Anatomy of Axl's voice

[nosidam]

Yeah, another Axl's voice-topic, but I really tried to do a different one from everything you've ever read. It's against the tide, I think.

I noted that people here tend to consider Axl's raspiness his singin' trademark, when it's not, or should not be. Raspiness, IMO, defines the UYI era, not his whole career. In the beginning, until AFD, Axl applied very little rasp in his voice when screaming (SCOM and the Rocket Queen outro, for example, have almost no raspiness at all, and so does most of the other songs). In Lies, the raspiness began to overlap his normal screaming voice, and in UYI his clean and wild howls were 100% gone. I'm not judging the quality of his raspy voice. I enjoy all of these different styles. Axl was able to reinvent his way of singin' because he is very talented and was physiologically blessed.

My point is: Raspiness doesn't necessarily define Axl's quality as a singer. This is an illusion. The problem with him since '01 is not lack of raspiness, but rather a sad inability to scream with all the depth and wildness that defined his voice since the beginning, raspy or not. The difference today is that raspiness, when he is capable of doing it, tend to disguise his fragile voice, so, yes, it's a way to deliver power in a "superficial" way. That's why in '10 he was all raspiness, even when singin' traditional clean lines. In '06, even more clearly, he was spectacular when screaming with rasp, and very disappointing when his clean voice was demanded. The fact is that raspiness has its price: it ruins the throat, and that's why he completely lost his clean and powerful high pitched screaming during the AFD and Lies touring, but he was able then to reinvent his singin' style using the raspiness as a solid base. During his long hiatus in the 90's, he probably healed his throat , allowing him to perform a clean singin', but, probably due to lack of training, he lost his power, and rasp, if fully used, would completely fuck his then newborn and crawling voice (I really believe he was then saving time to recover his voice).

Concluding: I believe he really fucked his voice after abusing raspiness in '10, and now, since he never was able to regain his classic power and wildness from his youth, he has nothing more to appeal to. The main difference between '11-'14 and '01-'02 is that, in the latter, he was very slowly upgrade, probably doing exercises and taking care of his voice, and now he's totally downhill. He came from a very good sequence of years and now is fucked up and doesn't give a shit anymore. Let's hope he find a way to reinvent himself or, at least, to regain a goal to achieve after hard work.

That's it. Sorry for the never ending subject, but, between us, there isn't much to talk about anyway...

[Damn_Smooth]

Yay, another Axl's voice thread.

[Axl_morris]

The guy is past 50 and can sing better live than people half his age. Katy perry is totally shit live.

Most people complaining are angry because they weren't old enough to experiance the peak of Axls career.

Axl isn't topping the charts, he is playing the hits from his career. He is not an athelte like he once was, he's not the singer he once was.

20 years ago my girlfriend went to see him in manchester and he never turned up. Thats what people talked about then. In 06 they moaned about braids and no slash.

Now they moan about no rasp and DJ ashbas solos.

Just be glad there is a GNR to see live because one day there won't be.

Edited April 11, 2014 by Axl_morris

[magisme]

The original lyrics to Jungle were YOU ME, so he didn't really fuck up the lyrics at Bridge School.

[Dean]

He sounds amazing on the re-recordings on Live Era.

He's very unique and his voice does make for interesting discussion. God knows what was happening live in 2001/02, but the 4 year absence seemed to have done him wonders. His vocal coach from the recording of Appetite thought he had ruined his voice when they heared the Illusion albums.

[nosidam]

The guy is past 50 and can sing better live than people half his age. Katy perry is totally shit live.

Most people complaining are angry because they weren't old enough to experiance the peak of Axls career.

Axl isn't topping the charts, he is playing the hits from his career. He is not an athelte like he once was, he's not the singer he once was.

20 years ago my girlfriend went to see him in manchester and he never turned up. Thats what people talked about then. In 06 they moaned about braids and no slash.

Now they moan about no rasp and DJ ashbas solos.

Just be glad there is a GNR to see live because one day there won't be.

And you pray to Axl every night before you go to bed, right?

