I don’t listen to bands anymore, because I’m more interested in solo artists, mainly female, but some male. The thread on the Beatles got me to thinking about how it used to be more common to have more than one lead singer in bands. Lots of bands have background singers, but to have multiple hits by different singers, does that happen anymore?
For example, the Beatles had hits with Paul McCartney singing lead, John Lennon singing lead and George Harrison singing lead. I can’t think of a Beatles hit with Ringo Starr singing lead, but I wouldn’t be surprised that I’ve just forgotten. I know he had solo hits.
The Monkees had multiple hits with Davy Jones singing lead, Mike Nesmith singing lead and Mickey Dolenz singing lead. I can’t think if Peter Tork sang lead on a hit.
Fleetwood Mac had multiple hits with Christine McVie singing lead, Stevie Nicks singing lead, Lindsey Buckingham singing lead and Peter Greene (?) singing lead. I know there were more singers (Bob Welsh, Dave Walker, Danny Kirwan, and Jeremy Spencer, but I don’t know if they had hits).
Kinda speaking of, I know of bands who had multiple singers on albums, but those songs weren’t singles and therefore weren’t hits. For instance, when Peter Gabriel was lead singer of Genesis, Phil Collins sang lead on a few album songs, so it wasn’t totally out of the blue when he took over vocals when Peter left. Back then he sounded a lot like Peter anyway.
So, what are some other examples, and does it ever happen today? I realize that today, “hits” aren’t exactly what they were back in the olden days.