The "Axl's Voice" Thread - Please Keep All Discussion Here

[Sonic Reducer]

My wallet wouldn't be ok with the kind of money they're asking, I mean I would still go but it would hurt. I can see Nick Cave for €47, and Judas Priest + Iron Maiden for a hundred.

[Pedrolg]

48 minutes ago, Sonic Reducer said:

My wallet wouldn't be ok with the kind of money they're asking, I mean I would still go but it would hurt. I can see Nick Cave for €47, and Judas Priest + Iron Maiden for a hundred.

Yeah, it's expensive. But I will say one thing: I went to the 2016 São Paulo show with some friends that are not hardcore fans - they are general rock fans, who attend loads of shows, ranging from Metallica to Paul McCartney, to Roger Waters and AC/DC. They like GNR but weren't even aware of CD's existence or that Axl actually left his house from 93 to 2016. If you check youtube, you wll see that Axl did allright that night, but within the lack of rasp, falsetto and all that.

All my friends were particularly blown away by the show, placing it above most gigs and ranking among the best they've ever been to. Axl in particular was deemed a highlight, and everybody was impressed with how much he had left, his range, power, screams and stage presence. So it's not like their product sucks.

[ChristmasFnatic]

Whats so cool about this place is that everyone loves Axl but have different views and share their long thoughts/theories about this and that. Not a boring place! Lol.

[IncitingChaos]

i hate how bad Axl has gotten on LALD. 2016 it was exciting and fun still

He’d transition that “you gotta give the other fella heelllllllllllll” perfectly. Now it sucks. 

Plus those screams were great

[Jw224]

1 hour ago, IncitingChaos said:

i hate how bad Axl has gotten on LALD. 2016 it was exciting and fun still

He’d transition that “you gotta give the other fella heelllllllllllll” perfectly. Now it sucks. 

Plus those screams were great

I think this can be applied to pretty much every song he sang well in 2016 lol. 

[Pedrolg]

Having watched the last two gigs, I have absolutely zero doubt that Axl is giving everything he has. I have no idea how much he did to prepare and get his voice ready for this leg, but once he gets up there in the stage, he is doing as much as he can right now. It shows.

Truth is his voice has deteriorated severely since 2016. It might be because back then he was doing lots of vocal work for AC/DC, but I really wouldn't bet on that. His voice seems overworked and his upper register sounds absolutely fried. He seems fully aware of it too, and that makes me wonder if his plan is to just keep performing until his voice is no longer able to do it. It breaks my heart to say that but he really seems to be going down that route with the effort he is putting in and how he is pushing through those performances, digging deep for rasp and doing those long setlists.

I think those AC/DC performances did him in, but who knows. I hope he eventually talks openly about what happened to his voice since 2010, even if he does that a few years from now. I would love if this came back to bite me in the ass, but I'll go on and say he will never perform those Brian Johnson songs with AC/DC. I have zero doubt he is, at this time, absolutely unable to replicate that kind of form.

It must be hard for Axl to be going through that. The man was an absolute powerhouse. Perhaps it is time to cherish whatever is left, support him a bit and go along with it. It's been a fantastic, if somewhat convoluted ride.

[koldweather]

1 hour ago, Pedrolg said:

 

It must be hard for Axl to be going through that. The man was an absolute powerhouse. Perhaps it is time to cherish whatever is left, support him a bit and go along with it. It's been a fantastic, if somewhat convoluted ride.

Whilst I do agree with your comment, I would say we have been down this road with Axl many times, I seriously thought during the SA 14 leg his voice had finally gone to rot, some of his efforts on that tour were truly terrible and his voice was ultra thin sounding, like there was nothing left in the tank. 2 years of rest and probably some vocal training for ACDC and suddenly he comes back very good with GnR and a total monster with ACDC.

He wouldn't be the first to have done so either, my personal favorite singer Freddie Mercury's voice turned to utter rubbish in early 79, in fact this video is VERY similar to TIL where he had to sing it lower because his voice gave in (the crack at the end of the first chorus is something impressive!).They also boosted up Brian's mike due to Freddie's singing problems.

