Who do you think is the best thrash metal vocalist?

[Phylactery]

Thanks for the image of some random dude getting fucking by Lemmy. I feel fucking ill now.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

<Dawn of Meggido>

His vocals to me sound fucking apocalyptic.

He's tolerable and I've gotten used to him, but the instrumentation is what sells the apocalyptic vibe. The vocal melodies just seem goofy, the way he holds the last syllable of nearly every line, just eh. It's kind of campy like Tim Baker, only he could shriek and pull of a really intense and uncomfortable performance, I feel like anyone in Warrior's register could do what he did.

 

[CiG]

Lemmy. Blackie Lawless. Young Bruce Dickinson. Pre-Broadway Jon Oliva. Anyone with swagger and grit. Those are/were cool singers. Tom G Warrior is a mega fuckin' nerd, which is more what I assumed the appeal to him was. I mean, in a way I get it, Celtic Frost had some of the most nerd-cool lyrics of their time, vivid and escapist and all of that, the songs on the whole are cool in the way fantasy/sci-fi fandom X can be cool and appealing, but he does not have a cool voice.

I agree with this. I have the Hellhammer book and it was pretty obvious by the end that he was a massive dork that often smelled like piss and cats. Pretty much human garbage for much of his youth.

 

[Elric of Melniboné]

Give examples of particularly tortured and/or evil performances from him, at least post-Hellhammer. Even when I struggled with death metal I thought his voice was kinda relaxed/drunk sounding if anything. Like, Schmier up to Release from Agony, there's a painful and strained vocal performance. Tom G Warrior is just some kind of friendly chromosomally deficient caveman grunting "HEY-EYYYYY!" to his neighbors.

Evilness of vocals is definitely totally subjective, so I don't really see the point in providing examples of that. It isn't going to change your opinion as you're obviously very familiar with the songs already. I doubt that we're going to agree on it, and that's fine with me.

It is true that he mainly sounds tortured during Hellhammer.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

I'm actually not that familiar with Celtic Frost. Obviously I've listened to the best material a number of times, but they've never been a band that I could immediately recall more than a couple songs of off the top of my head, and I don't particularly have any strong favorites. Gib examples

 

[Elric of Melniboné]

@CASSETTEISGOD posted one of my favorites on the previous page.

"Into the Crypts of Rays" is the first song that I heard with Tom G. Warrior on vocals and one of my first extreme metal songs in general, and has always given me an evil feeling since the first time that I've heard it.

"Circle of the Tyrants" and "Visual Aggression" are some of my other favorites from when I first started listening to Celtic Frost.

 

[CiG]

I think early Warrior's impact was that he sounded blatantly untalented, but quite obscure and individual to the rest. In metal there's always a case to be made for technically bad > technically good.

Not always, but once in a while.

 

[Talos of Atmora]

My favorites are:

Bobby Blitz (This guy is fucking incredible)
Chuck Billy (His performance on Eerie Inhabitants when I first got New Order made me a fan)
Tom Araya (That moment when you realized that extremely high-pitched guitar at the beginning of Angel of Death is actually Tom )
Tom G. Warrior (UH!)
Max Cavalera
David Wayne (This guy should be on everyone's lists)