His rendering of the chorus, with its "four walls around me to hold my life," may be the best expression of his incredible vocal gifts — despair and joy fighting out their eternal battle.
But I stumbled with Facing the Wind: discordant gusts of harmonium, nagging strings, intermittent percussion like someone banging on a coffin lid and vocals raddled with despair.
According to Rolling Stone, the song's despairing vocal hook (which starts around the two-minute mark) came about after Lopatin typed words into voice synthesis plug-in Chipspeech and tinkered with the sounds that came out.
Howe and Duquette were particularly perturbed by comments from Mike Cameron and Cliff Floyd, the team's vocal leaders, that suggested despair.
It's a tumble of words and ideas and subconscious despair made vocal and the rhythm of it unfortunately escaped him on the night I attended.
Mr. Callahan, who also records as Smog, has a stoicism that recalls Johnny Cash, and he pairs his oft-despairing vocals with spare instrumentation.
As the emotions flicker and change in the songs, Miss Stansfield's voice captures the metamorphoses: from plea to declaration in "You Can't Deny It," from yearning to hope in "Sincerity". The one song in the set that wasn't on her album was Billie Holiday's "Good Morning, Heartache". Miss Stansfield savored its despair, floating a vocal line from melody to paraphrase as if dreaming of escape.
In "Breakaway" she uses plenty of swooping vocal technique to sell her despair as she wonders, "What if all I am without the pain is empty heartache?" (It's one of several lines that make less sense on the page than it does set to music).
The band's punk leanings were buoyed by Shogun's powerful, soul-baring vocals, a rich melodious howl that communicated despair and abandonment in equal measure.
Doom metal: Slower paced, clean or growl vocals, musical and usually lyrical themes of despair and doom (hence the name).