"Good Axl, please forgive me if I'm too exigent. You could be in an indefinite hiatus, but you're out there singing to me. Thank you for existing, raspy or not. Amen."

[RandallFlagg]

It's that he has no goddamn POWER in his cleanish vocals sometimes, he sounds like he's been weeping and is whining and it's a weak falsetto, we just want to know why he can't do what he did in 2010, if he'd just give an interview about his voice now and then it'd save a lot of bitching. Axl's a victim of his own extremes, when he sounds good, he sounds fucking good but the fans will give him shit if they smell blood and a lot of them will give him his due when he reaches the standard he can reach when he's on form, just seems few and far between because he has some kinda struggle to realize his own potential.

[nosidam]

He sounds amazing on the re-recordings on Live Era.

He's very unique and his voice does make for interesting discussion. God knows what was happening live in 2001/02, but the 4 year absence seemed to have done him wonders. His vocal coach from the recording of Appetite thought he had ruined his voice when they heared the Illusion albums.

And in an interview he said he didn't like at all his voice in Lies, and wanted to re-record everything he has done. I love his voice in this album, especially in You're Crazy.

[Absent]

Yeah, another Axl's voice-topic, but I really tried to do a different one from everything you've ever read. It's against the tide, I think.

I noted that people here tend to consider Axl's raspiness his singin' trademark, when it's not, or should not be. Raspiness, IMO, defines the UYI era, not his whole career. In the beginning, until AFD, Axl applied very little rasp in his voice when screaming (SCOM and the Rocket Queen outro, for example, have almost no raspiness at all, and so does most of the other songs). In Lies, the raspiness began to overlap his normal screaming voice, and in UYI his clean and wild howls were 100% gone. I'm not judging the quality of his raspy voice. I enjoy all of these different styles. Axl was able to reinvent his way of singin' because he is very talented and was physiologically blessed.

My point is: Raspiness doesn't necessarily define Axl's quality as a singer. This is an illusion. The problem with him since '01 is not lack of raspiness, but rather a sad inability to scream with all the depth and wildness that defined his voice since the beginning, raspy or not. The difference today is that raspiness, when he is capable of doing it, tend to disguise his fragile voice, so, yes, it's a way to deliver power in a "superficial" way. That's why in '10 he was all raspiness, even when singin' traditional clean lines. In '06, even more clearly, he was spectacular when screaming with rasp, and very disappointing when his clean voice was demanded. The fact is that raspiness has its price: it ruins the throat, and that's why he completely lost his clean and powerful high pitched screaming during the AFD and Lies touring, but he was able then to reinvent his singin' style using the raspiness as a solid base. During his long hiatus in the 90's, he probably healed his throat , allowing him to perform a clean singin', but, probably due to lack of training, he lost his power, and rasp, if fully used, would completely fuck his then newborn and crawling voice (I really believe he was then saving time to recover his voice).

Concluding: I believe he really fucked his voice after abusing raspiness in '10, and now, since he never was able to regain his classic power and wildness from his youth, he has nothing more to appeal to. The main difference between '11-'14 and '01-'02 is that, in the latter, he was very slowly upgrade, probably doing exercises and taking care of his voice, and now he's totally downhill. He came from a very good sequence of years and now is fucked up and doesn't give a shit anymore. Let's hope he find a way to reinvent himself or, at least, to regain a goal to achieve after hard work.

That's it. Sorry for the never ending subject, but, between us, there isn't much to talk about anyway...

The assumption that it is fundamentally impossible to distort one's voice in a healthy manner, that is, one which does not harm the vocal folds, bothers me. I'm growing really tired with morons pretending to be vocal experts, stating rasp is harmful as an absolute or calling any high-pitched note falsetto.

One can't scream with the level of force and distortion that Axl did in '10 as frequently as he did for as long as he did with poor technique. If his technique was lacking, if that manner of singing was harming his voice then it follows his voice only would have deteriorated over the course of the tour. We know that is not the case. That's not to say Axl's technique is perfect, but at his peak in '10 it was pretty damn close to it. The fact that Axl only improves over the course of tours strongly supports the more logical hypothesis that Axl refuses to practice or practices insufficiently during the breaks between tours.

