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Rolling Stone List of Greatest 200 Singers of All Time

Gregg Allman
Yeah. RS had Gregg Allman at 70 on the 2008 list of 100 greatest singers, but he does not appear on this 2023 list of 200 greatest. I really love the Allmans. Not sure Gregg would go on my list of 100, but there must be a place for him on the top 200.

I would personally put Paul Young in the top 200, but I suppose the reason not to is that he was not that popular for that long, so maybe hard to say he was "great" in RS's sense.

No one from the Dead, Music? :)
 
I think Gregg is one of the greatest blues singers of all time. Maybe you could argue that “rock” is a different genre.

Jerry Garcia had a wonderful country music style voice, but not the kind that gets you in these lists. Also one of the greatest guitar players of all time but, again, not necessarily one for these lists. (He played in paragraphs.). Bob Weir of the Dead has one of the worst voices I’ve ever heard, and Phil Lesh’s is worse, but as a band they are the best that ever was. As Bill Graham said, “they’re not the best at what they do. They’re the only ones that do what they do.”
 
I think Gregg is one of the greatest blues singers of all time. Maybe you could argue that “rock” is a different genre.
RS claimed to include singers from all genres, and included blues guys like Muddy Waters, Howling Wolf, and BB King, if I recall. Maybe one of the Alberts. I love the blues, but I am not sure I would have included any of them, except maybe Howling Wolf. I suppose BB was a much better vocalist when he was younger, but I admit to not being that familiar with his earlier material. I do not think I have a blues singer to put ahead of Gregg Allman, except maybe Howling Wolf, who is sort of a novelty singer, and someone really obscure like J.B. Lenoir or Little George Sueref. I was trying to decide whether I would consider Paul Butterfield a great blues singer. Would we consider Janis Joplin a blues singer? I think she sang blues songs about as well as anyone.

Jerry Garcia had a wonderful country music style voice, but not the kind that gets you in these lists. Also one of the greatest guitar players of all time but, again, not necessarily one for these lists. (He played in paragraphs.). Bob Weir of the Dead has one of the worst voices I’ve ever heard, and Phil Lesh’s is worse, but as a band they are the best that ever was. As Bill Graham said, “they’re not the best at what they do. They’re the only ones that do what they do.”
I think I sure would have made room for Garcia on the list of the top 200. You are not the only big Dead fan to dislike the voices of Weir and Lesh. I would not go as far as you, but I would not say on the list of the greatest ever, either. I would actually say that Pigpen was probably, to me, the best vocalist the Dead had, at least early on. I would say that he was a great blues singer, too! :) But I know RS is never going to put him on the top 200 list.
 
I would put Gregg Allman above Howling Wolf as a blues singer, even though Howling Wolf was a path breaker and a phenomenon. He didn’t have much in the way of range and could never have sung both One Way Out and Melissa the way Gregg did (e.g., beautiful songs as well as growling songs).

Pig Pen was the blues man of the Grateful Dead, and did have a good voice, but not as good as Jerry’s voice, which was a beautiful country singer’s voice but could also do blues and folk and other genres. RS listed him at 46 in their 100 greatest guitarists, but of course I would have listed him much, much higher, I just don’t think they understood what he was doing. He once said that if he did something that got a great response out of the audience he would never do it again because it was something that was dead that he was just doing for that reason and not spontaneous and part of a bigger flow (or something like that!). When you approach it that way your guitar playing is not always going to sound polished but it’s going to have another quality that is, well, something no one else does.
 
I like the Allmans and the Dead, too. I don't really know why Gregg does not strike me as top 100 singers. Melissa is one if my favorite songs and his vocal is wonderful. Like I said, I would put him in the top 200, for sure. You caught me on Howling Wolf. More phenom than great singer.

I like Jerry's voice a lot, and certainly on things like Attics of My Life he is great. He was great in New Rider's, too. As I recall he sang some lead with them.

I don't think I can debate top guitar players. I think some of the live Dead videos are fantastic and diverse, with Garcia in the thick of them. The Dead and Garcia had a unique approach.
 
An interesting thing about Greg Allman was how young he was, say, when he wrote Whipping Post, when it was first recorded, and when they played it at the Fillmore East. Apparently, 20, 21, and 24. He sounded good and like a 40 year old guy from the beginning, but his vocal at the Fillmore is transformed from the original recording. Such growl and intensity. I agree, the whole band is on fire. And I agree that, probably all of its incarnations, a better band live than in the recording studio. (Except for, maybe, Duane on Layla.) Okay, you have convinced me. Gregg Allman should be in the 100 greatest singers of all time and ahead of any other strictly blues singers.
 
Note to overly prolong this particular discussion of Gregg A, but it always amazes when someone really young can write a great song possessing wisdom that most of us think comes with age. GA wrote Melissa, one of my favorite songs, when he was 16. If I recall, Jackson Brown wrote These Days when he was 16. (By the way, GA's version of These Days is one of the reasons I was not thinking of him for top 100 ever singers. :) Just not my favorite version of another one of my favorite songs.
 
Yes, Jackson Brown wrote These Days when he was 16 - his best song in my view and like you said it had a wisdom in it that was beyond his years. I hadn’t realized that Gregg wrote Melissa at such a young age.
 
Yes, Keith’s brilliance is that he is a master creator of riffs. Not his technical skills.
I do not think there is any doubt that Keith is a master riff creator. How technically skilled he is is the subject of considerable controversy among folks who should have a lot more to bring to that opinion than I do.

