Greatest Heavy Metal Singers (Readjusted)

Before I kick off into a treatise on the greatest heavy metal singers, I wanted to quickly note that I have successfully got back my old blog posts. I have moved them over to this blog. The only thing is that the videos didn't keep the original formatting I gave them when the HTML was saved, so they are slightly larger than the content column in the middle of the page. No worries, it's just an aesthetic matter. Now on to the fun stuff.

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Greatest Metal Singers of All Time


This is all made up from my own personal favorites, not based on real music knowledge, haha. With that said, there are two factors which make an awesome metal voice. One is the epic-ness of the voice, and second is the badass-ness. A combination of these two factors gives the singer a higher score on my list. Some singers are better at being epic, and others are better at being badass. You can have some people who are so damn epic, but have no badassness,  that their epic quality alone carries them to a high spot on the list. You can also have the opposite, where the badassness puts them high on the list.

How do I rate them? What's my methodology? Duh, I make it up. The max score a person can get is 100%, this can be made of a combination of the two factors, or one alone. It is nearly impossible to get 100% by one of those factors alone, because then your voice probably isn't metal -- it's probably [insert a music genre which is known for epic singers] or hardcore (which isn't heavy metal, let's get that straight from the outset).

So here is the list. The list will start at the top with the least-best and work its way up to the best, by cumulative score. Note: these percentages reflect the singer's voice, not their persona.

22) Dave Mustaine (Megadeth). 15% Badass; 0% Epic; -300% Sounds retarded. -285% total.
21) David St. Hubbins (Spinal Tap). 20% Badass; 10% Epic. 30% total.
20) Sabastian Bach (Skid Row). 30% Epic; 10% Badass. 40% total.
19) Brian Johnson (AC/DC). 40% Badass; 5% Epic; -5% Annoying. 40% total.
18) Geoff Tate (Queensryche). 40% Epic; 0% Badass. 40% total.
17) Phil Anselmo (Pantera). 40% Badass; 2% Epic. 42% total.
16) Tim "Ripper" Owens (Judas Priest/ Iced Earth). 33% Epic; 10% Badass. 43% total.
15) James Hetfield (Metallica). 32% Badass; 7% Epic; +5% Rah!. 44% total.
14) Till Lindemann (Rammstein). 40% Badass; 10% Epic. 50% total.
13) Robert Plant (Led Zeppelin). 45% Epic; 5% Badass. 50% total.
12) Bon Scott (AC/DC). 55% Epic; 30% Badass. 55% total.
11) Matt Barlow (Iced Earth). 30% Epic; 30% Badass. 60% total.
10) Freddie Mercury (Queen). 60% Epic; 0% Badass. 60% total. (not metal -- but so damn good)
9) Axl Rose (Guns N' Roses). 50% Epic; 10% Badass. 60% total.
8) Geddy Lee (RUSH). 60% Epic; 0% Badass. 60% total.
7) Meat Loaf (Meat Loaf). 65% Epic; 0% Badass. 65% total. (quasi-metal)
6) Ozzy Osbourne (Black Sabbath). 55% Epic; 10% Badass. 65% total.


5) Bruce Dickinson (Iron Maiden). 40% Epic; 25% Badass. 65% total.

Bruce Dickinson (Iron Maiden)

4) Ian Gillan (Deep Purple). 60% Epic; 10% Badass. 70% total.

Ian Gillan (Deep Purple)

3) Rob Halford (Judas Priest). 70% Epic; 5% Badass. 75% total.

Rob Halford (Judas Priest)

2) Hansi Kürsch (Blind Guardian). 80% Epic; 10% Badass. 90% total.

Hansi Kürsch (Blind Guardian)

1) Ronnie James Dio (Rainbow, Black Sabbath, Dio, Heaven and Hell). 250,000,000% Badass; 4,035,000% Badass. 254,035,000% EPIC AWESOME total.

Ronnie James Dio

(his epic singing kicks in around 1:45)

Ronnie James Dio recently died of stomach cancer. So sad. He was and forever will be, the man (even though he was like four feet tall, his voice was about 9 million feet tall).

Yours truly, 

-dWis