The Top 200 Greatest Rock Singers -100 to 91

Now half way into our  list of the top 200 greatest rock singers, inspired by the travesty that was Rolling Stone's supposed list. Where they got it wrong, this list hopes to be more effective,  not only focusing on rock singers and those adjacent to the genre. If you have been reading you know the focus is not only on  technical vocal ability, in terms of range and power, as well as their dynamics, phrasing and the overall character of their voice. Can they emote from different places? How well does their voice hold up live? . How they control a crowd or their entertainment value as performers is also not a factor; there are some great front men who are also sub-par singers. There are also not going to be any Bob Dylan like singers, who are better songwriters than vocalists.

. Most pop singers won't appear here, but there are a few country or jazz singers who crossover just enough to qualify for this list, while having a significant influence on rock music. Don't expect rappers on this list or metal vocalists who just scream or growl, but never actually sing. I am keen on singers who are derivative of other singers. The bulk of these are doing their own thing, the few paying tribute to other artists have still made enough of an impact with their music. Having a unique vocal quality is going to be one of the most important factors often trumping technical ability. If they sound too much like Steve Perry from Journey after listening to their vocal coach rather than developing their own style, it is also not going to fly. Some of these might have been ignored by mainstream music media, but by the time we get to the top 10, I am sure it will all make sense, so here are the Top 200 greatest rock singers.

 100- Ray Lamontagne

This Soulful folk vocalist carries bluesy husk to his voice that allow him to carry a retro vibe that recalls classic Motowm. It is not about range or power as much as it where he puts his voice, which is in all the right places.

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99-David Drainman

The Disturbed front-man aside from the spastic monkey noises he sometimes makes, owes more to classic metal singers than the other singer from the nu-metal scene his band got lumped into. With each album they moved further from those tropes allowing him to his display his aggressive yet melodic style of singing

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98-Julie Christmas

The former vocalist of Made Out of  Babies qualified her self to be on this list due to the quirky nature of her voice that goes from growls to sounding like an insane preschooler, but she can also belt it out with the best of them and has matured into an excellent singer over the years.

   

97- Anneke van Giersbergen

Flowery female sirens adding a softer layer of atmosphere to metal was not always a thing. It was not until Anneke graced the Gathering with her pristine pipes that this came about.

   

96-Ics Vortex

The Arcturus vocalist is perhaps most known for his soaring clean vocals he lent to the golden years of Dimmu Borgir where he stole the show with his operatic hooks while playing bass. This provided the needed contrast to their normal growls.

   

95- Ripper Owens 

Being the man who replaced Rob Halford is a heavy title to carry around your career. Instead of just being a tribute act he preformed well with bands like Iced Earth, to show he can be his own man.

 

94-Ian Astbury

Another singer who filled in for an icon is the Cult vocalist who filled in for Jim Morrison. He has more power and range than Morrison, his powerful baritone is what makes the Cult sound so distinct.

   

93-Keith Caputo

When Life of Agony broke in the 90s, their style of melodic hard core was in many ways ahead of it's time thanks the pained bellow of Caputo that could smooth into a chilling croon. Other wings tried to fill the gap during Caputo's time away from the band and failed because they could not capture the raw emotion of suffering his voice held.

92--Jaz Coleman

His one of a kind voice that inspired the roar of most industrial bands thanks to the output of hit band Killing Joke, is also very nuance and he is capable of a new wave like croon to give a depth of dynamics

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91-Mat McNerney 

His most notable work is with Beastmilk aka Grave Pleasures and Hex Vessel, which shows how flexible his evocative baritone is. He can go from grim post punk to 60's psych-folk. He sings with both power and feeling in equal measure.  

The Top 100 albums of the 90s : 90 to 81

Here we continue with out Top 100 albums of the 90s a decade generally assumed to be dominated by grunge, while there will be some on here sooner or later its the open door to experimentation that alternative hitting the mainstream that brought out some of the interesting sounds we look at today in 90 to 81.


