I appreciate the hell out of great vocalists. And i can appreciate the effort and years of training. But i much prefer vocals that are more on the rough side. I love and appreciate jazz and Opera type vocalists.

But my bread & butter is punk and blues. I love the aggression and raw sound the men's voices give off. They sound like they look and whenever i was in a punk/metal/jazz band in high school. I played bass and i also sang. I always said ''I want my vocals to sound as ugly as i look''

Are vocals important when you listen to your music? are you turned off from people who sound average or below average? what if they good lyrics though? but were shitty singers.

Vocals are of utmost importance.

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But character is EVERYTHING.

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You can have a technically amazing singer who is bland as hell, or on the othe hand, a singer with terrible technique but exceptional pizazz and emotion in their voice. The latter will win evey time.

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When it comes to the sound of vocals, I prefer a male falsetto over anything else. However, vocals mean very little to me. The music behind the vocals is what catches my ear first and is what makes my ass shake, not vocals, and in music, the sound of the drums and bass are extremely important because they are the things that give the songs power and rhythm (which is why 99% of today's music sounds like shit, because it doesn't contain drums and bass and the type of drum machines they use sound like weak Fisher Price toys.)

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As far as how good a vocalist is though, that's the least of my concern. Hell, opera singers are the best vocalists in the world but that still doesn't change the fact that their music is boring as hell.

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[Edited 12/10/14 7:39am]

it depends, some genres must have voices that fit that genre...

can anybody picture Dylan singing in a metal band ? remember that Lou Reed fiasco with Metallica...

that said, many singers are versatile and can adapt to different genres...

but it's the VOICE who makes the change to adapt to a certain genre, NOT the other way around

my opinion...

Vocals are very important - they're usually the "face" of the music, the most immediately distinctive thing on the recording.

But I agree that a technically not-great singer who has the power to communicate can be much better than a bland but precise one. I like what Johnny Rotten said about singing - "I want to say what I mean, and SOUND LIKE IT." And he did.

But so do the Beach Boys. I get so much feeling from those guys' voices blended together, I don't think it would be better if it was "rougher".

I think a Real artist w/ something compelling to say-

Will always come off 'convincing' vocally.

nd33 said:

nd33 said:

Vocals are of utmost importance.

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But character is EVERYTHING.

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You can have a technically amazing singer who is bland as hell, or on the othe hand, a singer with terrible technique but exceptional pizazz and emotion in their voice. The latter will win evey time.

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This sums up my thought on the matter.

Vocals are important. I cannot stand a thin reedy weak high pitched in the middle of two notes but not quite either whiney sounding vocal. I cant really listen to PE because the girls vocals just shoot through the back of my brain and make me want to strangle someone. There's nothing worse than a great heavy sounding band fronted by a weak azz one dimensional 'recite the lyrics' vocal.

Most people today sing like they dont really understand the lyrics. Its robotic and boring.

FrenchGuy said:

Honestly I never cared much about the vocals when it comes to singers.. It's all about the music and the rhythm to me. Hell I can even forgive bad lyrics, but the music has to be good. Apart from few acts (in funk and soul mostly and hard rock sometimes) vocals are not important to me. That's why I never paid much attention to those singing talent shows on TV. I'll take any Janet song over anything Celine dion has made, no matter how high her voice can go. Actually those screaming singing divas (Mariah, Whitney, Celine, Beyoncé...) give me headache with their high register notes..

I agree about the powerhouse vocalists like Mariah & them. I can listen to them sometimes, but not all the time.

For me, I usually pay more attention to the melody and tune when it comes to songs. Sometimes I won't even realize what the song is about until much later when I finally pay attention to the lyrics and vocals lol.

nd33 said:

Vocals are of utmost importance.

.

But character is EVERYTHING.

.

You can have a technically amazing singer who is bland as hell, or on the othe hand, a singer with terrible technique but exceptional pizazz and emotion in their voice. The latter will win evey time.

.

Totally agree with you. Vocals are very important, and so are lyrics, at least to me.

But like you said, character is everything. There are many amazing singers who can hit high notes that do absolutely NOTHING for me, for instance Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, some opera singers, etc. etc. , and then there are some pretty average to really bad singers with mediocre or weak voices but I have absolutely no problem enjoying their music. Some Pharell songs come to mind, or some mid 90s RnB singers with mediocre skills but nice lyrics, or unusual voices.

People on this board don´t like Andy Allo that much, and I must admit I never really cared about her when she was with Prince but these days I love almost every song she´s ever appeared on, from the songs she did with Prince to the song she did with Miguel Migs (This Feeling).

Her vocals may not be that strong or great, and people hate her raspy voice but I just love This Feeling, Oui Can Luv, What It Feels Like or Time.

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And then there are some singers I used to love, like Mary J Blige but at some point their constant oversinging ( or melisma ) started to get on my nerves. Same with Chaka Khan. Great singers both of them, but sometimes a tad annoying.

Incredibly important, but also very subjective. It doesn't matter the kind of music, a vocal performance/style that I enjoy/want to listen to is still required. The best example I can give of this is with metal. I've been listening to metal longer than I've been listening to Prince (by a year or so) and I can't get into a lot of the modern stuff, even when the music is of the variety I would normally love, because the cookie monster, screamo, black metal, grunting, growling nonsense is just a complete turn off. Now, give me something like Mastadon, with some clean vocals that actually sounds like singing and I'm all over it. Happens a lot with indie rock, too. Doesn't matter what genre it is, though, if I don't enjoy the vocals I can't listen to the music.

Mind you, I'm not saying they need to have what would be considered a good or strong singing voice, either. Stevie Nicks doesn't technically have a great voice, but she's one of the best vocal stylists of the last 40 years and I could listen to her sing all day. I just need to enjoy the voice to enjoy the music.

Random aside; I LOVE jazz vocalists from all ages, actually buy releases of that nature both new and used, but asbolutely DESPISE opera. Opera and modern "country" are the two genres I simply can't do.

I think Chrissie Hynde or Joan Jett should have been on PE....can you imagine that?

FrenchGuy said:

Honestly I never cared much about the vocals when it comes to singers.. It's all about the music and the rhythm to me. Hell I can even forgive bad lyrics, but the music has to be good. Apart from few acts (in funk and soul mostly and hard rock sometimes) vocals are not important to me. That's why I never paid much attention to those singing talent shows on TV. I'll take any Janet song over anything Celine dion has made, no matter how high her voice can go. Actually those screaming singing divas (Mariah, Whitney, Celine, Beyoncé...) give me headache with their high register notes..

Well damn. I see you're just as smart as you are sexy.