Is popular music a mass produced commodity or a genuine art form?

Popular music's status as either an art form or a money-making tool for the seemingly omnipresent and looming force that is "The Man" is, in my opinion, a purely subjective one, and leads me to reference a reasonably common coinage, which is: 'One man's trash is another man's treasure.' I fully believe that this quote can quite easily sum up my point, however, I still have to fill another eighty-or-so words, so I'll continue. There are, of course, musicians and record labels who are purely out to make as much money as possible, and will stick to various formulae that they know will make them rich. However, I think that if an artist or a band truly love what it is that they're creating, and they put their whole selves entirely into a song or an album, then, regardless of the outcome, it is a true work of art.

Is it reasonable to consider that rock music is gendered male?

Men have ruled rock music since its creation, over fifty years ago. Iconic figures like Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Paige and Joe Strummer (plus, every single one of the Beatles) have filled the charts. Only very occasionally have women forayed into this male-dominated territory, such as Janis Joplin, Joan Jett and I'm sure a couple of others with too many J's in their names, but whenever they have, their gender has always been more like a quirk, or a selling point for their music. As opposed to... Well, their actual music. I don't think it's particularly unreasonable to state that rock music is gendered. Guitars are just bigger, louder phalluses which are okay to play with in front of large crowds, and much of the genres and sub-genres contained within "rock" almost exclusively deal in degrading women, so it's not hard to see why many consider it to be male-centric.