Top 5: Vocalists

Kingsnake wrote: Other female: - Bat for Lashes

1) Peter Hammill
2) Gary Brooker
3) Roger Waters
4) Greg Lake
5) John Lennon

Richey Edwards wrote: Morten Harket

Good choice. Always loved that guys voice. Power and range.

@ moshkito:  Whilst the aspect of acting out the lyrics is very important, it's not the be all-end all either.  A great singer still needs a great tone, range and power to have options otherwise his/her repertoire is going to be limited.  The ones you mentioned like Morrison, Hammill or Kate Bush tick at least some of the above boxes.  If however you take someone like Donald Fagen, he was fabulous at acting out the lyrics but had by his own admission limited vocal ability which is why he is not regarded as a great singer. As such, what you call 'acting out' I call phrasing and it was usually not a problem with most of the well known singers up to the 70s because distinct accents and styles of speaking English still persisted.  But nowadays too many singers mimic Tony Martin/Lea Salonga respectively so there is an annoying uniformity and lack of character in the vocals.  Some of it is simply continental Europe taking over prog and people for whom English is not a native language singing in it (as opposed to their own language in the 70s).  But even the ones coming from Britain/USA (like Haken's singer for example) don't have much soul.

@moshkito "Of course, pedigree is important".  Amen, thank you, no ifs and no buts.  Not necessarily pedigree in terms of training but just possessing a great and versatile instrument.  It is also important in acting as well; great actors have great voices with amazing dynamic range (like Daniel Day Lewis in the climax of There Will Be Blood).  Inflection is important (and it wasn't only the Hammills or Gabriels who did it, it's just more noticeable in their case because of the theatrical element in their music) but you can't really inflect your way out of a limited voice.  

^^^ Good, yes (and I mentioned Fagen on similar lines), but not great, at least on the level of Hammill.  There has to be some level of virtuosity to regard a singer great (while that too is not the be all end all).  There was a better balance between the athletic and artistic aspects of singing in rock then.  But again, this has a lot to do with the cleaning up of language itself and the 'othering', if you will, of those who still lie outside the mainstream whereby their authenticity somehow makes them 'weird' and misfits.  So you don't get the variety of English accents anymore that you once did and that by itself takes a lot of flavour and character out of singing.  The demands of the audience have also changed.  If you have noticed, lately a lot of pop singing is excessively staccato, like reciting a nursery rhyme.  I simply can't stand that kind of singing with no attempt to draw out notes (not asking for legato, no) so I speculated on why somebody would prefer that approach and one possible reason could be that unless it is sung thus way, the audience feels unable to discern all the words and considers that a drawback. In such a scenario, there is even less room for quaint accents.

progbethyname wrote: Lately I've been appreciating the hell out of.... Jon Oliva (Savatage) Phil Collins ( Genesis ) Ozzy Osbourne ( Solo Career & Black Sabbath works ) Annette Olson ( Nightwish) Ronnie James DIO (DIO, Black Sabbath) Burton C. Bell (Fear Factory) Roger Waters (solo work & Pink Floyd) Rick Davies ( Supertramp) Carl McCoy ( Fields of the Nephilim) Jaz Coleman (Killing Joke) Yeah. I did 10 cause I'm an ass. Happy Holidays all!

I don't know many of these, but I do find it strange that you put Anette from Nightwish instead of Tarja, or at least Floor. On the other hand, I do love DIO, I believe he is my very favourite Metal singer... though I guess his work was closer to hard rock than to metal. Also, I'm glad Waters gets some love; I do believe he was a great and very unique singer that often gets overlooked... however, I can hardly think of someone capable of putting so much passion and emotion to their singing (specially on the utter despair department).