But Axl is getting older and reaching the age where one's vocal system naturally begins losing its resilience to damage and the kind of vocal "atrophy" that would occur over long periods without practice. Axl's problems are not due to some universal issue with the addition of rasp to one's voice but due to his personal technique. You can hear the differences in his vocal production between '10 and the present, he sings with restraint now, higher placement, less chest, less rasp, more falsetto, whether that's due to some kind of general dissatisfaction with life or the band or something or apprehension of harming his voice irrevocably I don't know. I believe he's still got it in him to give performances equal to and surpassing '10, he has tremendous natural talent which survived the painful vocal horrorshow that was the UYI tour, not to say I didn't love his voice during that time as well, but it was objectively lacking good technique, if you add to that natural ability consistent practice and good instruction he could be capable of more great things.

[bigcountry]

The clean vocals are more natural for him but he is singing through his nose a lot.

If he would use more vocal range with the clean vocals that would make it sound much better, but he is either choosing not to or he has lost his range.

As far as the rasp, yeah it sounds good when not over used but at this point in his career it is most likely too hard on him. I bet he can still do it but at what cost? cancelled shows, legs of a tour or causing them to scrap the whole tour.

Edited April 12, 2014 by bigcountry

[Axl_morris]

The guy is past 50 and can sing better live than people half his age. Katy perry is totally shit live.

Most people complaining are angry because they weren't old enough to experiance the peak of Axls career.

Axl isn't topping the charts, he is playing the hits from his career. He is not an athelte like he once was, he's not the singer he once was.

20 years ago my girlfriend went to see him in manchester and he never turned up. Thats what people talked about then. In 06 they moaned about braids and no slash.

Now they moan about no rasp and DJ ashbas solos.

Just be glad there is a GNR to see live because one day there won't be.

And you pray to Axl every night before you go to bed, right?

"Good Axl, please forgive me if I'm too exigent. You could be in an indefinite hiatus, but you're out there singing to me. Thank you for existing, raspy or not. Amen."

Exactly

[EvH]

I can't help but laugh everytime I read the word "raspiness".

[vndam1121]

I really think a singer, especially one like axl loses that raspy sounding voice as age sets in. It's like an athlete eventually begins to slow down as they age. I don't really think it should be a big shock that his voice has gone in this direction over time.

For example, take a look at the case of burton Cummings the singer from the guess who. When he was younger he had a voice similar to axls, great range, powerful, and with that scratchy/raspy sound at times. These days, his voice is the clean sounding "Mickey Mouse" as some around here call it. Compare him on a video from back in the day to more recent performances, and it is similar to what is going on with axl.

[Tom2112]

The guy is past 50 and can sing better live than people half his age. Katy perry is totally shit live.

Most people complaining are angry because they weren't old enough to experiance the peak of Axls career.

Axl isn't topping the charts, he is playing the hits from his career. He is not an athelte like he once was, he's not the singer he once was.

20 years ago my girlfriend went to see him in manchester and he never turned up. Thats what people talked about then. In 06 they moaned about braids and no slash.

Now they moan about no rasp and DJ ashbas solos.

Just be glad there is a GNR to see live because one day there won't be.

Katy Perry still sounds like Katy Perry when she sings live... Axl however sounds like a totally different singer spare a few momentary moments of energy in songs like Nice boys or Civil war.

Your advice to "just be glad there is a gnr" is laughable, we're not the one's who should be working for peoples support... that's the bands job, THEY should be glad WE'RE still supporting them, even if we are begrudgingly doing it at this stage and still hoping for a big improvement.

[SlashisGOD]

Everyone makes excuses for Axl but the truth is you can use a raspy voice for years and years and if you do it right, you can retain power and good cleans. I listen to a ton of black metal and those guys use a much harsher rasp than Axl ever did and they still sound powerful live and in the studio. I do that style as well and I am fine.

