Sat by a pool on holiday with the Bluetooth speaker playing some tunes on shuffle, and throwing out a few old faves. Got me to thinking about some favourite singers/vocalists that just seem to strike a nerve when I hear them. A couple for me (so far, from this random playlist):

Paul Smith – Maximo Park (love the Northern inflections)
Ange Dolittle – EAT, Big Yoga Muffin, amongst other projects (not sure why, but his voice just gets me…)
Mark Lanegan – low register powerhouse
Steve Earle – love a bit of Americana
Jason from Sleaford Mods
The girl from Amyl and the Sniffers

Do you have any fave singers that just seem to always lift the song they’re singing to a higher level of greatness?!

Martha Reeves
Marvin Gaye

Maria McKee – such a range and such control. Ludicrously unappreciated.

Florence Welch

Another Lanegan fan here.

Eddie Vedder, Chris Cornell, Frazey Ford, Jason Isbell, Sturgill Simpson, Colter Wall, most of the Stax/Atlantic classics and Beth Ditto. Too many to narrow down really.

Alison Moyet

Sade

and Whitney obvs. Goes without saying as she is the best vocalist.

edit: was.

Joan Baez….. saw her live at the Albert Hall in 1965…. gave me goosebumps…. wonderful voice.

Tarja Turunen (ex Nightwish)

Floor Jansens version of the same song is pretty awesome too, considering she only had 48 hours notice to perform it live!

Sharon Den Adel (Within Temptation)

Yannis Papadopoulos (Beast in Black) – Just for the nuts vocal range!

All women.
Probably Madeleine Peyroux and Taylor Momsen at the moment.

Kate Rusby. A stunning voice with a piercing clarity.

Amongst others:
Bessie Smith
Otis Redding
Bob Marley
Bob Dylan

Bjork – unmatched for range.
Chris Stapleton – Love a bit of Raspy Country
Daltrey is great, but think he’s a tW@
Aretha – Unparalleled

Hard to argue with most of the above.

I’ve become slightly obsessed with Kate Bush recently. Definitely linked to the Stranger Things hype-machine

Horace Andy
Beth Gibbons (Portishead)
Björk

Anette Olzon
Tarja
Jimi Jamison
Nina Persson
Steve Augeri
Jonas Bjerre
Natalie Maines
Grant Nicholas – Solo only
Hayley Mary
Kathleen Edwards
Tommy Shaw

Ange Dolittle – EAT, Big Yoga Muffin

Thumbs up…Thought it was just me 🙂

Otis Redding
Etta James
Dusty Springfield
Levi Stubbs
Eddie Kendricks
Marvin when he’s not showing off, and especially when he’s singing with Tammi Terrell
Snoop Dogg

Skin – possibly the most underrated/forgotten talent of all time.

Fiona Apple, Emiliana Torrini, Thom York, PJ harvey.

Fiona Apple, Emiliana Torrini, Thom York, PJ harvey

hree out of four ain’t bad…

For a female voice, I want clarity and emotion.

Beth Gibbons. Always knew she was good (untrained, but good) and then somewhere recently I was directed to this

Liz Fraser (Cocteau Twins / This Mortal Coil / Massive Attack)

Hope Sandoval (Mazzy Star)

and for the male voice – character, and gravel.

There are loads of great voices, some dependant on the style of song, some purely great singers.
I’d go with Elizabeth Fraser, Jeff Buckley and bjork. God forbid rod Stewart probably deserves a mention….

Brandon Boyd
Dolores O’Riordan
Billy Corgan
Freddie
MJ

Annie Lennox
Stevie Nicks
Seal
Phil Collins
George Michael

are a handful that come to mind.

Eddie vedder is superb.

Danny boz from thunder is very underrated

Though these boys rule.

Though my favourite is baz from massive wagons. Cos he’s a nice chap!

Loads of the above, and a bit of Karine Polwart as well

Adam Duritz of the Counting Crows. Whiney, a lot of the time but so flexible and he can pour in the emotion. But mostly I like his erratic borderline freeform live versions (and watching the band try and follow whatever random direction he’s just gone in). I mean, august and everything after is 3 decades old and there’s songs that they’ve played at probably every single gig but they find ways to keep it fresh.

And Regina Spektor. You need to have a bit of acceptance of screeching and howling at the moon but she’s one of my favourite “voice as an instrument” singers.

Karen Matheson.
Maddy Prior.
Roland Orzabal.
Cher.
Matt Monro.
Dido.
Dusty Springfield.
Chris Rea.
George Michael.
Ozzy Osbourne.

The list is endless & of course depends on mood/amount of alcohol consumed.

Bill Janovitz

Black Francis

Jason Isbell

Kate Bush

Bjork

Neil Fallon (Clutch)

Mark Lanegan

Tom Waits

Elizabeth Frazer

Kristin Hersh

Degs:

https://youtu.be/eywoX6qz5pg

Hmm not sure how to embed

Some great suggestions

..just remembered, I should’ve included Kate Stables (This is the Kit). I’m fairly new to her stuff, but loving it…

And another shout out for early Rod Stewart

Agnes Obel

Plus lots of the above mentions. Oh, and not forgetting Karen Carpenter.

Neil Fallon (Clutch)

Didn’t stick him on my list but he’s one of my all time favourites from the best rock band ever. Sounds like a possessed preacher and such a wonderful lyricist to boot. Don’t know of anyone else who could sing a recipe for crab cakes.

Quite a few already mentioned

Also off the top of my head

Yusef / Cat Stevens

Gillian Welch

Roberta Flack

Julee Cruise

Sarah Jarosz

Sam Cooke

Bill Withers

Gretchen Peters

John Prime

Sam Beam (Iron & Wine)

David Berman (Sliver Jews)

Simon Joyner

The Prisonaires

Loads of +1s already (Hope Sandoval, Bill janovitz, Beth Gibbons, Skin, Steve Earle).

For me also…

Eliza Carthy
James Dean Bradfield
Nanna Hilmarsdóttir (Of Monsters And Men)
Nick Cave
Eivor

But, IMO, no-one in ‘pop’ touches Sinead O’Connor for vocals. If you can ignore all the crap floating around her, her voice at it’s best was pure, raw and unearthly all at once. She could do things with dynamics, tone and timbre that I’m not sure I’ve heard anyone else get close to.

Never heard of most of them. Probably trendy new stuff I guess. clicked to add Maria Mckee to find that I am not the only fan. Early Lone Justices was the best. I’ll add Belinda Carlisle. Not so much in her solo days but early Gogos and the later stuff. Go and find “I wanna be sedated” from 20 something
here

Old school: Beatles, Bowie and Patti Smith
Medium school: Pixies and Sisters of Mercy
New: Sleaford Mods and Rosalia

Amongst others.

Jello Biafra.
Such a distinctive sound and such a frontman.

Guy Piciotto from Rites of Spring/Fugazi.
Again, very distinctive and huge energy.

Agree regarding Sinead O’connor

Also thought of a few more
Annie Lennox
Chris Isaak
Lux Interior
Jim Reid
Angus Stone (Dope Lemon)
Nina Simone
Poly Styrene
Norah Jones
Rodriguez
Toots Hibbert

Think Freddie Mercury gets my vote 👍