There's a very unknown prog metal band called Vanquish from Virginia. The album Nine Deadly Sins is quite entertaining except for the vocalist's off-key and overly gravelly voice. Not a bad find, considering they allow their album to be downloaded for free, but either Greer Cawthorn needs vocal training or they need to find a new singer.

Agreed, I just like how much different he sounds than most black metal vocalists.... a lot of rasp...

So you'd rather a generic metal vocalist? Riiiiight. I happen to think his vocals are good on that album (even though they are a bit cheesy at times). I couldn't imagine Human Insecticide and W.T.Y.D. with any other vocalist (except, perhaps, Tom Araya or Eric A.K.).

Hansi Kursch is a completely different kind of singer, and I'm positive that his voice over ATG would ruin the cool atmosphere that album has. I like Hansi, but he isn't the right singer for something like as archaic and fantastic as Awaken the Guardian.

When one is careful to avoid sweeping generalizations on vocal STYLES you don't appreciate, this is actually a difficult thread. I don't dig the stereotypical European power metal vocals - clean and high pitched - but I am sensible enough to see that AC DC- style vocals wouldn't go with the music either. There are some albums with horrible vocals, but guess what, I don't think my opinion of these albums would have been redeemed by these vocals, not enough to call them good albums at any rate. In a good album, the vocals will almost invariably suit the music, it is just that I may not be agreeable to the vocals. So, there are albums where I am not crazy about the vocals but it doesn't stop me liking the albums.

All told, the closest I could get to answering this thread was James La Brie but listening to Kansas gave me a different perspective on the La Brie style vocals I see in so much modern prog. I am now sure Dream Theater intended those songs to sound that way and no other, it's just that I am not receptive to whatever it is that they are trying to convey.

No you're not, you're sticking with that album until you love it! Accept it and move on. I don't think Hansi could pull those melodies off as he's got no where near the range Arch does. I don't think I like John Arch's solo material much, mind you. I'm just checking it out now and it seems a bit too "modern progressive" for my liking... I'll give it time though. I tell you who I can't get into, Geoff Tate, I just find his vibrato a little annoying.

You are sticking with that album PriestofSadWings! I am adding my voice to ANationalAcrobat's!
Seriously though, I have always thought John Arch a brilliant singer with a voice perfect for the atmosphere of Fates Warning's material.

DCA by Dimmu Borgir... one of the most bloody screwed up albums i ever had the bloody misfortune to listen too. Shagrath only farts in the whole bloody album!!!

Not that the album is good anyways........... Still 2-3 songs are allright

anything by 3 inches of blood with the screamo guy lol

Really? That's too bad...

I actually like the sound of the both voices in harmony with each other. I definitely prefer Cam Pipes vocals. However, I do think Jamie Hooper is bringing something worthwhile to the table.

I like their multi-vocalist approach. I just wish they would write better music to go along with it.

I felt the same about John Arch's solo.

Awaken the Guardian is of course awesome, and it is due in large part to the vocals. I don't think I'll even listen to that album at all if the vocalist was just a "good" singer. John Arch's almost over-the-top vocals that always have some unexpected twists and how they work perfectly with the riffs to synergistic effects totally make the album a masterpiece.

It wouldn't be the same without Arch, what he does is pretty magical and perhaps his finest performance, though The Spectre Within isn't exactly a slouch in the vocal department. That said anyone with songs as strong as Fata Morgana is worth a listen in my book.

It's one of those albums that even though you can see its influences and such is completely unique, I don't think I've found an album that makes me feel the way it does. I guess I was disappointed by Arch's solo stuff because it had a completely different feel.

Profanum (Pol) - Eminence Of Satanic Imperial Art

So atmospheric, so brooding, so evil - black metal at it's finest... until you hear that the vocalist pretty much does his recordings in a meat factory while pissed off at pigs with mold.

I've never been a huge fan of the Vocals on Mayhem's De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas.

I liked Arch's solo material, he sounded great and Jim Mathos's guitars were very cool themselves, winding and swirling about in a subtle and melodic fashion that I just dug.

