Sammantha - I've been meaning to listen to Amanda Palmer as I've heard about her and so glad I did :) I've just been watching her TED talk and felt so inspired that I then started listening to her.

Libby: I totally agree with you on the new Paramore music. Their old style was so much more unique, and now they're losing their originality. I feel the same way about Evanescence, too. Of course, both bands have a few really good songs on their newer albums, but it's just not the same as their older stuff.

I dont know if this counts but I like The Birthday Massacre i thinks its just a girl singer

....oh and also Lights...

I've been listening to her for years. She's fantastic!

Hole, The Horrorpops, The Dresden Dolls and Amanda Palmer.

Oh and No Doubt of course.

My favourite female single is Janis Joplin. She has an incredible voice and songs as well!

More?? Doro Peach, the frontwoman of Warlock, Crucified Barbara, Vixen, Patti Smith, Susan Tedeschi (great guitarrist), and of course the women already mentioned.

Women Rock!

All these suggestions are great! I have heard of a couple of them. I do listen to a lot of paramore but I'm not so keen on their new stuff as well as Kenotia (not together anymore) and circa survive. Evanescence of course are classic. I stumbled onto Halestorm on spotify the otherday, by accident, I'll have to give them another listen.

@Hella I watched the runways film a couple of months ago and thought it was really cool. My cousin has Joan Jett's I love rock and roll on vinyl, from when she was a teen : )

@Mel I do quite like the yeah yeah yeahs. Do you ever listen to the subways? (Theres a girl in the band although I think the male frontman does quite a bit of the singing too). The joy formidable are also good, I saw them live in Jan. Defo will check out the rock string quartet.

I listen to so many male bands and singers I sometimes like get sick of boys moaning about girls or showing off, I just want listen to kick-ass female singers instead.

The Plasticines, The Runaways, The Blackhearts. I don't listen to many female rock bands actually.

Some of my favorite female-fronted rock bands are Evanescence, Paramore (closer to alternative but still really good), Flyleaf, Fireflight, and Halestorm. All of these bands have great music and amazing female lead singers. Hope I helped!

Girl bands are my Favorite!
Female fronted - Yeah Yeah Yeahs (My #1 favorite band ever), No Doubt, Starfucker (Not the techno band, you have to search a little closer for them), Santigold.
All girls - Escala (This wonderful rock string quartet), Tegan and Sarah, My band: Dragons Blood,

I'm going classic with the Go-Go's!

All-female: The Two Funerals. They're more punk though.
Female-fronted: Thalarion... if you like gothic metal. :P
I don't listen to regular rock so I can't really suggest anything particularly helpful, sorry.

I love Die So Fluid http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=561xjnfadWs . I also love the Nymphs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5GcHoeQb8U but they're not together anymore and Feline http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBKqYoQ1nRU (Grog from Die So Fluids earlier band) and I'm also a big Siouxsie and the Banshees fan.

I'm loving evarose (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRHBYeTlIyU) and Haim (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dtIjyG9gTg) at the moment. Has anyone else got any suggestions for good all female (or female fronted rock bands)?

Yay, glad you like her. We're interviewing her for an upcoming issue of Snippets!

I only recently have heard her music, but from what I've listened to she's great!

I love her.. I wanted to see her live but she cancelled my city's date. Oh well :)

Youth Brigade aren't too bad. I'm on a Dead Kennedys kick at the moment.

Try You Tube - Enter a band or track that you like and then see what comes up. I have found that some of the odd results that come up lead me to gems that I have never heard of.

Not sure if you already know her: she's an amazing artist, musician and singer. Crafter too, since she usually makes the costumes she wears on stage. Check her out!
here's her new (and first) video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvOXuZwOEvM

:)

Agree with Rawr, knowing some of what you already listen to would be a BIG help. But..

"Smile Empty Soul" is one of my favorite bands. They're from California, & mildly popular. They're more hard rock/alternative tho. But awesome. :p
I love 90s hard rock bands. Fuel, Alice in chains, matchbox 20, the offspring, soundgarden, puddle of mudd, seether, staind, Nirvana ... A good variety of really good hard rock bands. None are classic tho.

I am so into STYX right now it is not even funny

Classic rock: Aerosmith, Def Leppard, Whitesnake, Slade, ... :)

mcfly are my all time favourites. i kinda go through phases with other bands. i LOVE ska-punk and pop-punk, though my top listened to bands on last.fm are probably a fairly accurate representation of what i listen to most http://www.last.fm/user/deffoxcazr bit of a mix really. :)

and at the minute i'm completely LOVING keith urban.

Pink Floyd, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Florence and the Machine, Led Zeppelin and many more but these are the best.

I love girl bands, rather, bands with girl frontwomen.. My favorite band is the Yeah Yeah Yeah's, I love their kind of unforgiving rock sound. I also like No Doubt and Santigold.

Volumes

Avenged Sevenfold, Korn, Bullet For My Valentine and Halestorm lml

It's difficult to tell you how to come up with a melody, because that's something that usually just comes... For me anyway. But I suppose what I do is find a band or song, or more than one that has the sound i want to have, and I listen to them over and over for a couple days, and a melody of my own eventually surfaces. Either that or I'm playing my guitar, and something just comes up.
As for finding a new process, my process is usually where I write the song and the music together at the same time, and I can't finish the song if I don't have music. But that's just me.
'aneniine' suggested a good thing: Doing a theme. That always helps!
If you're a beginner song writer, you may want to start with shorter songs, and then gradually move forward to longer songs as you get better, so it's not so overwhelming.
I don't know much about harmony... I don't have a band, so I can't tell you that one. Sorry.
But anyway. I hope that some of this helped.

Starfucker, also known as STRFKR! I'm even going to see them next week xD
Also listen to Tame Impala. I can't quite describe their music, but to put it into perspective, after listening to them for the first time, I had a nightmare that John Lennon's ghost was haunting me in a psychedelic fun house.