Name a band where arguably their singer isn’t the most famous member

[paddingofpaws]

I have two considerations:

Blink-182 and Led Zeppelin

Cozy Powell of course

But each of them sang and there was no lead singer. In terms of fame I would probably say that Bob Dylan is the most famous, followed by George Harrison, Roh Orbison and Tom Petty, then Jeff Lynne.

There’s also bands where one of the blokes at the back becomes famous in a completely unrelated way, like D:Ream.

Yes, that was the whole idea of it: that it was a supergroup. IMHO one of them (well, probably two, to be fair) would have been better just contributing their excellent guitar skills and leaving the other three to do the singing, but I know that views differ spectacularly when it comes to at least one of them and the beauty or otherwise of his singing!

They would have been boring as hell without Bob

I disagree. I think he's an amazing songwriter and musician; just not personally a fan of his voice. I know he has a lot of fans, which is great - and he does put feeling into it - but I wouldn't give him the lead mic and push Roy into the background myself.

Being all of them independently famous and busy, as well as coming from two different continents, I read that it was a real challenge for them to be able to synchronise their schedules to be able to record as the TWs. Therefore, Bob laid down a lot of the lead vocals independently himself from afar, to give them more options when it came to editing, balancing the contributions and producing it (presumably led by Jeff), and they ended up just using a large proportion of Bob's vocals that were already in the can.

This is a great answer

For me, Genesis - I only know Phil Collins’ name, because I liked his solo music and have one of his albums.

Yes, but as has been said many times now, Phil Collins is the lead singer. The OP wants to know about bands where the most famous member is not the lead singer.

It's where if the lead singer turned up for an interview alone we'd all be disappointed, but if, say, the bassist did, we'd be happy.

Bands like oasis and the who have more than one personality, not necessarily that one person is more famous than the other.

Captain Sensible did have a number one single with Happy Talk. I don't think The Damned ever made it to number one.

And, on cue

Kyuss - Josh Homme
New Order - Peter Hook

Would also say tambourine player Joel Gion is equally as well known as Anton Newcombe in Brian Jonestown Massacre.

Slipknot when Joey Jordison was their drummer.

We Are The Fallen, they didn't last very long, but Ben Moody, Rocky Gray and John Le Compt were in Evanescence.

Ooh good call. RIP Joey

Jane's Addiction

Steely Dan started out with a singer whose name I don’t even know, though Donald Fagen did take over singing duties at some point.

Robert Smith when he was in The Banshees.

Was he the lead singer from the beginning of Genesis?

I think a good rule of thumb is whether they get talked about as “x’s band”, where x isn’t the singer.

I don’t know exactly why The Who are Pete Townsend’s band, and not Roger Daltrey’s, but that’s definitely the case.

When Peter Gabriel was the lead singer, Phil Collins was not more famous than Peter Gabriel.

If we’re including this… then we also need to include Johnny Marr when he was both in Modest Mouse and The Cribs.

Vince Clarke in Yazoo

No, because people have actually heard of the Banshees. Nobody knows either of those. At least hardly anyone.

But it was Sousxie and the banshees. And most people would recognise souisxie soux