90- Entombed - "Wolverine Blues"
Continuing to be ahead of their time, this Swedish band also birthed the groove fill death n roll sub genre with this album that slayed things like "Far Beyond Driven". The title track alone was worth the price of the album.Yeah it was back in the days when you paid for albums.

89- Veruca Salt -"Eight Arms to Hold You" No, this is not the album with "Seether" on it. While that one is good, the song writing on this one is more mature , emotive and rocks out, with "Volcano Girls" having way more balls to it than "Seether' which fit more neatly into what was becoming expected of alt-rock at that time.

88-the Get Up Kids - "Something to Write Home About" Emo had been alive and well in the underground and this album pushed it towards a larger audience and prepped kids for bands like Jimmy Eat World who would later bring the word "emo" to mainstream audiences when things went wild with in on Myspace in the 2000s. But when this album came out it was just more thoughtful punk rock.

87- Judas Priest-"Pain Killer" Seeking to redeem themselves from being turbo-lovers, Priest came back to prove they could hit it as hard as all the thrash bands they influenced. A new drummer helped them pull this off and Tipton and KK, showed they had some impressive chops up their sleeves and could shred with the best of them. This album would be one of the last great metal albums before grunge.

86- Katatonia-"Discouraged Ones" They transitioned from being a gloomy doom ridden death metal band to switching over to clean singing and touching on more of a Cure like goth ambiance.

85-the Gathering-"Nightime Birds" Before the slew of symphonic melodrama that bands like Nightwish would be out of Europe, the Gathering brought a more majestic soaring to gloomy doom thanks to the vocals of Anna Maria van Giersbergen or Anneke as she would later be called. This album is way ahead of it's time.

84-Butthole Surfers- "Independent Worm Saloon" Gibby and the boys stopped clowning around and began rockin on this one , though it still retained much of their signature weirdness. Not hard enough to be metal, but to trippy to be punk. They would later really sell out with the album that followed.

83-Warrior Soul - "Drugs, God, and the New Republic" While they saw some popularity in Europe, they deserved to hit bigger in the States as they were better then bands like Tripping Daisy, who you won't see on this list. They toured with Danzig and Soundgarden, which is where I caught on to them.

82-Dj Shadow - "Entroducing" The drums sound is the only thing that sounds that dated to me, there are many other elements on this album they stand the test of time and find this to be an electronica classic.

81- Skunk Anansie "Post Orgasmic Chill" Another album that was an alternative to mainstream alternative.Skin their black lesbian lead singer has a set of pipes on her that take these songs to the next level. The songs held up well with the years as I can go back and easily listen to this one.

 

Heylel's "Nebulae"

Portugal's Heylel, have crafted an album with more depth than some of the bands they have taken cues from. This is apparent right from  opening notes that drift into your ears with an almost Pink Floyd like ambiance the  super clear tone that David Gilmore used on the bands' latter material, think "Division Bell" more than the Wall"

The second song  leans into a much more Nightwish like arena of prog metal , though I tend to think of this sort of thing as symphonic power metal. There is no shortage of melodramatics and theatrics. The vocals come across crystal clear, the synth sounds are sometimes thinner than I would like, but I get the idea.Sure the Gathering is a reference point, in the way there is some distance given to the chug and the empty spaces help create the melancholy.

The riffage sticks much closer to arena radio metal than the heavier sound Nightwish uses, Lacuna Coil comes to mind in this regard. I think they are darker and have a more sonic and gothic sound than Lacuna Coil. "Alter Ego" finds more soul being infused in the vocals , some of the intervals that creep in bring back the memories of the Pink Floydisms in the intro, though this time it is more "Wall" . It is in these moments where the band steps out from behind their influences and claims their own identity.

The more blatant ballads like " The Sage" I don't feel add as much to the album as a whole since they have already established themselves with this dynamic. The guitar does shine here, but the whole neo- classical thing doesn't really add anything to the scope of there sound since they have already flirted with it so heavily.

Sparse whispered male vocals haunt the periphery of the songs. They work best on "Deeper", which finds the female lead once again wowing you with the more emotive approach to her melodies. The lyrics however don't hold as much weight as her voice , but the harmonies that come in distract you from that fact. The build towards the end of this song seems like it has been a long time coming, as you find your self in need of more rock moments. This even makes me reluctant to call this a metal band.

