QUEENSRŸCHE frontman Todd La Torre recently addressed the lack of “real singers” in heavy metal, calling them a “dying breed.”
The 48-year-old La Torre tweeted on Monday (June 27): “I love gutturals don’t get me wrong, and I do them occasionally in some of my own music. They provide an attitude you can’t get without it. BUT, I remember when metal had actual real singers. Those that still do it are the minority now imo [in my opinion]. It’s a dying breed folks.”
In other QUEENSRŸCHE related news, the band’s former vocalist Geoff Tate, who has been on the road celebrating the 30th anniversary of the iconic QUEENSRŸCHE albums “Empire” and “Rage For Order“, recently appeared on “The Jasta Show” and admitted that his backing band play the music tuned down a half step to accommodate his singing.
“I can’t hit those high notes like that anymore in standard tuning. Jesus Christ. I mean, not doing a show,” he laughed (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET). “I could do it on its own if I was just gonna sing the song, but doing it night after night, no. You’ll kill yourself. I could barely do it when I recorded it. [Laughs]”
Tate went on to say that tuning down a half step “doesn’t make a big difference at all” to those in attendance. “It’s mostly to save the singer’s voice,” the former QUEENSRŸCHE vocalist explained. “And also, my backup singers, they have to hit all those notes too. And we’re doing it night after night after night. It’s hard on you as a singer to do that. So you find ways of… Tuning down a half step makes a huge difference ’cause you’re not just killing yourself to hit the note, and you can do it consistently seven days a week. But if you are tuned up to standard tuning, I think you’d probably only get three shows before you’d have to take a break. And economically, that’s just really, really hard to do, to make it work. So we tour just about seven days a week, if we can help it. It depends on the travel.”
You can check out the full interview below, as well as Todd’s recent tweet.
I love gutturals don’t get me wrong, and I do them occasionally in some of my own music. They provide an attitude you can’t get without it. BUT, I remember when metal had actual real singers. Those that still do it are the minority now imo. It’s a dying breed folks.
— Todd La Torre (@ToddLaTorre) June 27, 2022