I don't vouch for either of these sources, but Guitar World ranked Keith at 18th and RS ranked him 4th. I think both were considering rock players only. While there is a lot said about riffs said in both blurbs associated with the rankings, I would not say that either bases the ranking on riff writing. Again. I am no expert, but to me Keith manages to somehow stay in the pocket while being most often behind the beat. It seems to me it is his guitar that drives Stones songs, at least when Mick Taylor was not there. Seems to me that shows skilled not just skill in writing the riff. But I do not want to argue.

Some would claim that Jimmy Page is sloppy and that his skill is riff writing. Not my opinion. But I think k Keith is harder to evaluate technically.
 
Hey, Music I did not mean to change directions on you. You were essentially agreeing with me from earlier. My bad I seem to have mixed feelings on how technically good Keith is. He really is one of my favorite guitar players. Angie is another example of what seems like good playing to me.
 
FWIW, I'll throw out a few names off the top of my head as to singers who should have been on the list, as they don't appear to have been included...

Fred Neil (folk singer), Karen Dalton (folk singer, Fred Neil's protegé), Sara Carter (the Carter Family), Blind Willie Johnson (1920s-30s gospel singer playing in blues style), Marty Balin (Jefferson Airplane-Jefferson Starship, horribly underrated IMO), Mick Jagger (am I right here, Marianne Faithful made the list but Mick did not?), Nico (if Lou Reed made it to the list, so can she), Alice Cooper (the singer in the band of the same name), Gerry Roslie (the Sonics), Lux Interior (the Cramps), John Lydon (a.k.a. "Johnny Rotten"), Otis Redding (another am I right? not on the list?, c'mon)...
 
FWIW, I'll throw out a few names off the top of my head as to singers who should have been on the list, as they don't appear to have been included...

Fred Neil (folk singer), Karen Dalton (folk singer, Fred Neil's protegé), Sara Carter (the Carter Family), Blind Willie Johnson (1920s-30s gospel singer playing in blues style), Marty Balin (Jefferson Airplane-Jefferson Starship, horribly underrated IMO), Mick Jagger (am I right here, Marianne Faithful made the list but Mick did not?), Nico (if Lou Reed made it to the list, so can she), Alice Cooper (the singer in the band of the same name), Gerry Roslie (the Sonics), Lux Interior (the Cramps), John Lydon (a.k.a. "Johnny Rotten"), Otis Redding (another am I right? not on the list?, c'mon)...

Jagger is 42. Redding is 9. See I g-200-best-singers-of-all-time/] (https://rateyourmusic.com/discussion/music/rolling-stones-200-best-singers-of-all-time/)

Very hip additions you have. I could argue for most of them. I would put both Marty and Grace Slick on there. I would pass on Lydon. I am not an Alice Cooper fan. Seemed close to a novelty act to me, but that is my bias. Nico probably literally too short lived, but she was great, Lou aside. Fred Neil excellent and hugely influential.

Later addition: Wasn't Marianne Faithful a bizarre choice?! I guess she is down at 173, but still. I think there is your comparison with Nico. I would argue that Nico was a much more important musical figure than MF, and technically a much better singer. And I like her version of Jackson Browne's "These Days."
 
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This list is interesting...

I was wondering if anyone has the list in one "page" so we don't have to scroll and click to get all the way through it?
 
Jagger is 42. Redding is 9. See I g-200-best-singers-of-all-time/] (https://rateyourmusic.com/discussion/music/rolling-stones-200-best-singers-of-all-time/)

Very hip additions you have. I could argue for most of them. I would put both Marty and Grace Slick on there. I would pass on Lydon. I am not an Alice Cooper fan. Seemed close to a novelty act to me, but that is my bias. Nico probably literally too short lived, but she was great, Lou aside. Fred Neil excellent and hugely influential.

Later addition: Wasn't Marianne Faithful a bizarre choice?! I guess she is down at 173, but still. I think there is your comparison with Nico. I would argue that Nico was a much more important musical figure than MF, and technically a much better singer. And I like her version of Jackson Browne's "These Days."

Thanks for the corrections. I returned to the list and noticed that there were some glitches every now and then when scrolling from my end. This led to sections being missed.

John Lydon (Johnny Rotten) tended to sing in a less aggressive way with his second band, Public Image Ltd., and more conventionally on "The Animal Speaks" by the Golden Palominos. I would certainly rate his singing over, say, Debbie Harry's (who's on the list). Alice Cooper could croon pretty well IMO on songs like "Blue Turk." And while I can appreciate Lou Reed's singing on the third Velvet Underground record, and the first two as well, after this it seems like he smoked too many cigarettes or something and continued "speaking" his songs, rather than singing them. As for Lady Soul being number 1, I attended a concert she gave at ChicagoFest back in 1981. I was pretty close (having arrived early) and man could she sing! The sound system couldn't handle her range. Pretty incredible. She can be number 1 if number 1 needs to be named. I'm fine with it.

Came up with few other names that I didn't see on the list: John Lee Hooker (blues singer), Colin Blunstone (lead singer for the Zombies), Brian Connolly (with the glam-rock band The Sweet); Noddy Holder (of Slade, another glam-rock band), Jim Morrison (of the Doors, Iggy Pop auditioned for the job after Morrison's death but was turned down), Bon Scott (first singer for AC/DC), Tim Buckley (an eccentric folk singer, Jeff Buckley's father), Gene Clark and David Crosby (of the Byrds), Lydia Mendoza (a Mexican-American folk singer), Anita O'Day (a jazz singer), Patty Waters (another jazz singer), Coley Jones (1920s-30s blues singer and string band leader), Roky Erickson (of the 13th Floor Elevators), Nick Cave (The Birthday and the Bad Seeds), Syd Barrett (of the early Pink Floyd--Bowie was a fan), and again, am I wrong here, no Janis Joplin?...

As they still go by Rolling Stone, at least they remembered their roots enough to include Muddy Waters and Mick Jagger!
 
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