The "Scarborough Fair" tinged "Wings of Eternity"  showcases her voice, but feels like it needs more of the band behind it. They do finally join in, this occurs in  manner that is not expected as they sway behind the solo rather than crunching into it. This finds the vocalist taking on more of a pop cadence until the chorus finally surfaces, and here their is almost a folk element.

These guys lack little in ability, some of the production choices might have made this a thicker more metal album if  done differently. Not sure how some of this transitions over live as the bulk is power-balladish. The most prog moment on the album would be the cover of King Crimson's "I Talk To the Wind". This version is more lunge crooned and floats over the back drop of shimmering post-rock like guitar. So the artistic choices they made here are impressive because they don't play it safe with this one. Anyone capable of covering King Crimson, has to get some props for doing so in the first place.

The darker groove to "the Great Abstinence" works well. The songs crawls in-between jazz and metal. The syncopation on the verse the singer uses really feels original and fresh.The band works best the more they think out of the box and leave the safe confines of their influences behind. "Sometimes" finds the singer somewhere in-between and Ani Difranco folk and blues.I guess more recent Pain of Salvation could also be a reference point for the direction these guys are heading in, as it seems they started off as a metal band and are wandering into different territory.

With a title like "Embrace the Darkness" you expect the metal to come out in full force. It does capture a dark ambiance, almost like Dead Can Dance.However this song serves is more intro than metal. More doomy chords ring into the climax , but it never explodes like you suspect it will.

I think finding a balance between the metal and more progressive elements they are embracing is going to be where the ext album takes these guys , but for what this is it was still an entertaining listen.The metal moments might not have paid off as much as they hinted at, but with that out of the way I can now listen to this with a better set of expectations, hopefully this review cleared that up for you as well, though taking a listen for yourself  is going to be the only answer, but over all what they do works way more than it doesn't.

The Return of the Weekly Shuffle

What the fuck is a weekly shuffle you ask. Well I hit shuffle mode on my iPod and review the first ten songs that pop up. It is back by popular demand so here we go.

the Last of the Famous International Playboys by Morrissey

This song is golden, smartly written though not as mean spirited as some of his solo work, but it is tons of fun none the less. People always call Moz depressing, but this song makes me smile every time.

Bulletproof Cupid by Placebo

Sure its a cool riff, but that doesn't make this a song . It feels more like the intro to the Sleeping With Ghosts album.

Ups by Cocteau Twins

This song flutters like fairy birds. She rolls her consonants strangely on this one and is speaking in tongue most of the time here , but that is the great thing about Liz is  she uses her voice more like an instrument rather than just the tired old verse chorus radio rock.

Saturday's Child by Brendan Perry

The male half of Dead Can Dance whose voice once reminded me too much of Neil Diamond, so I used to fast forward past his songs most of the time and now he is one of my favorite singers. Live the man is  an unsung powerhouse. I like this song because the way he transitions up into falsetto is very endearing.

Day of Lords -by Joy Division

Damn, the Weekly Shuffle returns only for my iPod to pump out a bunch of goth, "Where will it end" laments Ian Curtis. This song is heavy even though its not metal. The bass really pumps nicely into the drums on this .

Obedience by Wreck and Reference

O.k something closer to metal. I am still not over the fact this band's name is not No Youth. This was a great almost industrial album that shows  much like Pinkish Black that you don't have to have guitars to be heavy. The tormented vocals that come close to screaming with out screaming are brilliant.

The Earth is My Witness by the Gathering

The golden years from these guys and ..gals. There is a dark yearning to this album that feels like snow to me. This was my first exposure to this band and really stuck with me , despite popular opinion their other albums fall short of this one.

Whiskey Funeral   by Darkthrone

The black and roll years of this band are sadly under rated much like Kiss' disco days or Vegas Elvis. I am a champion of the under dog when it comes to bands getting away from their comfort zones to find something else that works just as well as the sound you expect from them.

