Often of an evening I watch old episodes of Top Of The Pops on the iPlayer and tonight I watched a 1987 episode when “You Win Again” was number one. And I do love that song, and I love loads of Bee Gees tunes. But boy, do they lack charisma or what? They looked like three total spods. I’ve never known them to say anything funny or witty, but their genuine talent is an obvious “piss off ganglesprocket, who cares what you think” retort which cannot be denied.
But this made me think. Are there any other charisma vacuums that I am forgetting about? Is there anyone else with Bee Gee levels of success (I accept producer or performer, provided they have done both in their time) which I am forgetting?
Does anyone have less charisma and more success than the Bee Gees?
Always wondered whether The Byrds were a bit lacking in that department. Maybe Crosby the exception?
But has any band ever looked cooler than they did on the cover of the first album?
Maybe the Thelonious Monk Quartet in 1966?
I love Lawrence Gales smoking a pipe while playing the contrabass at around 1:00
They did look great
I think Genesis suffered from a severe lack of charisma once Peter Gabriel had gone. Phil Collins was a great drummer and singer but a bit too spud-like for a frontman.
You never saw Tony Banks kick his piano stool over? No, me neither
I see your Genesis and raise a Mike & The Mechanics.
I place a late bid with Bankstatement
Barclay James Harvest make late-period Genesis look like The Jesus and Mary Chain.
Arf!
They were a bit wet weren’t they, especially in the Berlin bass players kimono period.
And yet..
They remained on Charisma until it was finally subsumed by Virgin Records in 1986
ARF!
Not a band, but in terms of success (and there aren’t many as successful as the Bee Gees, so it’s a small field), I’d argue that Michael Jackson didn’t have any charisma.
In the 80s to the mid-90s, he did have an aura in the same way that Prince did. At around the time of the Jarvis intervention- he lost that and became embarrassing.
I was trolling a bit, because of course he ha(d/s) an enormous fanbase, many of whom are expressive in their phenomenal devotion, even after all the controversies. But true charisma requires warmth and connection, and it seemed to me there was always a distance with Jackson. Maybe it’s connected to coming to public attention early in life? The gloss of professionalism set in early for both brothers Gibb and Jackson?
I don’t think charisma requires warmth and connection. It’s more of a hard to define sense that we are drawn to this person, we we want to look at them, they command the attention of the room. They may be aloof and non-communicative but we respond to them anyway. I think Jackson had it until he went Wacko odd and dark aspects emerged.
Didds is right.
I suspect charisma is ultimately in the eye of the beholder, but it isn’t warmth and connection for me either. Peak Morrissey certainly had charisma, but he was neither warm nor particularly connective (in fact, in many ways he was quite the opposite).
Jackson is a hard one, because the level of his fame was so great that it’s probably impossible to divorce from an assessment of his personal charisma. He probably never walked into a room in his entire adult life without being the absolute centre of it.
But then, take away the fame and are you left with a particularly charismatic individual? I’m not so sure that you can perform that surgery, even hypothetically.
On this subject, I did enjoy hearing his son’s accent this week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hc6l6NwheeQ
There was an awards ceremony in the 90s where the three of them were at the mic saying their thank yous and Maurice gave way to Barry, saying affectionately “your go now, chooky-egg” and Barry winced with embarrassment but he also loved it. It was a very warm moment.
Maurice appears to be wearing a Joy Division housecoat.
It’s a Hepworth theory that there is a dial with talent and end extreme and charisma at the other, and that all acts can be placed somewhere on it. He also posits that the BeeGees dial is turned way towards Talent and it’s hard to argue with that.
Does that mean the most charismatic people have no talent?
I’m sure there can be a 50/50, peak era Bowie perhaps.
Just another half-baked Heppoism that fails to stand up to scrutiny.
Arf
My God, that is utter twaddle, isn’t it? We saw Bryan Ferry a few years ago, and we were in about row 3. Obviously, whether you like him or not, he is amazingly talented, and boy does he have charisma to burn on stage.
