Are there any bands that have their bassist as their lead singer?

Answer 1

You could see that in many groups. Twin solos have been since the invention of rock and roll. We have groups like Boston, Blueberry smoke, the new guns and roses and many more.

Answer 2

Absolutely. Paul McCartney was not necessarily the lead singer of The Beatles, but he sang half the songs, and he plays bass. John was the true leader of the band, but Paul sang up front on a lot of songs. When Cream were big, Jack Bruce sang most of their songs; great bass guitarist, sometimes considered the best. When Peter Cetera, bass player for CTA, played for Chicago, formely CTA, he sang a lot of songs and the rest of the group sang harmony. Geddy Lee from Rush, although he plays keyboards also, is lead singer. There must be many more. Yes, the lead singer in Skillet is the bass player in the band.

Answer 3

The lead singer from blink 182 is in fact the bassist. Even though singing is alternated between bassist and guitarist depending on song , the bassist is considered lead.

Rush, Geddy Lee (bass/vocals)

Cream, Jack Bruce (bass/vocals)

Trapeze, Glenn Hughes (bass/vocals)

Motorhead, Lemmy (bass/vocals)

Budgie, Burke Shelly (bass/vocals)

Slayer, Tom Araya (bass/vocals)

Thin Lizzy, Phil Lynott (bass/vocals)

There is a Black Sabbath track (It's All Right) in which the drummer sings, and originally Dimmu Borgir had a drummer/vocalist (he switched to guitar).

An important number of bassist have been the lead singer - or one of the lead singers - of their band, including Paul McCartney (The Beatles), Brian Wilson (Beach Boys), Les Claypool (Primus) Larry Graham (Graham Central Station), Lemmy (Mothorhead) and Sting (Police) to name a few.

Lead singing drummers are quite more rare, as singing and drumming at the same time is quite hard, but they do exist : Ringo Starr (The Beatles) Roger Taylor (Queen) Keith Moon (The Who) all sung occasional lead vocals for their bands, for example.

Answer 4

Of course it is possible, and not this hard, it just takes a little bit of practice. A lot of bassist sang lead for their bands : Paul McCartney from The Beatles, Roger Waters from Pink Floyd, Brian Wilson from The Beach Boys and - those ones are very impressive because they play very difficult bass lines at the same time - Les Claypool from Primus and John Entwistle from The Who.

Answer 5

Defiantly not

Of course a four track is the most common form of rock band and is the easiest to write for but there is no limit to the amount of members that can be part of a band.

The only example I can think of now is the Metal Band "Slipknot." They feature 9 members

(8 members, RIP Paul Grey)

Answer 6

Of course, it's possible, but would you want two bass players in a band? Low notes have a tendency to interfere with each other more than higher notes, so both players would have to carefully coordinate what they play to make sure this doesn't happen.

One approach would be to make sure their sounds are as different from each other as possible. One could play clean and the other distorted, for example. I guess it's worth experimenting with, but there's probably a good reason why it hasn't been done very often.

If I remember right, Styx toured with two bassists at one time, but they didn't play at the same time. Each played certain songs, but only went on stage together for the finale.

Sammy Hagar sometimes tours with both Mona Gnader and Michael Anthony. Mona plays during the first half of the show, which is all Sammy Hagar songs, and Michal plays the second half which is all Van Halen Songs. Then they both play during the finale as well.

Answer 7

Can the bass player be the frontman in a band? Yes. It does happen. And usually, the lead singer is the frontman, but not always. For example, the lead vocalist for the band Fall Out Boy is the guitarist, but the bassist is generally called the frontman. And in some groups, the "frontman" is shared between two members.

Now, it is possible that the questioner is asking about the bass singer in a quartet. There are (or have been) times when the bass is the leader (and frontman) for the group -- and at times the bass singer may sing the lead in a song, but not most of the time.

Answer 8

Typically, yes. The band made that person the lead singer for a reason!

Answer 9

Yes. Examples are Sting and Paul McCartney

Answer 10

If the man playing base is the best singer, sure.