I don't mean vocalists who once had a decent voice or something, or people who went through a massive vocal change, but people who once had an amazing voice and lost it too quickly.

(No list thread please! Explain!)

Jonas Renske comes into my mind. Starting with a pretty understandable but not emotional growl on ''Ihva Elohim Meth'', then moving into his emotional growls/crying shrieks on ''Dance of December Souls''. Jonas was in my opinion at his prime there, while still sounding understandable. Hope soon died, (atleast for me) when I heard the EP ''For Funerals to Come''. I don't know if it was Jonas who did all the vocals there, but they sound way too forced and over dramatic. His final performance on October Tide's first album was good. He didn't sound understandable, nor emotional, but well done. Later he only did clean vocals which still sound annoying to me.

Phil Anselmo did a great vocal job at the first few Pantera records, just before he fucked his voice with heroin and stuff.

Legion from Marduk, He had a great voice on Heaven Shall Burn and Panzer and such but by World Funeral he completely blew his out.

Tom Araya used to have a much more melodic voice with a hell of a lot range on Show No Mercy (scream at the end of Tormentor, anyone?) and Hell Awaits, with the high water mark being Reign in Blood. He jumped the shark on South of Heaven, though, and up until Divine Intervention his voice gradually became more and more gruffy and harsh while his range decreased. Christ Illusion is the epitome of this, and nowadays it seems as if all he is doing is shouting anymore. I still moderately enjoy Christ Illusion, but Tom's vocals are definitely one of the low points of the album.

That's exactly what I was thinking, he can't hit any of the higher notes he used to hit back in the day.

I'll go out on a limb and say Bruce Dickinson. He lost it right at No Prayer for the Dying. He had a few good performances on that and Fear of the Dark, but the 90s weren't too kind to him. The Death on the Road DVD performance by him is pretty sub-par. His voice improved in the studio for Brave New World and the other new albums, but he still doesn't have the range.

Huh? He didn't sound good in the early 90s with that raspy tone he started using, but with his later solo stuff and new Maiden albums, he sounds great. Not as much range, but his voice is fine.

Harry Conklin. He sounded amazing on Ample Destruction and Satan's Host's debut, but on pretty much everything since he's been getting weaker, losing range and just generally sounding more and more average. Fucking shame, that is.

Age is harsh on a lot of singers

Geoff Tate comes to mind, as does Belladonna when he rejoined Anthrax.

Phil Anslemo pissed his godly voice away on Vulgar

Hetfield is terrible at singing now, he ruins the classics live.

I'll stat the obvious and say Hetfield. Never an ''awesome'' vocalist, perhaps, but he had a great thrash voice on the early albums, which has now sadly turned to a strained screech :/

Yeah Hetfield is my biggest complaint. He sounded pretty decent and menacing on the first two albums. But by Justice he began to wane pretty badly and on the self-titled he just sounds like fucking roadkill.

I always thought Joey Belladona still had a great voice when he came back to join Anthrax, I barely noticed anything difference.

He's improved since the 90s, but a big part of the appeal of Bruce Dickinson (to me) was the range. He'll never be able to hit the high notes in Run to the Hills or Rime of the Ancient Mariner again.

His older voice does compliment the new "mellower" (for lack of a better word) Maiden albums though.

Actually, I think that made his voice freakier and almost better in a way.

Never a good vocalist, but at the start a decent one - Anders Fridan (In Flames). I don't even think what he does now can be called 'singing'.

LaBrie from Dream Theater. He used to be able to hit those high notes, and sing fairly well... but now he really can't do any of it anymore.

Didn't he eat a poisonous taco or something?

Lord Worm and Dani Filth are some obvious ones.

I still like Araya, but I do agree that he's not the vocalist that he was. Same with Maniac, I like his later work but he's nothing like he was on Deathcrush.

Actually, he lost it right at Among the Living. If you listen to the Armed and Dangerous EP and Spreading the Disease.... then listen to Among the living, you can hear a large nosedive in vocal quality and range. He never regained the abilities he had on Spreading the Disease, either, and his range diminished quite a lot, as did his tone quality; especially live. A real shame, too, he had a lot of potential.

What? He sounds way more menacing on black album and AJFA then he does on the first two. he sounds like a teenager before puberty on the first two.

With some reluctance I'd agree on Hetfield, though. He had a great thrash voice, then lost that for some pretty decent melodic vocals for a few albums, and then proceeded to lose that, too. He tends to have an ok voice for the first few shows on tour, then it's just all downhill from there.

I thought he sounded fine on the self titled, it was just that the songwriting itself sucked ass.

Ihsahn from Emperor maybe?

Ozzy hasn't been mentioned yet which is probably because he was never the greatest singer, technically speaking. However, I think that his voice was perfect for Sabbath's early albums; its ragged, thin sound is perfect for conveying the horror necessary for a song like "Black Sabbath." When Ozzy yells "Oh, God, please God help me!" it is fucking convincing. Compare that to his voice nowadays; he sounds like a shitty impersonator of his own work as a result of his ridiculous drug abuse. He can't even fucking remember the lyrics to classic Sabbath tracks. He's become a pathetic shadow of his former self.