I agree with this. Are you from VA by any chance?

Disarmonia Mundi

The music that they write is awesome, but I can't stand the vocals of Björn Strid. It was almost to the point of ruining 'Fragments of D-generation' for me.

I never really dug the vocals in The Jester Race, Reign in Blood, and Master of Puppets. For the most part, the vocals in thrash metal don't click with me. I find them rather boring, frankly.Tom Araya lacks any real range while Hetfield's vocals strike me as annoying. With the Jester Race, the vocals are rather underwhelming and lack power.

Yeah, In Flames (all albums, not just with Anders), Dark Tranquillity and Arch Enemy's later stuff all have terrible vocals with decent music that would sound better with a nice clean, deep voice or one with more range.

all metal sounds like shit, face it you all liste nto bullshit, lets fucking scream and make gay fucking rifts that sound like shit.

Hah! Rifts!

What a fucking jagov.

Maybe it was just me, or from the first time i listened to it, but i thought Iced Earth's self titled debut album had vocals that did not fit very well at all with the music on it. they really did define their sound much later onwards in their career.

Even as a fan of Agalloch, I really don't like some of the vocals at all. Especially those soft, powerless, half-whispered gargles used over acoustic passages. The whispered vocals are all pretty bad. It's a shame because the vocalist has shows that he's actually quite decent, but apparently he chooses to use a rather annoying style. Ashes Against The Grain is an excellent album, but it probably has the worst vocals out of all Agalloch albums.

I say most of the depressive black metal bands are like that, the shrieky vocals, I mean. Just like Silencer.

HADES - If at first you don't succeed
ARCH ENEMY - Rise Of The Tyrant

Now that's interesting. Is it because Angela is a girl, or did you just like the old guy better, or does it just have to do with the style of vocals?

I thought her vocals fit very well with the mood of the album.

One band that comes into mind is Vio-Lence. They are a great band, but their vocalist has a very... well... wierd style that makes you not take the album seriously at times

In my opinion Angela's vocals don't fit anymore to the music Arch Enemy is playing on this album. Her vocals did fit very well to e.g "wages of sin" but personally I think "Rise of the tyrant" isn't that much of a death metal-album rather than a speed/thrash metal album. e.g. "revolutions begin" is a pure speed metal song (referring only to the instrumental aspects)- a real awesome one. But her vocals just don't fit anymore to this kind of music.

It hasn't got anything to do with her being a girl. Honestly the first time I heard her singing couple years ago, I thought "Dude, this guy sounds really pissed".*lol*
It was before I knew the singer is a girl.

Early In Flames with clean vocals (especially on the TJR) would be interesting to hear I think. Dark Tranquillity released some good stuff. (Only Of Chaos and Eternal Night and The Gallery in my opinion.) And the vocals fit well. Arch Enemy's vocals sound kind of boring.

Every Burzum album save for Dunkelheit.


Varg's vocals are absolutely terrible.

Dark Tranquillity's music isn't bad or anything, but the vocals suck; terrible raspy yelping that just doesn't do my ears justice at all.

Enchantment's 'Dance the Marble Naked' was a great UK Death/Doom Metal album that was ruined by the shitty vocalist. The Same goes for US Death Metal band Excruciating Pain and their album 'Thou Shall Choose'.

Also, am i the only one who doesn't like Bruce Dickinson's vocals?

This is very true actually! That guy sometimes sounds like a shitty hardcore singer, and sometimes he sounds like a slightly enraged Chewbacca. Quite comically bad really. Makes the album rather difficult to take seriously.

with you 110% never understood the reasoning behind that awful AWFUL mix

Warning - Watching from Distance

Not horrible... just hard to get used to, same thing goes for Revelation & Against Nature.

Tony Foresta on the first Municipal Waste album just sounds awful.

I don't usually complain about vocals, but Finntroll raises my eyebrow. I love the folk tunes, but if they were trying to sound like trolls, they could have done a better job in my opinion.

Silencer - Death - Pierce Me