It all comes down to no training on Axl's part and his "I don't care" attitude.

[nosidam]

Yeah, another Axl's voice-topic, but I really tried to do a different one from everything you've ever read. It's against the tide, I think.

I noted that people here tend to consider Axl's raspiness his singin' trademark, when it's not, or should not be. Raspiness, IMO, defines the UYI era, not his whole career. In the beginning, until AFD, Axl applied very little rasp in his voice when screaming (SCOM and the Rocket Queen outro, for example, have almost no raspiness at all, and so does most of the other songs). In Lies, the raspiness began to overlap his normal screaming voice, and in UYI his clean and wild howls were 100% gone. I'm not judging the quality of his raspy voice. I enjoy all of these different styles. Axl was able to reinvent his way of singin' because he is very talented and was physiologically blessed.

My point is: Raspiness doesn't necessarily define Axl's quality as a singer. This is an illusion. The problem with him since '01 is not lack of raspiness, but rather a sad inability to scream with all the depth and wildness that defined his voice since the beginning, raspy or not. The difference today is that raspiness, when he is capable of doing it, tend to disguise his fragile voice, so, yes, it's a way to deliver power in a "superficial" way. That's why in '10 he was all raspiness, even when singin' traditional clean lines. In '06, even more clearly, he was spectacular when screaming with rasp, and very disappointing when his clean voice was demanded. The fact is that raspiness has its price: it ruins the throat, and that's why he completely lost his clean and powerful high pitched screaming during the AFD and Lies touring, but he was able then to reinvent his singin' style using the raspiness as a solid base. During his long hiatus in the 90's, he probably healed his throat , allowing him to perform a clean singin', but, probably due to lack of training, he lost his power, and rasp, if fully used, would completely fuck his then newborn and crawling voice (I really believe he was then saving time to recover his voice).

Concluding: I believe he really fucked his voice after abusing raspiness in '10, and now, since he never was able to regain his classic power and wildness from his youth, he has nothing more to appeal to. The main difference between '11-'14 and '01-'02 is that, in the latter, he was very slowly upgrade, probably doing exercises and taking care of his voice, and now he's totally downhill. He came from a very good sequence of years and now is fucked up and doesn't give a shit anymore. Let's hope he find a way to reinvent himself or, at least, to regain a goal to achieve after hard work.

That's it. Sorry for the never ending subject, but, between us, there isn't much to talk about anyway...

The assumption that it is fundamentally impossible to distort one's voice in a healthy manner, that is, one which does not harm the vocal folds, bothers me. I'm growing really tired with morons pretending to be vocal experts, stating rasp is harmful as an absolute or calling any high-pitched note falsetto.

One can't scream with the level of force and distortion that Axl did in '10 as frequently as he did for as long as he did with poor technique. If his technique was lacking, if that manner of singing was harming his voice then it follows his voice only would have deteriorated over the course of the tour. We know that is not the case. That's not to say Axl's technique is perfect, but at his peak in '10 it was pretty damn close to it. The fact that Axl only improves over the course of tours strongly supports the more logical hypothesis that Axl refuses to practice or practices insufficiently during the breaks between tours.

But Axl is getting older and reaching the age where one's vocal system naturally begins losing its resilience to damage and the kind of vocal "atrophy" that would occur over long periods without practice. Axl's problems are not due to some universal issue with the addition of rasp to one's voice but due to his personal technique. You can hear the differences in his vocal production between '10 and the present, he sings with restraint now, higher placement, less chest, less rasp, more falsetto, whether that's due to some kind of general dissatisfaction with life or the band or something or apprehension of harming his voice irrevocably I don't know. I believe he's still got it in him to give performances equal to and surpassing '10, he has tremendous natural talent which survived the painful vocal horrorshow that was the UYI tour, not to say I didn't love his voice during that time as well, but it was objectively lacking good technique, if you add to that natural ability consistent practice and good instruction he could be capable of more great things.

