Decline of Shane's singing voice on the albums

[Fr. McGreer]

I actually thought his voice sounded better on The Snake, whiched was released three years after Hell's Ditch.

True, however, you can tell the cracks were already starting to appear on Peace and Love. This may be due to the fact that Steve Lillywhite mixed Shane's vocals way down, but compared to the first three albums, you can tell Shane is in a more rejuvenated state. He seems more focused and his writing is more prolific.

Iain

Yeah, your bang on. Why are the vocals (not just Shane's) on P&L so low in the mix? You can hardly hear Terry on Gartloney Rats. Cotton Fields is my favourite but the damn mix ruins the vocals.

[RICHB]

I actually thought his voice sounded better on The Snake, whiched was released three years after Hell's Ditch.

True, however, you can tell the cracks were already starting to appear on Peace and Love. This may be due to the fact that Steve Lillywhite mixed Shane's vocals way down, but compared to the first three albums, you can tell Shane is in a more rejuvenated state. He seems more focused and his writing is more prolific.

Iain

Yeah, your bang on. Why are the vocals (not just Shane's) on P&L so low in the mix? You can hardly hear Terry on Gartloney Rats. Cotton Fields is my favourite but the damn mix ruins the vocals.

Think this has been mentioned before. Didnt Lillywhite do it to hide the poor quality of shanes voice and obviously (well I think) they must have had to do it with the other ones as well or the album would have sounded strange. Think Phillip said later that Steve regreted doing it and should have just left it as it was

[Fr. McGreer]

Thanks Richb, sounds logical.

[Low D]

Didnt Lillywhite do it to hide the poor quality of shanes voice and obviously (well I think) they must have had to do it with the other ones as well or the album would have sounded strange. Think Phillip said later that Steve regreted doing it and should have just left it as it was

i think this is in carol clarke's book, and i think it was Lillywhite what said he regretted the decision, and in retrospect it would have been better to just let shane's vocals stand as they were. i think hell's ditch is a brilliant record, miles ahead of p&l in terms of sound & arrangements (too busy on p&l). and i think shane sounds just fine.

more recently, his voice is different, but i think explained as much by his continued loss of teeth as by anything else. my son was in a bit of a "shane" stage, missing some front teeth, some baby teeth, some adult teeth, and he had a hard time enunciating.

[pogues24]

I actually thought his voice sounded better on The Snake, whiched was released three years after Hell's Ditch.

True, however, you can tell the cracks were already starting to appear on Peace and Love. This may be due to the fact that Steve Lillywhite mixed Shane's vocals way down, but compared to the first three albums, you can tell Shane is in a more rejuvenated state. He seems more focused and his writing is more prolific.

Iain

Yeah, your bang on. Why are the vocals (not just Shane's) on P&L so low in the mix? You can hardly hear Terry on Gartloney Rats. Cotton Fields is my favourite but the damn mix ruins the vocals.

Couldn't agree with you more. If it wasn't for the lyric sheet inside the Peace and Love sleeve, I wouldn't have been able to understand any of Terry's lyrics, and Gartloney Rats is one of my favorite Pogues songs.

Iain

[Doktor Avalanche]

explained as much by his continued loss of teeth as by anything else. my son was in a bit of a "shane" stage, missing some front teeth, some baby teeth, some adult teeth, and he had a hard time enunciating.

Teef are overradded.

[dsweeney]

Actually, if you ask me, I think Shane's singing voice started to decline around the time of " Rum,...", if only slightly. On " Red roses .." he sounds like a bright and cocky young man, belting out the tunes at the top his voice. His diction is perfect. By " Grace..." he is still totally committed to the cause but his voice is defnitely on the wain. P&L, he doesn't even want to be there and barely blurts it out most of the time. By " Hells ditch " the voice is shot to bits but at least he sounds more into the songs I think, more at home with the material. " The snake " is a huge return to form, sounding a lot more like his old self. Unfortunately " Crock..." was a step backwards and he sounds exhuasted and not that interested.
Certainly his new teeth would help. I thought of writing a song called " The ballad of Sean MacGoohan" about a singer who carries his new false teeth around with him in a bag and pops them in on request of a recital.

[mh2004]

I think on the Lancaster County Prison album Shane sounds great, also on the song Plaistow Patricia and on I put a spell... so the more later recordings...
I think he sounds great on these, not good, but great and pure.
On the bootleg Gin lane, beer street his voice is also very rough and sounds like sigarettes and alcohol!

[cagliostro]

In the "Haunted" duet with Sinead O'Connor he sounds particularly Muppety. I definitely prefer Cait's version, but I think it also counts against it as it sounds like Sinead and Dr. Teeth, or maybe Grover, or a strange blend of the two. But I still prefer his voice to the majority of singers out there without a little soul in their voices.

[Low D]

Think this has been mentioned before. Didnt Lillywhite do it to hide the poor quality of shanes voice and obviously (well I think) they must have had to do it with the other ones as well or the album would have sounded strange. Think Phillip said later that Steve regreted doing it and should have just left it as it was

... Which was Joe Strummer's approach for Hell's Ditch, and I'd have to say it worked better.