Thoughts on Bruce Dickinson's Vocals...

[Anonymous]

Of course, it should be noted that Ronnie James Dio is sixty-four years old. He was recording his classic albums (Heaven and Hell, Mob Rules, Last In Line, Holy Diver, Sacred Heart) in his late 30's and 40's. Not to diminish anything from Brucey, but... damn!

Anyway, we could sit here talking about vocalists forever. Bruce still sounds pretty good, which I like, although his voice seems to... strain a bit more on the high points, like These Colours Don't Run. It's no big deal, he still sounds awesome.

The only thing that kind of does bother me though (and it's really minor) is that (at least when I saw him) he doesn't sing in the same time live as he does in the studio. I mean, of course, he's free to do that, but it slightly diminishes the live feel relative to other bands. When I saw Megadeth (2004), Dave sang everything like he did on the albums, and since we all knew how that went, we all song along. There's just an... almost surreal feeling to sing in time with 3,000 other metal fans all singing to Dave... you don't get that as much with Maiden except int he choruses, from what I know. Of course, I'm nit picking!

And while we're talking about singers, what about C.J. Snare from FireHouse?

 

[Genghis Khan]

WARNING!  This comment about Bruce's voice contains some spoilers about the current tour.

Spoiler

Bruce's vocals were not always audible during this tour.  This was not a problem the last two times I saw Iron Maiden.  I'm not sure why this discrepancy, but some fans have said that Bruce complained about the sound in some venues.  There were no complaints from Bruce in Toronto's Air Canada Centre.  However, some verses were so quiet that I could not hear them.  Bruce was either tired or maybe I just had bad seats (Section 120).  When needed, Bruce did hold long notes like the "hell" at the end of 'The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg' for example; he was spectacular.  The audience cheered.

I think that Steven Tyler of Aerosmith has a great voice.  He has strained his voice plenty of times live, however, just like Bruce.

 

[Onhell]

I love Bruce and I consider him amongst the best rock singers but you can hardly consider his solo career as very successful. At least from the commercial vue point. From an artistic point it's a matter of personal taste, I bought and appreciated every solo albums he made but you must admit that he didn't sell that much cds back in the 1995-1998 period...
So my opinion is that Bruce did come back in Iron Maiden mainly because he was fed up with playing in small venues. Since the band missed him (or at least a singer able to sing almost every nights during a whole world tour) his come back happened. That's a question of supply and demand, nothing more romantic 

Well, true that commercially speaking it was HUGE, but still much more successful than plenty of of artist attempting solo works. How many know of Russel Allen's (of symphony X) Atomic Soul? or Kotipelto's two solo albums? Andi Deris' or as mentioned before... Michael Kiske? I can't even find his stuff in stores, online of course they're in there somewhere. The last of heard of him, quite literally, is on Tobias Sammett's Avantasia: The Metal Opera and granted he doesn't sing much on it either.

In contrast People knew of Bruce's stuff small venue concerts or otherwise.