totally calm and relaxed. I never thought I would ever settle down, or get married, or have children; to me, music and the fans, that’s it, that’s my family and what I love most.”
What keeps the fire burning for DORO is her love and passion for music. 40 years in, she’s just as inspired by rock and metal as she was in her teens. DORO’s Cheshire cat-sized grin never slips away once when mentioning friendships with idols like DIO and LEMMY, or tales of sharing the same bookkeeper as BILLY IDOL, or duetting not once, but twice, with her very own heavy metal hero, Rob Halford of JUDAS PRIEST.
New album Conqueress: Forever Strong And Proud features two electrifying cover-duet’s; one is PRIEST’s iconic party anthem Living After Midnight, and the other is BONNIE TYLER’s pop-rock power ballad Total Eclipse Of The Heart. Hanging out backstage at Hellfest, she couldn’t believe her luck in bagging time with old pal Halford.
“The two duets with Rob Halford, they mean so much to me, as my first big tour back in 1986 was as the support band of the Turbo tour, and JUDAS PRIEST was my favourite band, and I couldn’t believe it,” she chimes, just like a kid in a candy shop with bucket loads of pocket money. “We were hanging out backstage, and Rob was asking me what I’m doing, and I said I’m just finishing the new album, and we looked at each other and I said, ‘Rob, are you thinking the same?’ and he said ‘yes! Shall we do something together?’ so here we are.”
Having been “born and raised with the New Wave of British Heavy Metal”, DORO proudly showcases her vinyl copy of her “favourite record of all time”, British Steel. So when Rob Halford asked her what song she wanted to do, Living After Midnight was easy pickings. And Total Eclipse Of The Heart came from Rob saying “for a long time, I’ve wanted to do this song with you”.
Together, DORO and JUDAS PRIEST have stood tall as advocates for minorities in metal. Whilst DORO has always “loved when people feel inspired” by her, she’s “honestly never thought so much about it. When people feel inspired by me and Rob, it’s fantastic, but I always did what I felt we had to do; to me it was never so much a fight, that I was a woman, it was more a fight to get the respect for the music, or to get the chance for your music, as back in the day in the 80s, heavy metal was not so accepted.”
Having been “thrown out of restaurants” for “scaring other guests”, DORO has always seen it as a fight for the heavy metal community, rather than anything else. It was thanks to “touring with Ronnie James Dio and MOTÖRHEAD, and JUDAS PRIEST” that made sure she never felt alienated or different, she “always felt very supported and very respected; I’m just a human being, I just love music, and I do what I love, it’s never a big deal.”
It’s that love of music, that will to fight the good fight, that drives Conqueress. On its anthemic opener Children Of The Dawn, less a song and more the sound of an army marching on through the gathering storm, she sings “we’ll be holding on through the rain and through the storm”; it’s an act of resilience which follows through the album.
“To me, it’s always two things: it’s either fight the good fight, or deep friendship” DORO reflects thoughtfully, “the whole album is pretty much about resilience, it’s why it’s called Conqueress: Forever Strong And Proud.”
It’s why she has no fear sharing songs with parts sung in both English and German, because it lets her carry that message in more ways than one. “Fels in der Brandung means ‘you’re my rock’, and I love that very much. It reminds me of Für Immer, which I sing all over the world, and even when people don’t understand German, they can feel it, and it means forever.”
Few artists carve their name in heavy metal history forever, yet DORO is one of them. Her contribution to the community won’t be forgotten, and will continue to inspire fans all over the world. So, raise a glass to 40, and many more.
Conqueress – Forever Strong And Proud is out now via Nuclear Blast Records.
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