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December 5, 2011 · 12:30 am

The Top 10 Rock & Roll Singers of All Time.

Ever since The Beatles turned me on to rock and roll at the age of 5, I’ve been singing along to the radio, trying to recreate the style and power of the great rock voices that inspired me.

Some signature performances, like Roy Orbison’s operatic masterpiece “It’s Over” and Freddie Mercury’s incredible “Bohemian Rhapsody”, challenged my limits as a singer. On my best day, I couldn’t reach those soaring heights of vocal power — but trying to sing along with Roy and Freddie made me a better singer.

I’ve been singing in rock and roll bands since high school, and there’s nothing like trying to cover a classic song to make you appreciate the artist who sang that song on the record. Just listen to teenage Stevie Winwood sing “Gimme Some Lovin’” by the Spencer Davis Group — or Bob Seeger tearing through “Get Out Of Denver”. Those performances literally leave you breathless.

Over the years, I’ve become a connoisseur of fine rock and roll vocals. So, just to start one of my favorite arguments, I’ve come up with a list of the Top Ten Rock & Roll Singers of All Time. This is not a list of my favorite singers. Indeed, many of my favorite singers – Van Morrison, Tom Waits, Bob Dylan, and Paul Rogers to name a few – did not make the list.

This is a list of the ten best rock and roll vocalists who ever picked up a microphone.

1. Elvis Presley

Elvis is King. Period. And I don’t want to hear from a bunch of folks who can’t get that bloated, drug addled Elvis out of their minds. Elvis put rock and roll on the map because his voice was magic. There is a quality to Elvis Presley’s voice that thrills the listener – in the same way the sound of Paul McCartney and John Lennon singing harmony gives you goose bumps. Every rock and roll singer after Elvis has been singing in his shadow. That’s why Elvis was the first inductee into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. (The Hall of Fame website calls him “the undisputed King of Rock and Roll”.) Listen to Elvis sing “Trying To Get To You” – and bow down to The King.

2. Ray Charles

There’s nothing Ray Charles couldn’t sing. The blues, country, rock and roll, soul, and rhythm and blues – Ray knocked them all out of the park. But as versatile as he was, no matter what style of song he sang, he made that tune inimitably his own. If Ray Charles had put a rock and roll band together in the 1950’s, he would have owned the rock and roll top 10. And though he recorded everything from gospel to standards – Ray Charles rocked hard enough to be in the first class inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. Check out Ray rocking “Baby, What’d I Say?”

3. James Brown

Another member of that first class of Rock & Roll Hall of Famers, James Brown is one of those singers that you just don’t even try to cover. Not even in your most drunken moment in a karaoke bar. Even if James Brown didn’t have the most out-a-sight dance moves ever invented, even if he didn’t have the most fabulous pompadour that ever adorned a rocker’s head – he would still have the most dynamic voice in rock and roll history. Like Ray Charles, James Brown didn’t make a lot records that would be considered straight up rock and roll: he was far too funky to play it in 1-4-5. But all you have do is listen to James belt out “(I Got You) I Feel Good” to know why he’s in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

4. Little Richard

Along with Elvis, Little Richard wrote the other half of the rock and roll singer’s lexicon in the 1950’s. Without him, The Beatles don’t wag their heads and sing, “Oooooh!” I can’t imagine what rock and roll singing would be like without the example of Little Richard: the freedom, the abandon, the soaring screams and “wooohs” – the joyous, anarchic, frenetic, rhythm-pounding pulse of his performances have influenced every rock and roller who followed. That’s why, he’s another guy they put in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. Imagine what conservative Middle American parents thought when they heard Little Richard sing “Long Tall Sally”. Dangerous, man. Wild and dangerous.

5. Paul McCartney

The best singer in the best rock and roll band of all time, Paul McCartney earns a spot on this list even if his only vocal performance in consideration was a song he released after The Beatles broke up. No singer dares to cover Paul’s “Maybe I’m Amazed” – one of the most spectacular rock vocals of all time. And Paul can still sing this song today at the age of 69. I heard him sing it at Staples Center in Los Angeles a few years back and it was still powerful. Paul McCartney is a force of nature. Here’s he is, decades before his Knighthood, singing “Maybe I’m Amazed” with his other band, Wings.