I didn't say, or at least it wasn't my intention to say, that rasp = lack of technique. Nor I said that high-pitched notes = falsetto. What I did say is that, since I think he lost his ability to deliver a distorted high-pitched screaming with little rasp the way he did in the beginning, probably due to the increasing use of rasp in the tours, it was more easy to him to apply power in his voice appealing to rasp. Apparently he's in a situation where either he uses rasp or he open the door to Mickey Mouse.

Of course his rasp is harmful to him. History is there to prove it. God knows what he did in '10 to sing all the year that way. I don't know how much it damages his voice, but the damage is real. The natural tone of Axl is a low baritone. To achieve a high pitched note the way he does, he must use falsetto or do what he does. The latter demand much more effort than falsetto. I don't know either how he manage to heal his voice. '92 was better than '91, and '93 was better than '92. Who knows?

I agree with the rest of what you said.

Everyone makes excuses for Axl but the truth is you can use a raspy voice for years and years and if you do it right, you can retain power and good cleans. I listen to a ton of black metal and those guys use a much harsher rasp than Axl ever did and they still sound powerful live and in the studio. I do that style as well and I am fine.

It all comes down to no training on Axl's part and his "I don't care" attitude.

I don't know if it is true, but wasn't the singer of Pantera who fucked his voice for progressively using a "thrash metal" voice?

Edited April 12, 2014 by nosidam

[ericy210]

Has a speech pathologist, vocal coach, or EMT doctor (ears, mouth, throat) ever weighed in on this? I'd like to hear a professional opinion. The speculation is interesting but, quite frankly, useless.

[nosidam]

Has a speech pathologist, vocal coach, or EMT doctor (ears, mouth, throat) ever weighed in on this? I'd like to hear a professional opinion. The speculation is interesting but, quite frankly, useless.

I'm a bath singer who sings Elvis. Does that count to you?

[SlashisGOD]

Yeah, another Axl's voice-topic, but I really tried to do a different one from everything you've ever read. It's against the tide, I think.

I noted that people here tend to consider Axl's raspiness his singin' trademark, when it's not, or should not be. Raspiness, IMO, defines the UYI era, not his whole career. In the beginning, until AFD, Axl applied very little rasp in his voice when screaming (SCOM and the Rocket Queen outro, for example, have almost no raspiness at all, and so does most of the other songs). In Lies, the raspiness began to overlap his normal screaming voice, and in UYI his clean and wild howls were 100% gone. I'm not judging the quality of his raspy voice. I enjoy all of these different styles. Axl was able to reinvent his way of singin' because he is very talented and was physiologically blessed.

My point is: Raspiness doesn't necessarily define Axl's quality as a singer. This is an illusion. The problem with him since '01 is not lack of raspiness, but rather a sad inability to scream with all the depth and wildness that defined his voice since the beginning, raspy or not. The difference today is that raspiness, when he is capable of doing it, tend to disguise his fragile voice, so, yes, it's a way to deliver power in a "superficial" way. That's why in '10 he was all raspiness, even when singin' traditional clean lines. In '06, even more clearly, he was spectacular when screaming with rasp, and very disappointing when his clean voice was demanded. The fact is that raspiness has its price: it ruins the throat, and that's why he completely lost his clean and powerful high pitched screaming during the AFD and Lies touring, but he was able then to reinvent his singin' style using the raspiness as a solid base. During his long hiatus in the 90's, he probably healed his throat , allowing him to perform a clean singin', but, probably due to lack of training, he lost his power, and rasp, if fully used, would completely fuck his then newborn and crawling voice (I really believe he was then saving time to recover his voice).

Concluding: I believe he really fucked his voice after abusing raspiness in '10, and now, since he never was able to regain his classic power and wildness from his youth, he has nothing more to appeal to. The main difference between '11-'14 and '01-'02 is that, in the latter, he was very slowly upgrade, probably doing exercises and taking care of his voice, and now he's totally downhill. He came from a very good sequence of years and now is fucked up and doesn't give a shit anymore. Let's hope he find a way to reinvent himself or, at least, to regain a goal to achieve after hard work.

