Halestorm’s Lzzy Hale on Band’s Growing LGBTQ Audience

Hottinger is often there to witness it and says many fans hand Hale letters, compelled to tell her their story. “‘I don’t have time to tell you everything; this says everything,’” Hottinger says, adding that Hale is sort of a heavy-metal role model to young fans.“ Watching little girls look at Lzzy, because she’s such a force onstage…they’re like ‘Wait, I can do that?’”

Halestorm’s diverse fan base is another sign of the expanding worldview of hard rock, which has been maligned for a history of misogyny and male gaze. At a 2023 show by Greta Van Fleet at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena, fans waved rainbow flags in front of the band, a show of support of GVF singer Josh Kiszka, who publicly came out that year.

“You can look out at the audience any given night, and it’s all walks of life,” Hale says. “The rock show doesn’t care who you like to kiss, what you like to wear, what you do for a living. We’re all the same.”

In this week’s rock-focused episode of Nashville Now, Hale and Hottinger break down Nashville’s vital scene rock and share what it was like playing for Ozzy Osbourne at his final show. Check out the full episode below.

Download and subscribe to Rolling Stone’s weekly country-music podcast, Nashville Now, hosted by senior music editor Joseph Hudak, on Apple Podcasts or Spotify (or wherever you get your podcasts). New episodes drop every Wednesday and feature interviews with artists and personalities like Lainey Wilson, Hardy, Charley Crockett, Gavin Adcock, Amanda Shires, Shooter Jennings, Margo Price, Dusty Slay, Lukas Nelson, Ashley Monroe, Old Crow Medicine Show’s Ketch Secor, and Clever.