Dee Snider recently shared his thoughts on what defines a ‘great frontman’ in an X post. He replied to a tweet asking if Robert Plant was the ‘greatest frontman of all time’ by writing:
“Nope. Amazing singer. But great frontman? He barely spoke to the crowd. ‘Does anybody remember laughter?’ James Brown is the greatest of all time!”
A user then named David Lee Roth as another great frontman, though they described him as a ‘horrible singer.’ The post noted that ‘when you have Eddie Van Halen on stage with you, you could be a mute and make it work.’ Snider shared in response:
“Like I said: singing and fronting are separate things! DLR was a great FM.”
Snider Thought On The Matter For A Long Time
Similar opinions from Dee Snider caused a stir on social media last year. He later clarified his comments in a chat with Ultimate Guitar:
“When I said they weren’t great frontmen, everybody said, ‘Here’s Dee shooting his mouth off again.’ But I’m not just shooting my mouth off. I’ve actually taken a lot of time to think about it. I didn’t just make an arbitrary statement. I’ve thought about it. I got on my computer, and I studied and researched it.”
The singer further explained:
“Now, a frontman doesn’t have to sing well but needs to be a guy who can engage the audience and entertain the people who stand there. A frontman that can wow the crowd with their incredible voice, yeah, that’s entertaining on a different level, but it’s not the same as a full-scale performance.”
Snider also called Plant ‘an incredible singer’ but said ‘showmanship, that’s what I do well.’