Chris Barnes
from a truly scary haunting bestial roaring monster growl to very VERY dry, burnt out (in more than one way) embarrasing shell of his former self.
once a pioneer - now a punchline

Ihsahn has definitely gone down hill. His harsh vocals have become pretty difficult to listen to and although his cleans have improved a good deal they still aren't that solid.

I hate to admit to it, but Daniel Gildenlow's range has been on a pretty steady decline since Remedy Lane. Of course the guy still has an incredible voice, but I doubt we'll hear another Reconciliation from him.

He was never very good remember the words to the songs.

The Lord hasn't lost it, he just isn't doing it. What you heard on OWN was what he was paid to do. There are a few videos of him doing something different, and a few of him getting down to his former gurgles.

I agree about Tom Araya... it's terrible.

Also, uh... David Vincent of Morbid Angel. Can he even do what he did on AoM or BatS anymore?

Perhaps Dani Filth? I'm sure that James Hetfield is worse than ever, poor old man~

When was Dani Filth ever an awesome vocalist?

Heroin doesn't fuck with your voice, you dumbass. Phil was a horrible vocalist anyway.

That's called aging.

Shagrath

Tom Angelripper. On Agent Orange he sounds evil and menacing, but lately he sounds like a very, very tired wheezing old man.

The first that comes to mind is James LaBrie, who had a phenomenal voice from his late-80s work with Winter Rose to Awake, but never really recovered from tearing his vocal cords after sampling Cuban cuisine. And then we got Daniel Heiman, who sounded like an even better version of early-90s LaBrie while performing with Lost Horizon, and then for some reason decided he'd rather sing shitty core music than continue with one of the only power metal bands in Europe that actually still has balls, and it's affecting his voice--he's starting to croak like Phil Anselmo. He probably wouldn't have a chance in hell of hitting the D6 on "Highlander - The One" nowadays.



He got food poisoning in Cuba. I have no idea why he even went to Cuba, never mind ate what passes for food there.

Russ Anderson, when he actually decided to sing instead of rant and shout, he had an amazing voice (I've heard Forbidden covering "Victim of Changes", and he nailed it, and a couple of really great, unreleased melodic heavy metal songs from the years between Twisted into Form and their groove shit). Now he's almost unbearable.

Ray Alder went from one of the best shriekers to ever sing in metal to a borderline lounge singer in about three albums.


Tom Angelripper was obsolete as soon as Sodom went for a more polished sound. He was a perfect fit for Sign of Evil, but Agent Orange needed a melodic vocalist, not a harsh one. Angelripper's performance on Agent Orange wasn't bad, really, just completely inappropriate, much like Geoff Tate singing "Chainsaw Gutsfuck" would be inappropriate.


Have you heard Power Metal. or do you really buy into their historical revisionism?



Bruce Dickinson is no shrieker; his super-high notes have always been weak and often obnoxious. His forte is his incredible power, projection, and drama, and the ability to be emotional without losing any of his "metal-ness" (Matt Barlow should have taken notes). I'd say he started to come into his own with Somewhere in Time and peaked with Dance of Death. He's slowly starting to lose it now, but he's lasted a very, very long time.

So true. Before I listened to some of the tracks off of Power Metal, I thought the same thing, but Phil is actually really damn good on that album.

I know I'll get murdered and raped if I say this, but Chuck Schuldiner. He was perfect for all their albums up to TSoP. I don't know, maybe I'm just not used to it yet or maybe I wasn't made to handle their most progressive album. But right now I stay away from the album because of the vocals. And then he died, so then no more voice to hear.

His vocals for Down are rather excellent. Id say with Pantera he did go down hill but for 'Over The Under' he has improved quite a bit. I also enjoyed his vocals with Superjoint Ritual.

I don't know where all this Chuck Schuldiner enshrinement is coming from as I have heard that "take pause" sentiment before regarding so called Chuck fanboys but I haven't come across any. At least not much on this site. I do like early Death though. Like not love.

Unfortunately, I never had the chance to see Cryptopsy live, but, strictly speaking of Worm on the grounds of studio recordings I would have to agree. From his time on Blasphemy Made Flesh to Once Was Not he scaled back his vocal performance. Not as in the quality degraded over time, but as in his range and the types of screams he performed... as if it were a conscious decision. I never really understood why he did that. Would have been nice to hear some of his inhuman screams on albums with better recording budgets.

I have to second Hetfield and Dickinson here. Hetfield doesn't even try anymore to get his more thrash-metal-proof sound he had on A.J.F.A. and has been sounding insecure sind the Load era. Dickinson is just getting old, not his fault but I don't like listening to new (live) material anymore...

And I'd have to say: Dave Vincent. right after Altars of Madness... Also JC de Koeyer from Gorefest can't pull of anymore what he did on the first Gorefest demos. Uhm.. Russ Anderson (Forbidden), Michael Coons (Lääz Rockit),

And ofcourse: Chuck Billy

Strange, because I really liked his voice on The Sound of Perseverance.

This is what I thought of. I listen to Whoracle and Jester Race and am amazed at how sweet his vocals are, and my amazement only triples when I listen to the new shit, it's so sad. He wasn't amazing but his growls early on were pretty decent and very enjoyable.

Although his vocals aren't the only thing wrong with new Flames, but it's the biggest part.