As the founding member and former lead singer of LIVE, Ed Kowalczyk fronted one of the most successful American post-grunge bands of the '90s – a group famous for its ultra-melodic, chest-beating, arena-rock radio classics "I Alone" and "Lightning Crashes." With his shaved head and intense eyes, Kowalczyk cut a distinctive figure, but what separated him from other '90s alt-rockers was his utter earnestness: he adopted U2's open-hearted stance as his own, preferring sincerity to irony. His singing is his own, but he owes a stylistic debt to Bono and Eddie Vedder. In some ways, he's more satisfying than Smashing Pumpkins' Billy Corgan, since Kowalczyk hits notes without making it sound like a major interruption in his day.
