Music with vocal harmonies

[nimos]

Having given up on my search for bands that sound like PRR, I've now widened my search for any music with vocal harmonies... in fact, PRR have corrupted my music tastes so much that I can seldom listen to anything without vocal harmonies!

So here are a list of bands I think are worth checking out, along with a link to a song:

The Dear Hunter: indie, progressive rock. One of my favourite bands of all time. Creative, epic, diverse, beautiful.
Listen to 'The Tank': www.myspace.com/thedearhunter
The start is quite jarring but stick with it! 2:40-3:45 is incredible.

Blackfield: depressing (not in a bad way) pop/rock.
Listen to 'Once': www.myspace.com/blackfield

Fields: (thanks to everyone here who recommended them) indie. Psychedelic, folky at times. Male/female lead vocals.
Listen to 'Song For The Fields': www.myspace.com/fieldsband

Eisley: delightful pop/indie/rock. Dual female lead vocals. "Dream journal entries set to music". Inspired lyrics; you'd think they were frequent acid users had you not read their biography...
Listen to: 'One Day I Slowly Floated Away': www.myspace.com/eisley

The Bridges: pop/rock, slightly country. Very polished, radio friendly production. Gets a bit samey after a while though.
Listen to: Only samples available on their myspace, and nothing on last.fm or Spotify. www.myspace.com/thebridges

I've tried listening to 'classic' bands with vocal harmonies, such as The Beach Boys and Fleetwood Mac, but for some reason they don't do anything for me. I think partly it's because the production sounds so dated.

I would love to hear your opinions on these bands and any recommendations you have.

[Lawrie]

Not really listened to any of those bands much except for Blackfield (of which I'm not a fan): will get on to Spotify and see if they have any of them on there to listen to.

As for a recommendation for bands with vocal harmonies, well I've said them before and I'll say them again: Klaxons! Check out their debut (and only, so far) album Myths Of The Near Future (2007). Sure it will be on Spotify etc to give the songs a listen. Most of the songs have at least some harmonic vocals on them, and some of the individual tracks are right up there with PRR's best harmonies, IMO. I'd recommend Two Receivers (#1) and As Above, So Below (#5) as the two best example tracks of their vocal harmonies, but as I say, most of the songs on the album fit the brief. The production is very modern/dancey too, so hopefully that will be the kind of thing you're looking for.

[nimos]

Gave Klaxons a proper listen today and just couldn't get into them! I think it's partly because I remember finding that vocal melody on Golden Skans really annoying when it first came out, so that memory has tainted my opinion of them.

[butler]

Spocks Beard use a lot of vocal harmonies in their stuff. I'm a fan of Blackfield (and the tree) but couldn't get into The Dear Hunter at all, seemed to lack that melodic touch I look for.

[ryan]

The producion on beach boys and fleetwood mac sounds dated?! Are you mad?! Have you heard pet sounds and rumours?! They sound better than most stuff released today!

[soundscapemn]

maybe he'd go for hearing SMILE?

Jellyfish
Pain of Salvation
Apes and Androids
Anathallo
Silverchair
The Receiving End of Sirens
Mew
Porcupine Tree
System of a Down
King's X
The Galactic Cowboys
Extreme
The New Pornographers
Alice in Chains
XTC

Queen
Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
Yes
Genesis
Pink Floyd
The Beatles

[AlExMachina]

Allow Klaxons. Gravity's Rainbow is a perfect example.

[Stefan]

Spock's Beard - Gibberish
www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yz2WgX1hp0&feature=related

[ant]

Of course the Spocks Beard stuff is good but in the vocal harmonys they are just paying homage to Gentle Giant - check out the Octopus and In a glass house albums.

[dutchprrfan01]

I could be mistaken, but I haven't seen anyone mention Fleet Foxes on these boards. Fleet Foxes are a good band with excellent vocal harmonies. They have a real sixties feel to their music; more than PRR they are standing on the shoulders of giants like Beach Boys and CSNY. They are certainly not as eclectic as PRR, but it's worth a try . 'White winter hymnal' is one of my favorites.

www.myspace.com/fleetfoxes

[forwardrob]

I love gang vocals, but I'm not sure whether you can always call them "harmonies" - I think that might be making too much of some of the singing voices.

Still, I'll post my favourites:
Future of the Left (just my favourite full stop)
Punish the Atom
Los Campenisos! - more tag team than gang, if you get the analogy

And if we count people harmonising with themselves:
¡Forward, Russia!
The Mars Volta

I'm sure more instances will become clear.

re The Beatles - try Because from the Love remix album - it's just the vocal harmonies. Stunning.

[ryan]

Future of the left, yes! Only a couple of tracks harmonising though.

The Bon Iver album maybe? The vocals are amazing.

[mhx]

Even though Porcupine Tree already showed up in this thread, I'd like to emphasize one song: Drown With Me

www.myvideo.de/watch/4355274/Porcupine_Tree_Drown_With_Me

Even without the layered vocals (1:50, 3:20, ...) this song would be amazing. The fact that this track was only released as a bonus on the special edition of In Absentia makes me wonder what other gems Steven might be hiding...

(Oh, and the sound of this video absolutely sucks compared to the original. )