A slight detour perhaps but it is undeniable that Adele has a remarkable voice and is a very good songwriter, that is to say she’s very, very talented all round. Her between-song chat is amusing and self-deprecating. She disappears between albums, which is totally reasonable. When she did that Graham Norton prank (where she entered an Adele soundalike competition, heavily disguised) she was brilliantly convincing. The moment she started to sing, the other contestants instantly knew it was actually her. At least one was immediately overwhelmed emotionally. This was within seconds. It couldn’t have been anyone else.
So Heppo’s theory is nonsense.
Surely the definitive answer is Kraftwerk who have built a career on the anonymity and banality resulting from the machine and computer age
Good call, but I think “anti charisma” rather than “no charisma” applies to Kraftwerk. It was deliberately left out rather than absent.
I think there is charisma there. The mystery of who they were, being German and hard to know, enigmatic, remaining anonymous and reclusive. These are things that create an alluring magnetism and charisma. Absolutely.
Surely Pink Floyd post-Syd and before Roger left have to be considered. I’m sure I read that they all knew they were not rock’n’roll monsters/charisma-laden performers in the traditional sense who could storm across a stage and get fans swooning, and hence the giant screens, lasers, etc.
Syd, obviously, was a heartthrob until it all went wrong. And later on, the endless arguments with Rog saw Dave G drop that quiet British reticence and get pretty spiky and, as a frontman, more charismatic. Roger, meanwhile, has certainly become more vocal and less anonymous/faceless.
Also, Coldplay. Millions of records sold to fans around the world? Yes. Cast-iron classic song(s)? Fix You. Can you name, or would you recognise, any of them apart from Chris Martin? No.
I’m not even sure I’d recognise Chris Martin.
It is my long-held contention that if Coldplay looked like Slipknot and Slipknot looked like Coldplay both bands would be improved.
If Slipknot looked like Coldplay, wouldn’t they be Muse?
Nope. Coldplay look like librarians and sound like librarians. Muse look like the Inbetweeners got really into Placebo and sound like Thom Yorke covering Queen at double speed. Slipknot look like serial killers and sound like serial killers.
How do you know they look like serial killers eh?
A fair question. I like to think that maybe under the masks it’s actually Coldplay. Supporting evidence:
That’s sent me on a YT Slipknot journey. They seem like nice boys, why can’t he sing all the time like he does in the chorus etc.
Cheers @Bingo-Little
No worries. They’re one of those acts I started off liking ironically but eventually came to realise I simply enjoy full stop. Iowa remains the masterpiece, but they’ve had a great career and produced some incredibly heavy records.
Still trying to figure out a way to see them live, although presumably their shows are now full of people doing TikTok dance routines to Custer.
Two excellent calls. I listened to Pink Floyd as a teen in the eighties and hadn’t a solitary clue what they looked like.
And Coldplay as well. Back in the day there was a term “Sleeperblokes” for non charismatic men hiding behind charismatic women. “Coldplayblokes” could be another term, if there were many groups like Coldplay where no one knows any member other than the singer.
I posed the ‘would you recognise the other members of Coldplay’ question to my wife only last week and she managed to talk me round into that being an unfair method of recognising talent. These days there are loads of bands I like where I wouldn’t recognise the ‘other’ members. I’ve been to gigs on the back of a downloaded album and not even recognised the lead singer because I’d never seen any pictures of them.
I’m happy with all the other reasons I dislike Coldplay. No 1 being their music!
Radiohead. Even the band name is uncharismatic.
Thom Yorke is very charismatic on stage when singing, probably less so between songs and off it.
Not for me. No more than the Bee Gees anyway.
INXS – Michael Hutchence had charisma in spades, making up for the vacuum in the band.
How many can name the other band members without resorting to wikipedia?
You’re right. I can’t actually name any other members of INXS, but I’m sure that one of them had a repeated first name – a bit like Boutros Boutros Ghali or something.
That’s the one:
Michael Hutchence
Bob Ferris
Thelma Ferris
Terry Ferris
Boutros Boutros Ghali
This made me actualol
Barry Barry Something?
The Farriss brothers, Andrew and, er, the other one.
And was it Garry Gary Summatorother?
That’s all I have.
This is a slightly different phenomenon, the charismatic frontperson and anonymous blokes (always blokes) sawing away behind unrecognised in the ten items or less at Tescos. Correctly named ‘sleeperblokes’ at the height of Britpop in honour of Louise Wener’s backline. Chvrches are a very good update on this, as are Coldplay and the 1975.
