Autotune... why?

[Rainwater]

Whenever I hear it being used, I wonder how can anyone think this sounds good?  And music channels are actually using it to filter the likes of Freddie Mercury and Simon and Garfunkel... it's like touching up the Mona Lisa with magic marker.

Just another device to dumb everything down into one pool of muck.

[Hilda]

Whenever I hear it being used, I wonder how can anyone think this sounds good?  And music channels are actually using it to filter the likes of Freddie Mercury and Simon and Garfunkel... it's like touching up the Mona Lisa with magic marker.

Just another device to dumb everything down into one pool of muck.

When I saw the subject of this topic, I thought it might have something to do with gadgets that automatically tune guitar strings using, I guess, small motors.

So I looked up the meaning of 'autotune' and discovered that I'm several decades behind the times. I had no idea you could change the pitch of a voice after it had been recorded.

[MissBarbara]

Whenever I hear it being used, I wonder how can anyone think this sounds good?  And music channels are actually using it to filter the likes of Freddie Mercury and Simon and Garfunkel... it's like touching up the Mona Lisa with magic marker.

Just another device to dumb everything down into one pool of muck.

When I saw the subject of this topic, I thought it might have something to do with gadgets that automatically tune guitar strings using, I guess, small motors.

So I looked up the meaning of 'autotune' and discovered that I'm several decades behind the times. I had no idea you could change the pitch of a voice after it had been recorded.

Auto-Tune is grossly misunderstood. Singers have been using forms of artificial pitch correction for decades, since the mid-1950s. Recording engineers used primitive forms of pitch manipulation in the Beatles's recordings, and most other major bands and singers have used it as well over the past 60-70 years.

In the early 2000s, an interviewer asked Paul McCartney if he used pitch correction for his recordings. The interviewer was shocked at McCartney's response: ""If I've done a vocal that I don't think is that good, oh come on, let's stick it through. Why not?"

"Auto-Tune" is a trademarked brand of pitch-correction software, and while it can correct tiny flaws in pitch, it does not, as is widely believed, make a mediocre singer sound good. And, contrary to the OP,  music channels do not "use it to filter the likes of Freddie Mercury and Simon and Garfunkel." Music channels play recorded music, and if any pitch correction was performed on the vocals, it was done in the studio at the time the song was recorded.

In general, I think many people object to the use of Auto-Tune and other forms of vocal pitch correction in modern recordings because they do not like the style of modern recordings. If you don't like Taylor Swift, then it's an easy accusation to level at her.

[Dudester]

There is a guy on Youtube (Andrei Cerbu) who has learned all the recording tricks and he just pisses me off. He is in Romania and he has a stable of cute singers that he controls. All these singers have their own YT channels where he does all the recording and editing. He also has two bands. Both make videos on YT, but only one actually performs in public. The one band that doesn't perform in public, they lip synch to music that he created in his office/lab. The drummer in that band misses beats and he often twirls his drumsticks. He makes me want to leap over the drum set and pummel him.
All of Andrei's singers are pop singers, with a range of two, or less, octaves. Whenever they do a cover of an actually talented singer, like Pat Benatar or Floor Jansen, I just cringe. The comments sections of these videos are filled with simps pining for these girls. Whenever I critique one of their songs, pointing out their auto tune and beat detective recording tricks, these simps wonder why I'm picking on their pretend girlfriends that they'll never be within thousands of miles.   

[Hilda]

All of Andrei's singers are pop singers, with a range of two, or less, octaves.

I recall watching, decades ago, an interview with a song writer who churned out hit after hit for a teenage pop idol. The writer was seated at a piano and the interviewer asked him why two keys, about an octave apart, had strips of red tape stuck on them.

"Ah," said the writer, "that's to remind me of his vocal range."

[Pornhubby]

AI will soon be capable of creating entire song catalogs. I think pitch-correction is the least of our worries.

