Poll: Screaming in music. Do you like it or not?

[ScrubberDucky]

Step aside motherfuckers, musician represent.

Seriously, though, I've always held singers who can do their job well, with emotion, feeling, and power in the highest of regard. Layne Staley, James LaBrie, Steve Hogarth, David Gilmour to some extent, they're all heroes, as far as I'm concerned.

Screaming in music is a personal (and aquired) taste, but from a purely technical standpoint, it's always felt like a lazy option to me. In the metal scene, growling/screaming can actually take on the form of almost art, and a lot of people spend years perfecting what most of us consider a primitive sound. But in anything more mainstream than having-more-than-40k-views-on-youtube level, screaming seems to be what rock/metal bands fall back on when they realize nobody within the band can actually sing worth a shit. It's either that or autotune. Or ripping off Eddie Vedder.

Again, it's all personal opinion. Most musicians resent it, but there's no denying that it has a large following, and sometimes there's genuine skill to it.

 

[KillKill]

Learning how to scream and growl and stuff seems like such a waste to me. If you have the potential to become a talented singer, why ruin your throat by screaming all day?

If it does ruin the persons throat they aren't doing it right, there's a difference between proper screaming and just shouting...

I see. Even so, it seems like a waste of time to learn how to scream well when you could learn how to actually sing well.

Fair enough, each to their own I suppose

 

[Thaliur]

Depends on the style really.
If it's done like in Symphony X or Krypteria songs, it's great, if it's done like in just about every Christina Aguilera or Kathy Perry Song, it's horribly annoyin.

 

[El Luck]

I listen to metalcore, deathcore and melodic death metal soooo...yes? I do prefer growls though, the ehavy metal screams in the above posts..eeeeeh...not my thing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Yr5rn3Sv_4

To me, that has ruined the idea of a mixture of Metal and Hardcore punk.

Anywho OT: Yup I like screaming, I like growling and such

And here's an At the Gates song and a Zimmers Hole song just for shits and giggles.


*edit* I voted for it's the devils sound because its not like its a bad thing...

 

[kouriichi]

Depends on the person SCREAMING AHHHHHHHHHHGREAAAAAHHHHHH!!

Some people i love. Like Dani Filth, or Rob Zombie. But then others.... not so much.




Dont tell me thats not honey for the ears. I almost refuse to play minecraft if i cant listen to CoF.

 

[TacticalAssassin1]

Hate it, except for one song.

EDIT: I voted that it's the sound of the devil, because I hate all 'screamer' and 'metal' songs. This is the only exception, and I don't even like it BECAUSE of the yelling, just the lyrics.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

It really depends. Bands like Bring Me The Horizon makes me want to rip off their faces and kick their balls in, while bands like August Burns Red I fucking love.

ABR \m/ Leveler is such an amazing album.

I'm on my way into town soon to get, amongst other things, The Devil Wears Prada's new album.

 

[ShadowyMOON]

It's an acquired taste, 100%, and even then it annoys me in some songs.

Although claiming that it's a lazy cop out ALL the time is plain ignorance, some people can make an art form out of it and take years to master it.

 

[Random berk]

Bruce Dickinson's screams are golden.

That is all.
No seriously, shivers up my spine when ever I hear him live.

Damn right, because Bruce Dickinson mixes the occasional scream with actual singing, instead of either screaming or growling through the whole song.

 

[staika]

I love it, I also used to hate it but then it grew on me and now i love it. I still prefer it if there were some clean vocals in the song either by the screaming vocalist or another vocalist. Here is an example of what i like.

 

[SweetNess_666]

I lurrrrve it but I think I may be a little less hardcore than a lot of people on here as I lurrve Bullet for my Valentine, 30 seconds to mars have some amazing screaming parts but my personal crem da la crem for me is Linkin park I just adore Chester bennington when he gets screaming he could go toe to toe with the best

 

[Duffeknol]

NOTHING pisses me off more than screaming in metalcore or deathcore. It's horrible. Not because it's too heavy, but because it's too watered down. Metalcore is and will always be the wimpy cousin of hardcore punk, which sounds actually angry as opposed to angsty. Now this is angry. Now this gets me pumped up.


Now compare that to wimpy crap like this:


It just sounds like a bunch of teens trying way too hard to be angry at their daddies. Metalcore can suck it.

 

[orangebandguy]

I hate it, it's just noise to me.

 

[dantoddd]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9rD4Paq0zE&feature=related

I would say so

That's won't get fooled again by the who

 

[The_Echo]

Screaming in music is a bit of a speciality and acquired taste, as I've found personally. I used to hate it. I found it obnoxious and unnecessary. But then it just grew on me, and now I absolutely FUCKING love it.

That's basically all I could add to the discussion right there, although I will say I'm not a fan of the bands you put as examples. (I'm sure someone has already mentioned how to properly embed YouTube.) The screaming doesn't impress me to any degree, frankly. Sounds pretty standard. Thinking about it, there aren't many "-core" bands that can scream and make me like it. Although genres are so mix-and-match nowadays that I can't quite say that for sure.

I'd like to point you to The Black Dahlia Murder. Specifically the albums Nocturnal [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DcAjsZU3ik] and Ritual [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=db9rsICje5s]. The way they work with the vocals is, I think, really nice. And the relatively Lovecraftian feel of their lyrics is a great appeal. (I could also compile a good list of bands that are a bit closer to your examples if you want. I love sharing music.)

Personally, I like screaming or growling more and more as it gets less and less human-sounding. Examples being We Butter The Bread With Butter [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QvNep88AVw] and Dir En Grey [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7IXmV6A6Bk].

 

[Arkhangelsk]

Learning how to scream and growl and stuff seems like such a waste to me. If you have the potential to become a talented singer, why ruin your throat by screaming all day?

It's a matter of taste. Why not do something if you like it and other's do as well?

OT: I enjoy it quite a lot. My favorite bands are In Flames, Children of Bodom, Trivium, Parkway Drive, and so on, and so forth. I enjoy deathcore, metalcore, death metal, and basically anything in metal (with a feeeeew exceptions).

So, yeah, screaming and growling is awesome.

 

[Arakasi]

So long as it is contrasted by other singing, it's great.

I don't want a song entirely screaming.

 

[Terminal Blue]

Hate it, except for one song.

I thought this was going to be a point about the sampled screaming in 'Downward Spiral' era NIN songs, which is fucking awesome.


Screaming as a vocal technique.. not so sure, a lot of the stuff I like I would describe as shouting, growling or snarling rather than screaming. Screaming kind of implies high pitched vocal noise, and I've only ever found that incredibly irritating. Even back when I actually listened to Cradle of Filth, it was in spite of the screaming not because of it.

Also, falsetto singing (a la Bruce Dickinson) =/= screaming in my opinion. It's a lot more difficult and takes a lot of vocal training.

EDIT: Someone mentioned Dir En Grey. One exception then, and even then I wouldn't say I 'like' it because they're so awful live.