An interesting side discussion might be the greatest charisma differential between a front person and the rest of the band.
I vote for the Sugarcubes.
How quickly you forget Einar!
Yes at their Reading headline slot around 1990 ish I remember him leaping around the stage with gay abandon.
A mate of mine works for the 1975 and is on good terms with bassist Ross. I’d made the assumption that he’d not be recognised when out and about but I was told that this was not the case and people knew who he was (this was in the States I believe).
I remember someone from Q approaching the band after a reader asked why one of their number was called Garry Gary. They replied, possibly facetiously, that it was a family tradition and that he had brothers called Barry Bary, Harry Hary and Larry Lary.
Gary Lineker famously has a father called Barry and a son called Harry. Sometimes family traditions defy all logic.
Emlyn Hughes had a son called Emlyn and a daughter called Emma Lynn, I believe.
Hard to beat Neville Neville though. One of the best ever chants (to DB’s “Rebel Rebel”)
“Neville Neville, they’re in defence
Neville Neville, their future’s immense
Neville Neville, they ain’t half bad
Neville Neville, the name of their dad”
A classic!
Garry Gary Beers. Quite rock n roll actually!
Yes! A very rock & roll name.
I watched the reality show where INXS auditioned for their new singer and it’s clear that Hutchence was of course very hard to replace but also the band were/are a tight unit going back decades.
Saying that REM were Michael Stipe and some blokes playing instruments would be a similarly wrong perception.
Then there’s Jeffrey Hammond-Hammond…
There’s a Queensland politician called Grace Grace.
Don’t forget Courtney Taylor-Taylor from the Dandy Warhols…
As Shakespeare almost wrote “Some are born charismatic, some achieve charisma, and some have charisma thrust upon them”.
Stayed in a hotel this weekend also staying were the Leeds United team, I’d no idea who they were but there was a young fan there collecting their autographs, to him they would have charisma, to me zilch.
My sister got married in a very posh hotel in Glasgow on the same weekend as the TRNSMT festival.
At one point during the reception my then five year old daughter charged up a bunch of American blokes to proudly show off her bridesmaids dress. Much fuss was made of her, much ooh-ing and ah-ing took place, but I spotted that she had left the family gathering so I went to get her.
It was only after I had taken her away that I realised she was chatting away to The Strokes.
But you wouldn’t have known because they were the Strks.
Were The Beach Boys particularly charismatic? Yes, Dennis was very handsome and the only member who could surf, but the others just seemed like quiet nerdy sorts. You could argue that Mike wanted to stand out as the wacky, interesting one but we knew it was all a bit forced.
Now, Murry Wilson had it in spades.
Moody Blues?
The Motors?
A band apparently so devoid of pulchritude their record label famously
refused to put their faces on the cover of their albums
The Archies? I dunno…they always seemed a bit two-dimensional.
*See also – more seriously, but related – Gorillaz.
Steven Wilson. Prodigiously talented but has all the charisma of a swotty sixth former.
Some rock n roll types are very dull. I can very much imagine an outlandishly dressed member of GWAR or Lordi having a John Major-type voice and having a caravan and a collection of spoons. I hobnobbed a little bit with clubland “faces” back in the day and often the people who made the most effort with their appearance had very little to say and thought this was enough to propel them to stardom. They would watch Zoolander and think it was a documentary.
Getting modern, Steven Wilson has talent to burn but having stood next to him I can tell you he is charisma free. Mind you Nick Beggs was there who has charisma which is visible from Mars.
Joy Division had it with their singer but then had none at all with New Order, being their generation’s Pink Floyd without the redeeming light show.
Hmmm…I reckon Barney and particularly Hooky had/have plenty of charisma, presence, whatever you want to call it.
Most definitely! Hooky has always owned the stage and been a great livewire.
I saw them live in Valencia, not long after the first album had come out, and Hook was on fire.
Hooky might confuse being an opinionated loudmouth with charisma though.
Agreed, But he wasn’t the first and will not be the last to do that, Uncle Wheaty.
