Skid Row Has Replaced Its Lead Singer with the "Escape From The City" Guy

This isn't exactly hot off the presses, but in April it was announced that Skid Row's lead singer of sixteen years, Johnny Solinger, would be leaving the band to pursue other projects.

His replacement is Tony Harnell, formerly of the Norwegian band TNT...



Of course, they wanted someone whose voice resembles classic era lead vocalist Sebastian Bierk's.

 

And some will know him as the guy who sang on this track.

 

Bach is a tool of epic proportions, but his voice and the way he looked when he was young were the main reasons why Skid Row were ever successful.

Snake and Rachel wrote all the songs but a lot of those songs just aren't very good. 18 & Life was okay in 1989, but today it just sounds dumb.

 

I couldn't name you a Skid Row song if my life depended on it, but I knew exactly who you meant by "the Escape From The City guy!" What does that say about me?



In addition to being a massive gamer, I'm also quite the fan of Crush 40 - the band responsible for large portions of the vocal music to a lot of Sonic titles since the first Adventure.

 

I know Johnny Solinger because he's from my hometown. Skid Row replaced a tool (Bach) with another, perhaps, equal or greater tool.

I haven't thought about TNT in ages. Ronni Le Tekro was a good guitarist.

 

As big as TNT was in Europe, and as not-big Skid Row has been since Bach left, it's hard to see this as anything but a huge step down. On the other hand, Harnell is American, so I guess he might as well do something close to home to kill the time before his inevitable return to TNT.

 

The Sega Dreamcast was really something else!

That song is embedded into the brains of an entire generation of people.

 

He sounds a lot like Ted Poley.

 

You know what... you're right!



I wasn't as familiar with Poley as I was with Harnell, so I just assumed his voice had changed with age. Listening back, it sounds like Harnell on backing vocals. Both are credited with performing on the song. That's definitely Poley recording the lead here for the re-recorded version.

I never specified in this thread that Harnell sang lead, so I'm in the clear! He's still a guy who sang on that track. I'm surprised Sega asked two established singers to provide vocals there, but then again they already had a strong working relationship with Harnell.

 

Harnell definitely sang lead on this track.

 

Sega seems to really like Poley and Harnell. It looks like they did a duet too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uuww5fHhnhY

I wonder what the hard rock fans would think...

 

And they recorded together again for the 2014 game too.



I guess they've done enough of these songs to consider this a side project.

 

Harnell is great Skid Row not so much.

At least they didn't get tool #3 in the band.