I stumbled upon this karaoke version of Sweet Child O’ Mine last night and thought you guys would get a kick out of it.
Not bad. He seems to clip the verses or something but if you told me this was a demo tape from GnR circa 1986 I’d believe you. Sure doesn’t look like that voice should come from that guy.
Now if he could just join Velvet Revolver and start writing good songs with Slash we’d have something. 
Watched the first verse and chorus. If I had an instrument like that, I would get myself in the best shape I could and put together a plan to get into the music business - nothing is a given, but from a sheer talent standpoint, that guy has an amazing vocal instrument. Jeez - it’s not fair.
He’s got a bunch of videos of him doing GNR. He’s really good, but he’s no Axl. 
Here’s the guy’s Youtube channel. You can listen to his other stuff there, he does more than just GNR.
I think his rendition of Maggie May might be even more impressive than his GNR riffs.
I have never voted on American Idol, but I would be tempted if this guy was on it.
What karaoke has a professional microphone and headsets? Where are the drunken revelers cheering him on?
Ugh. Axl Rose sings “Run To The Hills”. Not cool, bro!
Ha! I read a transcript of a radio interview with him last night and the interviewer asked him if he ever showed up at Karaoke Night just to screw with people. He said he did a few times just to see what it was like to sing in front of people and he was totally unprepared for how unprepared they were for him. He said people wouldn’t let him off the stage and he wound up doing 12 songs and straining his voice. He gave it up though because he began to get the feeling that the other participants had begun to resent him.
Anyway, I got the Karaoke reference from the title above the video and the fact that he was using Karaoke music to sing to.
P.S. - He has said that most of his videos are recorded the first time he attempts to sing the song, and he appears to be singing Karoke lyrics read from his computer screen. I noticed that he sings “And if they thought of rain” rather than “As if they thought of rain” in SCoM.
Still, it’s the talent that jumps out from this guy. Who cares if he flubs a word here and there? He’s not giving professional performances.
Sorry, Fois, I didn’t mean that as harshly as it sounds at second glance. I was on my way out of the room and typing in haste. I probably should have said something along the line of “It doesn’t particularly bother me,” rather than “Who cares?” No offense was intended.
This guy isn’t too bad. I’m liking the Maggie May.
I have a question for the singer/vocalist types out there though: Can someone sing like that for years and maintain their singing voice? That doesn’t sound very healthy. Does he have nodes already, is he overly tightening his vocal cords to do that, or am I just entirely off-base and that’s a perfectly normal way to sing?
I guess Rod Stewart pretty much maintained his voice (though I think Rod differed in that I don’t recall him screaming very much), but Axl isn’t himself anymore, I understand. How did David Lee Roth hold up after all that screaming? I heard an isolated vocal part of Runnin’ with the Devil, and his scream sounds. . . odd. Almost like 2 notes. Ah, Youtube to the rescue:
*Runnin’ with the Devil *(vocals-only)
Always wondered about this sort of thing, but never had anyone to ask.
You spelled “asshole” wrong.
I don’t know about that voice in particular, but one can maintain a gruff rock voice if one does two things: using the least harsh method of being gruff–using the false vocal chords–and singing regularly as well to counteract the hardness. You might be able to get past the latter just by not using your voice that often, and doing good soft vocal exercises like the Lindquest method.
It’s something I’m currently working on, since I kinda like my gruffer sounding voice for somethings. But it doesn’t sound anywhere near as good as that guy’s.
Depends on the basic nature of your tone - your *timbre *- and how you use your voice over time. I cite singers like **John Fogerty **of Creedance and Ronnie James Dio of examples of voices that sound rough or aggressive, but that is achieved through proper technique and they still had the ability to hit the notes late in their careers - with John still going. And don’t get me started about Rob Halford or Geoff Tate - operatic in technique…
(bolding mine)
Some time in his late 30s, my dad had to have surgery to remove some polyps (or whatever) from his vocal cords, and he and the doctor blamed all the yelling he had to do when he was in the Marines. He was discharged when he was 23. He didn’t do a whole lot of yelling in the intervening years. Conversely, I’ve been singing hard rock and metal since I was 17 (I’m coming up on 45 now), and I’ve never had any kind of trouble with my vocal cords, despite being a natural bass/baritone who “trained” myself to do the high-tenor screaming common to '70s-'80s hard rock and metal (lots of Priest and Maiden, in particular). I think the difference is that I’ve kept it up all these years, and kept the vocal cords in shape.
I discovered it’s often less stressful to “scream” out a high note than to try to sing it “clean”.
Ah! A fellow fan, I see!
FWIW, I was wrong here. I just listened to it a couple more times and he does sing “As if they thought of rain”.
So those of you who have been questioning my hearing can add me to your list as well.
Thanks guys, and to the others who addressed my question. “False vocal cords” led to some informative Googling.
Sounds better than anything I’ve heard from Axl that wasn’t professionally produced in a studio.