I am very very fascinated by the “anti-charisma” of Kraftwerk. Are there any other examples of artists whose lack of charisma is so extreme that it becomes charismatic?
While you think about that, here are the Ebony Steel Band from their Kraftwerk tribute album The Pan Machine.
I am baffled by the idea of Hooky having charisma. He got himself noticed on stage right enough but he has an overwhelming ordinariness about him.
I thought he was normally stage left.
I love the phrase “opinionated loudmouth” – it’s so terse, yet so evocative – concentrated language which says so much in so few words.
XTC
If they were from California they’d be hailed as Brian Wilson esque geniuses.
But they are 4 blokes from Swindon, and look like it
Agreed – Partridge and Moulding wrote so many incredible tunes. I think only three of the band were from Swindon, though. Hah!
Are The Grateful Dead regarded as “successful”? If so, I’d say they have zero charisma.
Bullseye, @Tiggerlion. OK , the Dead aren’t successful in terms of the albums they’ve sold.
But as regards inspiring eternal loyalty from their fans, there are few bands that can touch them.
And yet they were so uncharismatic that they make Kraftwerk look like Rammstein.
But that lack of charisma is very much a part of what made them what they were, if that makes any sense. They deliberately turned their backs on showbiz and the entertainment industry.
For us Deadheads, Jerome John Garcia had bags of charisma.
But we’re a funny lot.
Toto. A bunch of session musicians who looked like a bunch of session musicians.
Peter, Paul and Mary.
I reckon Foreigner wouldn’t have been recognised by their management company at the height of their popularity.
Bloody Foreigners. Come over here with their anodyne multi million selling albums.
But where were they foreigners? They were claimed by the Manx, Mancs and Aussies as one of their own.
Surely, for an actor or musician NOT to be recognised when they are out and about doing the shopping must be a great boon? The bliss of anonymity!
What a relief for Mr Lordi. He knows that he can do the weekend shopping at Waitrose without being mobbed by rabid metal fans
Nonsense. I know for a fact that all these guys wear their stage shit 24/7.
Seeing Slipknot doing the big shop in their local Ralphs is not even noteworthy in Des Moines.
I’ve never seen Slipknot in a supermarket, @MC Escher, but I did see part of their gig at Roskilde.
An extraordinary experience. It was as though the Gates of Hell had burst open and all the demons had invaded the moshpit. Impossible not to be impressed.
All a bit high tempo for me. I left after 20 minutes to see an Albanian hurdy gurdy collective.
“It was as though the Gates of Hell had burst open and all the demons had invaded the moshpit”
I had a not dissimilar lavatorial experience this morning.
I liked “All a bit high tempo for me. I left after 20 minutes to see an Albanian hurdy gurdy collective.”
I imagine it in Alexei Sayle’s voice.
‘Albanian hurdy gurdy collective’. These four words justify the wasted hours spent on this site.
It’s a tossup between The Honeycombs and The Applejacks. You decide.
https://youtu.be/cPg_bxniMFc?si=-MqT1BaQVJygrr2X
But they both had women musicians which was unusual for the time and must have led to a boost in the charisma stakes.
Plus in the Applejacks she switches from playing right to left which adds even more to the charisma.
They all do…what larks!
But without wishing to be ungallant, I would say that the charisma they brought to the party, such as it was, was completely neutralised by their band mates.
I suppose there is that.
Switches nuffin ‘ – they just flipped the image!
The drummer must have had some charisma to spare as bassiste Megan Davies married him.
I believe I have the answer.
The Eagles we all would agree are a charisma free-zone, making the Bee Gees look like Freddie Mercury by comparison. I would contend even worse than Floyd, and would argue Timothy Schmidt could hide quite successfully in the Buzzcocks line-up round unafraid of exposure.
They are (wikipedia says) the 15th best-selling act of all time. Above them only the ‘single name’ artists and Zep, Floyd, Queen and the Beatles.
Did the band Dodgy have charisma? I wouldn’t know cos I can’t remember anything about them, who they were, what they looked like or what that did. I can only recall one song (which was good enough-ish).
I recall they had a drummer with anti-charisma, looking a bit like a fatter version of Chas’n’Dave’s drummer. But that sort of adds into a sort of appeal.
Pure anti-charisma from the members to the music and the name.