I was about to post a question for Jaime about my head voice kinda dying out certain days when I vocalize. It usually happens when there's a discoordination with my breath support and chords and I experience a lot of cracking as I approach the break. Then my headvoice seems to lose power a bit, it loses its sharpness and turns into a weaker sounding falsetto, there's nothing I can do when this happens but to stop vocalizing.

Anyway, last night I went to a Chimaira, DragonForce (power metal) and Killswitch Engage...and I noticed that half way through the set, like 3 songs in, the singer of Dragonforce was experiencing the EXACT same thing. All his headvoice notes were weak falsetto-y.

So what's the deal with this? I'm assuming that it comes from pushing to hard causing swollen chords...or straining to keep the voice from cracking? Does this happen to anyone else? How does one combat this to keep the headvoice reliable day in day out?

Dude how was the concert though? Dragonforce is awesome my kid is into them!!!!!!

Overforcing the air.

JV

ZP Theart sounds like that anyway :P
Its just his whiny voice...

chrisphx,

The show was awesome. Typically, I never really liked Dragonforce all that much. But seeing the show shed a new light on them...they are so full of energy...the solos were extremely fun to watch, the singer is throwing water on people constantly, the keyboardist was jumping 4 feet off the ground while playing, the drummer is like an olympic athlete on drums...And they dont take themselves too seriously...overall they were the most entertaining band last night.

Jaime,
What about a guy like Rob Halford? You obviously have to push a LITTLE extra air to get the kind of growls he does. When ever I see older footage of him, he always seemed to be spot on in his head voice. (which he relies heavily on) Is this simply just a case of him always knowing exactly how much air he needs to sustain his growls but not lose his headvoice? Or after singing like that for so long, do your folds eventually become less susceptiple to swelling?

Lee,
Yeah, I heard this guy on the album. His voice is kind of whiney but this was without a doubt falsetto in his headvoice. Because everynow and then after a break (like a solo) he could sort get his headvoice back. But then if there he sang long string of words and some of them went above his break...they were all super weak and falsetto. It was totally noticable. But i'm sure most people didn't notice.

My friend loaned me their CD. And I was shocked at how fast they could play. Pushing barriers these guys are.

I saw that show in Toronto Tuesday. I loved Killswitch but was VERY disappointed by Dragonforce. I don't really like their music to start with but I was still expecting better from the singer. He had lots of energy but the singing was so off. He would probably be better off staying put to concentrate better on his vocals. Unfortunately his voice was cracking all the time and the whole thing just sounded very shaky. I was thinking to myself, if I knew those guys at all, I'd refer the singer to Jaime for some guidance!

Yeh ive seen them 3 times, and met them... funnily enough though, even though i dont like his singing, the shows i have seen were all really good as far as his voice health was concerned....must be jet lag or something...lol

I have seen them once before and am seeing them in May again this year. Last time ZP was perfect on stage except about three times where he lost his full tone on the high notes for a lighter tone much alike how Andi Deris sings old Helloween songs nowadays.

How were Howard's cleans at this show btw?

I think he has a beautiful voice when he sings clean.

I really don't want to put this guy's voice down in anyway. I think he's a really great singer...whoever can maintain a career singing high notes (above the break) is amazing in my book. All I'm saying is that this guy (for whatever reason,) had an almost non-existent full head voice when it came down to it (at this show)...Thats it.

May be he had an off night or he was sick...

Yeah...he's probably partying too much after the shows. i know whenever i drink booze, my voice goes straight to the crapper.

As far as Howard's voice...he was pretty much spot on. He does have a great voice, sometimes when I listen to Breath Life...when he sings the chorus, particularly when he says "life", The tone is incredible. He also has a really great vibrato...not to many people in that genre of metal (Screaming verses, singing choruses) use vibrato.