I don't really listen to rock/metal bands, pretty much LP is the only band I'm following on. That being said, I wonder which level Chester's live vocal performances would be on comparing to other bands. Chester is a hell of a studio vocalist no doubt, but sadly it seemed as though I had to worry about Chester going out of sync whenever he's singing live. Is this a common issue among other rock/metal singers? Edited: Just realized that my topic kinda repeated another thread's here, but I'm looking for more solid comparisons as in band/singer names.
I saw RHCP live. They hold really energetic, awesome shows (the concert was incredible), but damn... Kiedis misses every other note. Plus he forgot half of the lyrics... Only other bands I've watched on YT are Rammstein and Coldplay. I'd say he's better than both, but those are completely other genres, so...
Every singer, that's actually singing, will go in and out of tune live. Rock vocalists tend to gradually lose the bite in their vocals over time, whether it's caused or the vocalists decision depends on who you're talking about. And drinking and smoking only make matters worse.
As it has been said, it depends. For exampe, if you ask me, Thrice singer is really outstanding live. Most of the time, the guy sounds as he is in studio, and can deliver his screamed/raspy vocals parts without a problem. On the other side, a singer that really doesn't deliver well live in my opinion is the guy from Avenged Sevenfold. I mean, just watch their Rar performance...then you'll see Chester is quite good live, finally
To be honest, I think he does decently. Of course there are a bunch of singers out there that sound better, but let's not forget that LP songs are actually pretty damn hard for Chazzy to sing.
I'd rank him in the top 10-15% of vocalists in the general "rock" genre. He's sharp or flat enough to notice on recordings fairly often, but his truly cringe-worthy moments really aren't THAT frequent, all things considered. He tends to have trouble keeping time when he doesn't have percussion backing him (see: final chorus of Castle of Glass from KROQ 2012, many performances of Burn it Down at the part immediately after Mike's rap bridge), which honestly bugs me more than his generally excusable pitch imperfections. It's also disappointing how rarely he's able to replicate his raspy aggessive singing/screaming tone in a live environment these days. He can't hold a candle to the upper echelons of live rock vocalists (Maynard James Keenan, Matt Bellamy, Bruce Dickinson, Freddie Mercury...), but he's also leaps and bounds ahead of some of his contemporaries (Sonny Sandoval, Adam Lazzara, Doug Robb...)
In the studio, he might be the best singer of our generation, but his live performances have dropped off unfortunately.
If we're just comparing other "rock" outfits here, I think he stands up pretty well. Not great, but not bad by any means. One thing I notice is that Chester sounds infinitely better when covering songs by other artists. Whether it was 2011's Rolling In The Deep cover, or the Camp Freddie covers such as Highway To Hell. I'm sure it's because those songs are nowhere near the toll-takers that the typical Linkin Park song is, but it's definitely noticeable. Chester sounds amazing during the covers, and sounds even better on studio performances. This just leads me to believe that LP's songs are ridiculously hard to preform in a live setting. Have you ever tried to sing New Divide? My vocal range is a tad bit higher than normal, and I can't make it through that entire song without fatiguing. Now keep in mind this is 1 out of 20 or so songs Chester does night after night. That speaks volumes of his endurance. Just because he doesn't sound good on the 17th song of a set doesn't mean he's not a good live singer, it just means that he's tired as shit...and nobody can hold that against him. Most rock vocalists sound decent, but a lot of times (I'm looking at you, Tim McIlrath) they sound nearly unbearable. I love Rise Against with a passion, but holy fuck does Tim suck live. Brent Smith isn't bad, M. Shadows is alright, but a lot of the other more intense vocalists out there can't do what Chester does. I'd say even Shadows and Smith would have a hard time singing an LP set. Overall, I think Chester is the greatest vocalist of the generation. He has a distinct, appealing voice, great range, and can scream. And, while his live performances may not have the "bite" to them that they used to in his younger days, the guy can still fucking sing.
Yeah, my main point in this argument is that LP songs are just generally hard as shit to sing, lol. Btw, Brent Smith lip syncs parts of their set live. Sad. And I personally think M. Shadows is fucking awesome live.
As others have mentioned, Linkin Park songs are really difficult to sing. Like, wow. That's one of my only gripes with the band; they try to make every song some huge epic wailing sound. Chester could take a more modest song and make it his bitch, and he has. I guess they just like to push him because he is a very unique talent.
I think My December was a good example of a more modest vocal approach. It's true that Chester often goes into huge high pitched vocal parts though. It would be cool if he took a more variated approach sometimes. Hell, I'd love if he went into some crazy raspy rapping in a studio song, like he did live with the sabotage cover.
I think Matt Shadows sounds fine live, and in the studio too, like his style or not he is a decent singer. And one of the greatest concerts i ever been too is a Rise Against concert, and i have seen around 15 international bands live, so really saying Tim Mcilrath is a bad singer live is again an overstatement. Sometimes singers has a bad day live. Sometimes they reach the sky live. Chester is an fine example of that, as he has his share of magical moments and less great moments live. I think he is overall a pretty persistence good singer live, considering how much his voice has changed. But nowadays LP is much better in studio than live. But they differently sound great in studio.
As much as I appreciate his vocal abilities, I have found some of Chester's performances painful to watch since 2008, occasionally he's out of time, out of tune and out of reach of what he did in the studio, perhaps that has something to do with the new music. He was an absolute beast in 2003 and 2007 in particular though, but he has seemed to struggle at times live from the ATS onwards, very rarely do I see a flawless performance from him.
Unfortunately, Chester has gotten even worse since the Honda Civic Tour. Yes, it is hard to be able to sing 20 songs almost everynight, but the opening show in virginia was nowhere near as good as I thought Chester would do. He wasn't bad at the tinley park show I saw him at, but it was still not to his best potiential. He did have some decent shows performing on all those festivals before the honda civic tour. The Show at Berlin was amazing and the rio social was flawless. Chester had a chance to rest his vocals between the time LP had at ending the honda civic tour and performing at KROQ and that was one of his worst shows ever. Just because I haven't really seen any other bands play live asides from owl city (not a rock band), I can't really make a comparison. All I know is that we won't be getting anymore vocal performances as amazing as pre-2007. Blame the MTM era because of all the screaming.
IMO he sounded good during the ATS tour. I saw them here in Denver, and despite it being one of the last dates he sounded fantastic.