Christine Sixteen by Kiss

Speaking of Kiss...there's no use in pretending. I like Gene's creepy moment when he is talking to himself about how he has got to have her. The Lolita weirdness continues on Goin Blind. Musical it's catchy I'm not sure the under current of the Elton John piano line really works but thirty years later the song is in my iPod.

Into the Coven - Mercyful Fate

That intro is sweetly played as the calm before the storm. The riff is metal up to 11 no question. Fate is rawer than King's solo works and this appeals to people who are really into the first two Maiden albums as well, as long as they aren't pussies about becoming Lucifer's Child.


 

The Gathering : Disclosure

So by "How to Measure a Planet" we had conceded to the fact the Gathering were no longer a metal band and after initial listens to this one I went looking for my copy of "night time birds" which in hindsight left its fingerprints all over most to the melodramatic female front pop metal bands out now. "disclosure" marks the second album without Anneke van Giersbergen, and I can understand how this might be a sore spot for long time fans, "How to measure a planet" was the last album I remember buying by them , though it was during the drug years so I could have owned others, as I have been fleetingly familiar with their material after that point but have yet to give their new singer ... Who has been in the band now for 5 years so not new at this point ... a chance, so I went in this album pretending it came out after " How to measure...". In that context it still makes sense.

what I do like about it is there's a place in my iPod for melancholy pop music, I'm sure Sarah McLaughlin has put out something recently and I have yet to search for it, her older stuff makes me feel like I'm on an episode of Buffy so not sure why I haven't downloaded her back catalogue yet, and no Sarah is not on this new Gathering album but it sometimes feels like her music, with more emphasis on the band and not an over abundance of balladeer piano. Former Octavia Sperati singer Silje Wergeland, gives a much better nod to the bands legacy than the replacement singers for bands like Kamelot and Nightwish have.

The first song that made me look up from what I was doing and say " oh shit , I like that" was the song " Gemini I". The others tend to have a more subdued continuity to them. I do appreciate the mimickery Silje employs when sliding into her upper register though it has a more delicate pop sensibility to Anneke. In a lot of ways this album feels like " Night time birds" though it lacks distorted guitar and where that album made me think of the winter this feels more like a rainy November, but not in the Guns N roses way. Where "Night Time Birds" is an easier transition for a metal head to make I to this sort of fare and after going back to listen to it I think it's fair to say the album might have influenced Katatonia in some ways, though it has more majestic pre Nightwish moments and is significantly heavier than " disclosure".

Where Anneke once soared, Silje contemplates. Times change and I can see where this flavor of pop might fit on a brooding teen vampire drama. So approaching this as a separate entity, and long time fans are used to the changes so this album won't be a hard swallow.

While the album captures a certain mood through out some of the songs drift aimlessly in the grey clouds while others have more narrative purpose. Dynamically the third and fourth songs, are very similar but of the two " heroes for ghosts" actually goes some where. The subtle use of horn in the songs seconds half gives a different color sonically and when the distorted guitar comes in though hardly metal it creates a good dynamic balance.

Sure the song " missing seasons" is a moody estrogen release , it is a well written one with an endearing melody to it. So if you are writing music for teenage girls who hang out in libraries...you know like Willow from Buffy , then this is the way to do it. Speaking of Sunnydale , most of these songs sound like they would be preformed at the bronze, as they have the late nineties alt rock feel.

The closing melody to "Gemini 2" had to grow on me as on the first few listens I was underwhelms and while it is very Sarah McLaughlin, who is a bigger influence on her than Anneke by far, though not to discredit her for doing the Gathering's legacy justice. Similar approach was made with " paralyzed " whose melody took some time to mesh with my ear drums, the " say my name..." hook stuck but where the point where the song floats off with out the benefit of being anchored by is pointless, but a closer listen to the song kept me from writing it off. So with much weighing the pros and cons of an album so heavily focused on one mood and that mood being decidedly unmetal I resigned my self to giving the album an 8 out of ten points, which I rounded down from a nine due to the flat range of mood button the albums credit the Gathering is very capable of the mood they do weave almost to a fault. I would recommend this album to fans of Katatonia recent non-metal years as well.