Journey Vocalist Won't Stop Deceivin'

In 1998, when Journey hired Steve Augeri to replace vocalist Steve Perry, they gave the former Gap employee a simple instruction: Sing exactly like Perry, which he managed to do with extraordinary precision. About a year ago, fans started to notice that, at every show, Augeri's vocals were identical down to the smallest detail from. One Journey fanatic documented this apparent lip-syncing in thoroughly dork-tastic detail, complete with audio clips. When a couple radio DJs picked up the story, Augeri seemingly sang live, with disastrously croaky, off-key results. Last week, Journey put out a press release claiming Augeri was suffering from an "acute throat infection" and would be replaced by former Yngwie Malmsteen sideman Jeff Scott Soto. For those keeping track, Soto will be Journey's fourth frontman.

• 
  MUSIC 100 Greatest Debut Albums
• 
  MOVIES 'Star Trek' Is Crazy Good
• 
  TV 10 Shows to Watch This Summer
• 
  POLITICS No Price Big Banks Can't Fix

Song Stories

“The Pretender”

Foo Fighters | 2007

This song wasn't part of the planned track listing for 2007's Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, and was put together in a day. "It happened after we recorded a lot of stuff," said Dave Grohl. Yet it ended up as the album opener and the lead single. Grohl called it "a stomping Foo Fighters uptempo song with a little bit of Chuck Berry in it." The singer hinted at the lyrics' political overtones: "Everyone's been f---ed over before and I think a lot of people feel f---ed over right now and they're not getting what they were promised."

More Song Stories entries »

Twitter