That's it. Sorry for the never ending subject, but, between us, there isn't much to talk about anyway...

The assumption that it is fundamentally impossible to distort one's voice in a healthy manner, that is, one which does not harm the vocal folds, bothers me. I'm growing really tired with morons pretending to be vocal experts, stating rasp is harmful as an absolute or calling any high-pitched note falsetto.

One can't scream with the level of force and distortion that Axl did in '10 as frequently as he did for as long as he did with poor technique. If his technique was lacking, if that manner of singing was harming his voice then it follows his voice only would have deteriorated over the course of the tour. We know that is not the case. That's not to say Axl's technique is perfect, but at his peak in '10 it was pretty damn close to it. The fact that Axl only improves over the course of tours strongly supports the more logical hypothesis that Axl refuses to practice or practices insufficiently during the breaks between tours.

But Axl is getting older and reaching the age where one's vocal system naturally begins losing its resilience to damage and the kind of vocal "atrophy" that would occur over long periods without practice. Axl's problems are not due to some universal issue with the addition of rasp to one's voice but due to his personal technique. You can hear the differences in his vocal production between '10 and the present, he sings with restraint now, higher placement, less chest, less rasp, more falsetto, whether that's due to some kind of general dissatisfaction with life or the band or something or apprehension of harming his voice irrevocably I don't know. I believe he's still got it in him to give performances equal to and surpassing '10, he has tremendous natural talent which survived the painful vocal horrorshow that was the UYI tour, not to say I didn't love his voice during that time as well, but it was objectively lacking good technique, if you add to that natural ability consistent practice and good instruction he could be capable of more great things.

I didn't say, or at least it wasn't my intention to say, that rasp = lack of technique. Nor I said that high-pitched notes = falsetto. What I did say is that, since I think he lost his ability to deliver a distorted high-pitched screaming with little rasp the way he did in the beginning, probably due to the increasing use of rasp in the tours, it was more easy to him to apply power in his voice appealing to rasp. Apparently he's in a situation where either he uses rasp or he open the door to Mickey Mouse.

Of course his rasp is harmful to him. History is there to prove it. God knows what he did in '10 to sing all the year that way. I don't know how much it damages his voice, but the damage is real. The natural tone of Axl is a low baritone. To achieve a high pitched note the way he does, he must use falsetto or do what he does. The latter demand much more effort than falsetto. I don't know either how he manage to heal his voice. '92 was better than '91, and '93 was better than '92. Who knows?

I agree with the rest of what you said.

Everyone makes excuses for Axl but the truth is you can use a raspy voice for years and years and if you do it right, you can retain power and good cleans. I listen to a ton of black metal and those guys use a much harsher rasp than Axl ever did and they still sound powerful live and in the studio. I do that style as well and I am fine.

It all comes down to no training on Axl's part and his "I don't care" attitude.

I don't know if it is true, but wasn't the singer of Pantera who fucked his voice for progressively using a "thrash metal" voice?

I don't know about Phil (singer for Pantera) but I'm talking about bands like Emperor, Bathory, Gorgoroth, Mayhem, etc where the main vocal styling is a raspy scream. I've seen tons of these types of bands live and the singers can go from a very harsh rasp to clean singing without losing power (when they do sing clean that is). I have done it in the studio with no protools or any other effects.

[axlinkafayette]

I saw Axl in Person in April 1992 in Chicago, the single best rock concert i've ever seen. Watch the Youtube, its literally off the charts. Full of passion, singing with ease, ETC.

I can't sing a lick, but i love trying and i've tried Guns N Roses songs in Karaoke and until you try it, you have no idea how hard it is to sing like he did.

The classic example of this is with You could be Mine. The rapid fire section in the middle, and he even commented on this in one of the eddie trunk interviews, is incredibly hard to do like its done on the album.

It would take a herculean effort to get back to where he was in 1992, thats never going to happen, hell i don't think its even physically possible .

[Master Production]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PP8lWfk61Zc

I think his resembles this mostly now days. Cleaner in more parts than others.

Edited April 14, 2014 by Master Production