It's an interesting position that musicians/artists are put in. Balancing their art and commerciality. When we describe music, we think of the art in its purest form. When we think stage act, we think entertainment. Although I don't believe these two things are completely polar things. They should be something musicians should and must embrace. Listing off a few larger than life personas in popular music we can come up with a rather intense list. Kiss, Prince, Elton John, Slipknot, Maryiln Manson, etc. Now I don't advocate any musician goes out of their way to perpetuate a stage persona, rather it should be a natural extension of themselves.
Let's say we take David Bowie and his Ziggy Stardust character. If we are to take a direct quote from Bowie, "Offstage I'm a robot. Onstage I achieve emotion. It's probably why I prefer dressing up as Ziggy to being David." Now at first glance this may seem pardoxial. In real life he feels nothing but on stage (in the fake, articifical stage) he feels alive but maybe it is us that see things wrongly. The stage is where the real David Bowie comes alive, the sorta Jekyll and Hyde transformation, and in real life he is the one pretending. Pretending to fit in all of societies little niceties and pleasantries. On stage is when the unchained David Bowie comes to life.
Or we can take Alice Cooper, where there is the Alice Cooper we see on stage, then there's Vincent in real life. Yet again, this is a Jekyll and Hyde transformation. It isn't purely manufactured (although, you have to know that some of it is exagerated, but that is theatre, exagerated). Alice Cooper is just as much a real person is as Vincent is. They are both seperate identies but both the same person.
So what should stage persona be?
What we know is that it shouldn't be black metal. It shouldn't be fake. It shouldn't be manufactured. And it defintely shouldn't be something that you try and make people believe. What it should be is yourself. It should be an extention of yourself that doesn't exist in everyday life. So there is a fine line in all that. What point does it become a self perpetuated act, and when is it a natural extention of yourself. That is something that only the individual can answer for themselves. And the audience will know, they will feel what is fake and what is true.
As a final note, I have been discussing very extreme cases of stage persona. But it is not limited to just Slipknot-esque stage demenor. Where would Jimi Hendrix be without stage persona? Where would Janis Joplin be without stage persona. When you are on stage, you are bigger than life. At the end of the day, as the great prophet once said, people come to be entertained; no one comes to a show to be whipped; and if you do come to the show to be whipped isn't that for entertainment? If you have no stage persona, you become the stereotypical classical musician. Nose in the books, playing off the sheet. It doesn't matter how talented you are, without a presence no one will pay attention.
