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I just checked out a couple of videos on youtube and nicovideo and it seems the majority of musicians who wear "masks" around their mouths and female clothes are actually male. What's the reason behind this? The first thing that comes to mind is that it's their sexual orientation, but I doubt that's the only reason. What do you guys think?

Unfortunately from what I've learned, sexual orientation RARELY plays a role in crossdressing compared to other more common reasons behind it.

Sigh.

Btw, their sexual orientation could be anything, they don't have to be gay. Someone doesn't have to be gay to enjoy wearing the opposite sex clothes.
I don't like how there is such a high stigma with men wearing women's clothing, and then there's none when women do the same with men's clothing.

Just to make it easier for any other readers, I'll quote a paragraph from the wiki page concerning sexual orientation and crossdressing:

Man, I misread that as "Male Mexicans Cross-Dressing In Japan".

I would guess the reason is because they want to wear women's clothing, probably.

I'll admit, I laughed.

I know what you're trying to say and I already took that into consideration before posting. That's why I said I doubted it was just because of sexual orientation. I'm not trying to prove my innocence here but when I first watched the vids and read the comments about how they were guys, I couldn't care less. It was just something I wondered.

Well the next time you meet a cross-dressing Japanese male musician, you should just ask them. I doubt our opinion will be worth much. Not unless MAL has a huge transvestite population I am unaware of. Then again I am unaware of many things that concern MAL...

It's pretty well known that gender identity in Japan is different from western civilizations. Not saying that ALL Japanese men run around cross-dressing, but I mean.. we all watch anime here. I know I've seen it quite a few times in shows, and those guys aren't always homosexual.

Moreover, there's a LOT of pop/rock stars in countries like Japan and Korean and let's face it.. you gotta use a gimmick somehow. So my guesses for reasons would be A. Cultural differences (and acceptance?) and B. Publicity enhancers.. Both to an extent of course.

I asked here because the cover songs they do are based on Anime OSTs.

I don't think it has anything to do with acceptance, because they certainly aren't accepted over there.

A lot of the bands that have one (or sometimes two) men crossdressing are along the genre of Visual Kei or Oshare Kei. It's a very visual (obviously) sort of music where appearance means an awful lot. But the vast majority of them are not, and will never be major. Only a few exceptions to that, and when they went major they lost the VK/OK touch (L'Arc~en~Ciel {yes, they started out VK}, An Cafe, Gazette, etc). Dir en grey used to be VK too, but they dropped that soon after they started touring throughout the world (unfortunately) and changed their music style as well. Those sorts of bands that stay indie have a relatively small fanbase and, like anime, isn't widely received. In fact, it's rather frowned down upon - had a friend in Japan during the big Jrock rush a few years ago that wouldn't openly admit to liking said bands and only said popular ones... things like Morning Musume and other bands highly recognized.

I think it really boils down to the fact that some of these guys like crossdressing, some of the bands need a member that crossdresses to fit the VK/OK sort of status, and some might do it just because there's some sort of chance to be picked up by major record labels, however small that chance might be.

I could probably keep going but I'm just rambling at this point since I'm really tired. :/

And how to you know if they are actually male or not? Because you read the trap comments?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uH-ZtWDRrHY
I almost got a heart attack...
Versailles ia really awesome band though.

Maybe they find female clothing more comfortable. Or they want to be a trap.
Or.. Or maybe they want female fans to see how men are more beautifully crafted than females nowadays?
Q n Q );;

Fucking Visual Kei. It's essentially glam-rock, Japanese edition. Lolita23q is a good example. Love their music, but if they think I'm getting a hard on from watching their music videos... no comment.

I would gladly cross-dress for money.

The fujoshi and females in general love their traps. The men crossdressing are often hetrosexual in nature

Like with host bars the men aren't manly men in those establishments, they are feminine looking men. Same thing they are straight and some do have sex with their female clients outside of premises upon request.

Music has since the 50s become just as much about the visual performance as it is about the music itself. Visual Kei and the like is just one of the more popular ways for Japanese bands to form the right image to appeal to the target audience they're aiming for.

Same reason black metal bands wear corpse paint and mainstream rappers wear lots of "bling," most musicians need to appeal stylistically aswell as through their songs.

No, of course I don't come to a conclusion just based on that. If anything, the comments just makes me aware that it may be true. I know they are a male when they speak with their normal voice and who are known to be male such as a person called makmakmakochan. Otherwise, I don't know for sure - but I'm not talking about those who I am not sure 100%. I'm talking about musicians who are biologically male, but dress up in female clothing.