Compared to this, same year (something like 8 months later)

 

Sorry for the detour, but its just to show that sometimes things change when you least expect them!

Edited June 9, 2018 by koldweather

[IncitingChaos]

2018 Download third show 

2016 KC third show

difference is he was with a vocal coach in 2016 and 2018 is the mini paycheck run. His voice sounds so screwed up in 2018 using WTTJ as a base

Edited June 10, 2018 by IncitingChaos

[Pedrolg]

13 minutes ago, IncitingChaos said:

2018 Download third show

2016 KC third show

difference is he was with a vocal coach in 2016 and 2018 is the mini paycheck run. His voice sounds so screwed up in 2018 using WTTJ as a base

Different is absolutely shocking when you put those side by side. And this latest WTTJ sounds pretty bad imo. I'm glad people had fun with the show, but truly, this is on par with the worst Axl has produced in terms of performance.

I find it unconceivable that Axl would do as you say at this point, though. Having such a clear path to sounding awesome in 2016, to do nothing now and settle for that. Specially considering that he seems to be truly, physically suffering through this perfomance, and the fact that, for the first time in his career, his range is suffering greatly. I think he is on a path downhill and there is little he can do to avert it.

[koldweather]

To be fair to the bloke this is like his 175th show in 2 or so years, singing some of rocks most demanding songs, its going to take its toll.

As I said in the other show thread, he is having to use his chest voice way too much and is digging to deep. On the Jungle scream intro, notice how he is pulling up his chest voice and raising it to such an extent it begins to get quite strained and forced (like closing the throat forced). Whilst he also does something similar at that KC show, its not anything near as obvious and sounds far more balanced.

But yeah, the difference reallyis night and day, he is pushing so hard in the opening screams at Download that he has nothing left in the tank when the song starts, hence we get those winded weak sounding vocals.

[IncitingChaos]

12 minutes ago, Pedrolg said:

Different is absolutely shocking when you put those side by side. And this latest WTTJ sounds pretty bad imo. I'm glad people had fun with the show, but truly, this is on par with the worst Axl has produced in terms of performance.

I find it unconceivable that Axl would do as you say at this point, though. Having such a clear path to sounding awesome in 2016, to do nothing now and settle for that. Specially considering that he seems to be truly, physically suffering through this perfomance, and the fact that, for the first time in his career, his range is suffering greatly. I think he is on a path downhill and there is little he can do to avert it.

It really goes back to my point 2 years ago when he said he was joining ACDC. Everyone was worried about his vocal state of putting on these two shows in the same year, but truth is it built vocal strength and the muscles that he had learned to control and use with ACDC got stronger and his voice had more power. But when you build something up and then take a break and quit singing as much then those muscles deteriorate fast! And not only that when they weaken and you return trying to use em you can cause more damage and ultimately be left with a much worse vocal ability. 

I think that’s the situation he’s in now. His lack of practice and day to day vocal work caught up with him. You can’t train for a marathon for a year then run the race two years later unless you maintained the practice and work put into training. You’ll likely go out there and pull a hamstring. Which in vocal terms is what I feel Axl has done to himself.

[Jw224]

I feel like he definitely needs to take a break and prepare his voice a lot more. Even he is acknowledging it now. 

[koldweather]

By the way, when I'm talking about chest/head voice mixed voice, this video shows what I mean perfectly:

 

1st scream is head voice driven, notice how the higher pitched vocals come through more strongly, it also sounds sharper, though he does drop the note as it continues.

2nd scream is very chesty (almost as much as some of the LALD screams from tonight) and it much less stable sounding, you can hear the lower part of the vocals are dominant in this scream.

3rd scream is a good mix and fairly balanced, maybe just leaning more to being chest dominated, but a perfect balance isn't the easiest thing to get.

[D..]

