Apparently British people aren’t too keen on looking at misogynistic posters advertising their music, because they just banned Steel Panther’s new album’s poster.
The band’s new album Balls Out features a poster with a scantily clad girl holding silver balls between her legs, and an extremely ‘pleased’ look on her face. The whole thing reeks of 80’s hair metal and reminds me of the movie This Is Spinal Tap, where the band tries promoting their album with the girl in the dog collar. Heh. I can hear it now, Nigel Tufnel saying, “What’s wrong with bein’ sexy?” (You can see the album cover by clicking HERE).
Anyway, the Advertising Standards Authority had been receiving complaints so the organization decided to ask for the posters to be removed. They claim, “We considered that the main image on the poster was overtly sexual. We noted that the pose of the woman showed her with her legs apart, her hand between her legs and her breasts partially exposed and considered that her facial expression was suggestive of an orgasm and sexual activity.”
They add, “In addition to this, we considered that the album title Balls Out was sexually suggestive particularly when viewed in the context of the poster, where the woman was seen dangling two silver balls between her legs in a way that we considered was suggestive of male genitalia.” All good points. Ha.
Steel Panther’s record label (Universal) is none too pleased, saying that the ‘artwork’ is supposed to be a joke that nobody is really supposed to take seriously.
I don’t know…In a way that’s the bands whole shtick, right? I mean, they both make fun of and celebrate everything that is what hair bands were in the 80s, and portraying women as objects was one of them (think of all the album covers and music videos that showed women strictly as sex objects). But even though adults (especially ones that lived through the 80s) might recognize that, children might not, so maybe that’s where the problem lies.
On a lighter note, watch this clip from This Is Spinal Tap (only if you wanna laugh!):
