Ronnie James Dio (or, why I think shrieky voiced lead singers are awesome)

See link below for the rest of the article.

Because okay, that’s the thing, right? Shrieky voiced lead singers write about chicks and dragons and wizards and more chicks and going to California and how Love Hurts and shit like that (I know he didn’t write that, but let me riff, here), and all the low-voiced assholes can do is write about how much shit sucks. What’s up with that? Is there something about the ability to sing high that makes you HAPPIER ABOUT LIFE? At any rate — I will posit that metal written by shrieky guys always always trumps metal written by the low guys.

And that brings me to Justin Hawkins. You may remember a band called The Darkness from a few years back. They had a hit called “I Believe In A Thing Called Love” which featured the ULTIMATE shrieky-voiced lead singer, a stringy British dude with a wicked sense of humor called Justin Hawkins, who whooped and shrieked like nobody’s business. He was almost Freddie Mercury-like in sheer range, and he was AWESOME.

Then at some point he went into rehab, and then quit the Darkness. And so what do they do? They replace him with a LOW-VOICED GUY, who immediately gets all serious and singing about life sucking and stuff and then the band BLOWS. You see? You see?

Well, the good news is that Justin Hawkins is back, with a COMPLETELY AWESOME BAND called Hot Leg (yes, just the one of them!) and he’s just as shrieky and amazing and hilariously over-the-top as he was before. So low guy that joined what’s left of the Darkness? You may go to hades, my friend, because here comes Hot Leg. Enjoy.

I’ve Met Jesus.

www.oxadox.com