I agree with some opinions on this thread, but... Axl's vocals in 2016 (with Guns) weren't superior to the recent 2018 vocals. I'm putting AC/DC aside (Axl did fucking great, it's still so unbelievable he did it. And I'm so mad I missed the Marseille show).

I feel he is putting even more effort into the songs this year. The first 3 shows of 2018 are superior to the first 3 shows of 2016. I wouldn't bet on it, but he must have something in mind (new album). Or maybe he's in love again. Who knows! He is dead passionate anyway, and I love it.

Thing is, I saw him live 4 times in 2010... This is my reference. Anything since 2011 hasn't been on par. I left the 2012 Paris show in the middle of the set, I was fucking pissed. Same arena I was two years before, and Axl sounded like shit, honestly, I couldn't bare it. I felt he felt bored that year. 2013 and 2014 weren't much better (except for some surprises in Las Vega 2014).

The reunion clearly gave him a huge boost. That man likes being on the edge.... Challenged. It's like alcohol and drugs: you have to increase the dose to feel the effect.

Slash coming back was Axl's very own use of drugs. He mixed it with fronting AC/DC. Two huge challenges the same year.

I have no doubt he reads every critic addressed to him to fuel his anger/passion/hunger. So that he can prove them wrong.

Anyway, like I said in another topic, he is not getting any younger. I'm more than satisfied about what's he's delivering right now. He's putting a fucking great effort into every song.

I've followed almost everything since 2009. And 2018 is already a favorite of mine.

[Stress Fracture]

He’s giving it his all onstage. It’s offstage where the problem lies with his inability to release new songs that he can actually sing. He can’t sing YCBM but they keep playing it anyway.

While it looks like we’re continually complaining and hating, it’s more to do with seeing a crowd the size of yesterday’s, supposedly Download’s biggest ever, and thinking that another band would put on a flawless show and release a live album or Blu-ray of it.

Starved of new releases, I think that’s how we all listen to these shows. Could it become a future live album/video to commemorate this tour? Because of certain songs, the answer is always no.

[shootingstar]

On 2018-06-09 at 1:32 PM, tremolo said:

Well, the difference is your friends don’t have the same connection to the band that some fans have.

Yes, their product sucks big time. It’s mostly fun (except for trainwrecks like Berlin and RIR), but the delivery is very inconsistent. Shows are pretty hit and miss. Axl might give it his all or he might not give a rat’s ass and deliver a very sub-par performance.

To the casual listener that only knows the hits it’s not a big issue. They just wanna hear jungle, scom, pc and ycbm, and they only care about the overall experience. And yes, clearly the band is catering to those “fans” that are very forgiving and don’t care that much.

Nowadays you have to lower your standards if you are a fan and want to feel you’ve made your money’s worth.

Well, it seems to me that Guns for you is simply a matter of consumer-product relation..

[shootingstar]

15 hours ago, D.. said:

Thing is, I saw him live 4 times in 2010... This is my reference. Anything since 2011 hasn't been on par.

Yeah, and 2010 his golden era. Just listen to this, a song he now struggle with. But I can hear it coming back.. I just know it will.

 

[IncitingChaos]

Axl's new standard should be to sing this song better than a coked up Scott who has no idea where he is. Somehow he still sounds better than Axl here

[shootingstar]

19 hours ago, Pedrolg said:

Truth is his voice has deteriorated severely since 2016. It might be because back then he was doing lots of vocal work for AC/DC, but I really wouldn't bet on that. His voice seems overworked and his upper register sounds absolutely fried.

No.. It's not his upper register that its fried. It's his mid register, that was top notch 2010 and decent during 2016. That's why he still sound good on SOYL and ac/dc 'cause those songs goes above that. The choruses on Slither goes just below his stronger upper register, unfortunately.. still sound good thou..

Now he replace that mid register with falsetto, to spare his deeper mid rasp voice, and at worst sound like anyone would singing too low tunes with falsetto..  like the housekeeper in family guy, Consuela. "No..o.."

And that's not because he lacks rasp. He has too much of it that it's damaging his voice right now..

