Greatest Voice in Rock

WetWilly said:

Glenn Hughes

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Ding ding, winner.
I can't believe it took three pages for someone to post it.

Dio...the Pavarotti of rock and roll.

So many...

i always loved Paul Rodgers' silky smooth voice. I'm not a huge fan of my favorite bands from the 1970's still playing into their 60's (most are hard to listen to in my opinion) but after watching Bad Company's Hard Rock Live 2010, the man still has a great voice even after 42 years in the business.

Dear raging dolt, the question was in fact about voice, i.e. timbre, color, THE sound...and not about vocalization, i.e. power, range, control.

As such, I think the number of rock singers with truly great voices are few. Granted, rock doesn't demand "pretty" voices or pliable vocalists. In fact, ability can be a detriment...see Geoff Tate, King Diamond, early Zeppelin blues massacres.

But just for the fun of it. To attempt to make the game a little less subjective, I'm thinking what rock singers could sing the classic standards, (Sinatra, Andy Williams, etc.) or say, "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" without making grandma cringe.

Dio, for sure. Both in his falsetto and modal range.

Rod Stewart, for character as much as tonal quality.

James Dewar, especially his falsetto, which is saying a lot for a man.

Van Morrison

Halford, not sure. Nice lower-mids. His falsetto is great when screaming, but we're not screaming here. He's one of the many right on the cusp.


A few more. I'm tired

I'm going to echo Annie from the page before and 2008 and give Roy his shout out:

Did we really go nearly 5 pages here without mentioning Bowie? We should all blindfold ourselves and run out into traffic.

Peter Norway said:

Did we really go nearly 5 pages here without mentioning Bowie? We should all blindfold ourselves and run out into traffic.

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I wouldn't say Bowie is one of the greatest. Unique? Yes. But greatest? No.

Too much to name but Eric Burdon, and Bob Dylan for me.