6. Janis Joplin

Janis Joplin is not just one of the best female rock and roll singers ever – she’s one of the greatest rock and roll vocalists period. There’s never been another woman who fronted a rock band with such a fearless, soulful, and savage style. Like the great blues singers, Janis understood the sexual subtext of rock and roll – but she didn’t sell sex on the stage – she sold the power of the music. She was magnetic and magnificent. All I ask is that other, inevitably lesser singers stop trying to cover Janis’ classic, “Piece Of My Heart”. It just can’t be done.

7. Burton Cummings

Perhaps the least recognizable name on this list – and probably the only Canadian – Burton Cummings is hands-down one of the very best rock and roll singers that came out of the 1960’s. Lead singer for The Guess Who, Cummings sang classics like “No Sugar Tonight”, “American Woman” and “Share The Land”. But if you want to know why I think he’s one of the best rock vocalists of all time, all you need to do is listen to him sing “These Eyes.” Toward the end, when he does a soaring riff on, “These eyes are crying” – it’s one of those vocal moments that try as I might, I’ve never been able to replicate in the shower or in my car. Burton Cummings is a master class in rich, powerful, and exhilarating rock and roll singing.

8. Roger Daltrey

Roger Daltrey is the best rock and roll screamer of all time. I personally owe him a lot. (Back in college, Fat Dave Silberger compared me to Daltrey, and I still haven’t gotten over his undeserved but much appreciated flattery.) Fronting a magnificent trio – Daltrey’s voice was the fourth instrument in one of the most powerful live rock bands to ever take the stage. Pete Townshend is one of the great rock and roll songwriters of all time – and Roger’s incredible voice made Pete’s ambitious, operatic songs possible. Case in point: “Love, Reign O’er Me”

9. Robert Plant

I was never a huge Led Zeppelin fan back in the day, but in retrospect, maybe it was because I was afraid to cover their songs. Why? Because of freaking Robert Plant! Led Zeppelin was extremely popular inn the early 70’s when I was in my first high school band, but trying to belt my way through Zeppelin’s “Rock & Roll” or attempt “Stairway to Heaven” was to invite comparison with Robert Plant and, thus, failure. Still, trying to sing along with Plant made me a better singer. I saw him a few years ago at The Greek Theatre in Los Angeles during his tour with Alison Krauss. Dude’s still got it.

10. John Fogerty

I love John Fogerty. My father was born in New Orleans, Louisiana – but Berkeley, California native Fogerty had even more bayou in his soul than my dad did. When I was an 11-year old kid, the songs of Creedence Clearwater Revival jumped off the radio and connected with me more than anything other than The Beatles. It was that crunchy, snarling guitar groove – and John Fogerty’s voice: a rolling, driving, inescapable growl – like an unrelenting, passionate Little Richard with more politics than sex on his mind. I devoted myself to screaming through Creedence songs like Fogerty, pushing myself to my vocal limits. But I’ve never approached the master’s performance on “Fortunate Son.” Listen – and, once again, bow down…

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Filed under History, Music

Tagged as Burton Cummings, Elvis Presley, James Brown, Janis Joplin, John Fogerty, Little Richard, Paul McCartney, Ray Charles, Robert Plant, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Rock and roll, Roger Daltrey

July 23, 2011 · 3:20 pm

27 and Dead…

By BEN SISARIO

Published: July 23, 2011

Amy Winehouse, the British singer who found worldwide fame with a smoky, hip-hop-inflected take on retro soul, yet became a tabloid fixture as her struggles with drugs and alcohol brought about a striking public career collapse, was found dead in her home in London on Saturday. She was 27.

For many rock and roll fans who saw such reports about the sudden death of Amy Winehouse – one fact jumped right out: her age. 27-years old.

As of this writing, the cause of her death is not known. The London police said that, “at this early stage it is being treated as unexplained.” But nobody will be surprised to learn that the artist who hit the charts singing, “They tried to make me go to rehab, but I said ‘no no no’” probably succumbed to her addictions.

Thus, we add Amy Jade Winehouse (September 14, 1983 to July 23, 2011) to the list of rock stars that died at 27 years of age.