But said it before.. I wouldn't be surprised if he's suddenly back stronger than ever. It's there..

 

[MrMojo]

1 hour ago, shootingstar said:

Yeah, and 2010 his golden era. Just listen to this, a song he now struggle with. But I can hear it coming back.. I just know it will.

 

It'll be back, just think some preparation, training and less dates would help. 2010 was an INSANE year especially those scraped performances.

[koldweather]

2 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

No.. It's not his upper register that its fried. It's his mid register, that was top notch 2010 and decent during 2016. That's why he still sound good on SOYL and ac/dc 'cause those songs goes above that. The choruses on Slither goes just below his stronger upper register, unfortunately.. still sound good thou.

And that's not because he lacks rasp. He has too much of it that it's damaging his voice right now..

But said it before.. I wouldn't be surprised if he's suddenly back stronger than ever. It's there..

 

Yeah his middle register is struggling. What is interesting though is his higher register has gone back to being very airy sounding, like it was for much of 2011-2014. In 2016 he had that sharpness back in his voice, especially in ACDC, where vocally he was almost as sharp as he was in the early 90s at times on some of the early EU shows.

Also its bit of a chicken and egg I feel, is he using too much rasp and its causing damage, or is it because he has done some vocal damage that he now has to push so hard to get the Axl 'classic' sound and its so unstable now.I suppose its more of a loop!

[SWINGTRADER]

Axl showed disrespect to his fan base when he joined ACDC right at the time the "reunion" was set to start. The fucker was giving interviews and doing promotion for ACDC before he even did one for GNR. He put everything he had vocally for ACDC, and gave the "leftovers" to GNR .Not all of 2016 GNR shows were good, a lot of it sucked. It is just that those bad 2016 performances sound great in comparison to the shit we are hearing now.

 

Or maybe he just doesn't care about GNR and intentionally sounds like shit. We'll see when he sings for ACDC again.

 

p.s  Don't give the "ACDC songs are easier to sing" bullshit.

[Pedrolg]

1 hour ago, SWINGTRADER said:

Axl showed disrespect to his fan base when he joined ACDC right at the time the "reunion" was set to start. The fucker was giving interviews and doing promotion for ACDC before he even did one for GNR. He put everything he had vocally for ACDC, and gave the "leftovers" to GNR .Not all of 2016 GNR shows were good, a lot of it sucked. It is just that those bad 2016 performances sound great in comparison to the shit we are hearing now.

 

Or maybe he just doesn't care about GNR and intentionally sounds like shit. We'll see when he sings for ACDC again.

 

p.s  Don't give the "ACDC songs are easier to sing" bullshit.

I would agree, but then I listened to Axl singing Thundestruck or Shoot to Thrill. As much as I love GNR and feel disheartened by Axl's decline, I find it impossible to say those performances should not have happened. This is purw, raw, rock and roll at it`s finest. Axl sounds like an unstoppable force of nature, and it's just something to behold and appreciate forever.

[SWINGTRADER]

28 minutes ago, Pedrolg said:

 This is purw, raw, rock and roll at it`s finest. Axl sounds like an unstoppable force of nature, and it's just something to behold and appreciate forever.

My point exactly. He gave that to a fan base that wouldn't care if he fell off a cliff. They still hate him. He should have done that for to his real fans. The fans that had been waiting for him to reunite with Slash for over 20 yrs. Instead we got Mickey fuckin Mouse.

[Sosso]

38 minutes ago, SWINGTRADER said:

My point exactly. He gave that to a fan base that wouldn't care if he fell off a cliff. They still hate him. He should have done that for to his real fans. The fans that had been waiting for him to reunite with Slash for over 20 yrs. Instead we got Mickey fuckin Mouse.

I don't think that it has anything to do with the fans. He sang most of the AC/DC songs in the setlist for the very first time and he to had learn how to sing them in a proper way. GN'R is a different story. He is singing the songs for decades now and haven't feeled the ought to learn them again.

Edited June 10, 2018 by Sosso