The list got started early – with the death of the pioneering bluesman Robert Johnson on August 16, 1938. Legend had it that Johnson went down to a lonely crossroads and sold his soul to the devil for the ability to play guitar with a genius that inspired future rockers like Eric Clapton and Jimmy Paige. His death is full of mystery, too. But we do know that he was 27-years old when died after drinking from a bottle of whiskey that was poisoned with strychnine.

27-year old Brian Jones had recently been kicked out of The Rolling Stones when he was discovered at the bottom of his swimming pool on July 3, 1969. His death, too, is shrouded in mystery and unproven suspicions of foul play.

The coroner’s report concluded that Jones’ untimely demise was “death by misadventure”, noting that the troubled rocker’s liver and heart were greatly enlarged by drug and alcohol abuse

Canned Heat was a hit at Woodstock in the summer of 1969, but a little over a year later, the band’s leader, singer, and principal songwriter was dead at the age of 27. Alan “Blind Owl” Wilson died of a drug overdose on September 3, 1970 in Topanga Canyon – not far from where I live. Wilson had reportedly tried to kill himself twice before, and some say his death was a suicide, though he left no note.

Either way, Wilson is at home on this ignominious list, as suicide and overdose are the most common causes of death for these 27-year old rockers.

Just two weeks after Wilson’s death, an accidental overdose took the life of Jimi Hendrix on September 18, 1970. The virtuoso guitar god took a lot of sleeping pills on the day he wound up face down in his own vomit. The Belgian sleeping pills he took were far more powerful than he realized. He may also have been mixing pills with red wine. According to the doctor who first attended to him, Hendrix asphyxiated in his vomit, which was mainly red wine.

A little more than two weeks after 27-year old Jimi passed away too soon, rock music fans were stunned by another tragedy: the death of the great Janis Joplin due to an accidental heroin overdose.

The heroin that 27-year old Janis took in a Hollywood motel on October 4, 1970 turned out to be much more potent than normal. In fact, several of her dealer’s other customers also overdosed that same week.

The stunning deaths of rock superstars Hendrix and Joplin were followed in less than two months by the sudden demise of a third future Rock & Roll Hall of Fame member. The Door’s charismatic and controversial front man, Jim Morrison was found in the bathtub of his Paris apartment, dead of an accidental heroin overdose, on July 3, 1971. One of rock’s legendary heartthrobs, Morrison was also just 27 years old when his heart stopped beating.

A deadly mix of morphine and alcohol claimed the life of country rock pioneer Gram Parsons on September 19, 1973. The gifted and influential singer and songwriter was just two months shy of his 27^th birthday when he died in the desert of Joshua Tree, California from an overdose of morphine and booze. In fact, it’s been written that the amount of morphine Parsons took was enough to kill three people.

You may want to look up what happened to Gram Parson’s body: it’s one of the strangest rock legends of all time.

Pete Ham’s suicide on April 24, 1975 closed one of the saddest chapters in rock and roll history. There was a time when Ham’s band, Badfinger, was a serious contender for The Next Big Thing after the breakup of the Beatles – but their wonderful, melodic music could not overcome the twin evils of terrible management and awful recording deals. Despondent over has band’s troubles, Ham hung himself in his garage. He was, of course, 27. His suicide note included an indictment of Badfinger’s business manager, Stan Polley: “P.S. Stan Polley is a soulless bastard. I will take him with me.”

Almost two decades later, another rock and roll suicide shocked the world. But while Pete Ham’s glory days were behind him when he put the rope around his neck, Kurt Cobain was a superstar still in his ascendancy when he took his own life on April 5, 1994.

Cobain went out like Ernest Hemingway, putting a gun to his head.

Sublime front man Bradley Nowell managed to make it a few months beyond his 27^th birthday – but just before his band’s breakthrough third album went multi-platinum – Nowell was a dead man. The promising talent who wrote and sang such fabulous songs as “What I Got” and “Wrong Way” did, indeed, go out the wrong way from a heroin overdose on May 25, 1996.

So now, Amy Winehouse is gone, too. Just 27 years old. But the music remains. In fact, if you made a playlist of songs from the 11 artists noted in this article, it would probably be the best album you’ll hear all year.

And that would be the better way to remember them.