[MissBarbara]

AI will soon be capable of creating entire song catalogs. I think pitch-correction is the least of our worries.

You're spot on. And it's already happening...

[Pornhubby]

I remember when Milli Vanilli was scandalous.  Now we have choreographed teen dance groups who shake their asses at the audience and lip sync to music recorded in a studio by someone else. Lived too long.

[Dudester]

Back in the day RUSH used all kinds of audio tricks to make those three great musicians sound like 8 musicians. My present favorite band is BABYMETAL. They use all kinds of audio tricks, but they even take it as far as using recorded vocal tracks so that they're only actually only singing part of their songs. This is a band with A LOT of lore. I saw a fan grumble about something I've noticed a few years ago as the choreography they did in 2014 was frenetic and the present choreography has slowed way down. Another sacrifice a fan has to make is that when in Japan the band has amazing stage sets, a stage show, smoke, lasers and because the band is performing at home, it's a 90 minute show with extra effort by the dancers/singers. Outside of Japan, it's a 60 minute show with just the band and nothing else.

[Hilda]

Back in the day RUSH used all kinds of audio tricks to make those three great musicians sound like 8 musicians. My present favorite band is BABYMETAL. They use all kinds of audio tricks, but they even take it as far as using recorded vocal tracks so that they're only actually only singing part of their songs. This is a band with A LOT of lore.

I'm not familiar with this use of "lore". Does it mean something like "history" or "back story"?

[Dudester]

Yes, "Lore" as in folklore. One singer left because of a serious disease and a guitarist died in a freak accident. One song is based on a 500 year old folk song, another on a 1936 polka song and another was sung by French Revolutionaries in the 1790's. Then, there is a heart breaking performance in 2012 where the three girls were crying their eyes out on the last song because of a HUGE misunderstanding with management.

[Hilda]

Yes, "Lore" as in folklore. One singer left because of a serious disease and a guitarist died in a freak accident. One song is based on a 500 year old folk song, another on a 1936 polka song and another was sung by French Revolutionaries in the 1790's. Then, there is a heart breaking performance in 2012 where the three girls were crying their eyes out on the last song because of a HUGE misunderstanding with management.

Thanks for the explanation. I've heard of girl band members bawling their eyes out when they announce their retirement, but not over a conflict with management.

There's an old anime film called Perfect Blue that begins with the most popular member of a three-girl group announcing her retirement—which doesn't work out the way she planned.

My memory may be at fault, or my information out of date, but I think only one Japanese-language pop song ever made the US hit charts. Kyu Sakamoto, the singer, had the misfortune to be on the JAL Boeing 747 that crashed into Mt Fuji.

[Dudester]

Quoting Forbes, online-story this week (July 1st to 7th 2024) "This week, Babymetal earns their first No. 1 song on a Billboard chart in the U.S. The group’s newly-released “Ratatata” has proved to be a quick smash, and it didn’t take very long before it rose to the highest of highs on one list."

Metali charted at 86 (Aug 31, 2023)

Distortion charted at 26 on Dec 6, 2018

And three of their albums charted, Metal Resistance charted at 15 on April 14, 2016, Metal Galaxy at 19 on Oct. 19, 2019 and The Other One at 32 on April 23, 2023

[Hilda]

Quoting Forbes, online-story this week (July 1st to 7th 2024) "This week, Babymetal earns their first No. 1 song on a Billboard chart in the U.S. The group’s newly-released “Ratatata” has proved to be a quick smash, and it didn’t take very long before it rose to the highest of highs on one list."

Metali charted at 86 (Aug 31, 2023)

Distortion charted at 26 on Dec 6, 2018

And three of their albums charted, Metal Resistance charted at 15 on April 14, 2016, Metal Galaxy at 19 on Oct. 19, 2019 and The Other One at 32 on April 23, 2023

Thanks. Proof, yet again, that I'm a decade or two behind the times.

[Rainwater]

So i am being called a liar. 

I am an experienced musician and I know what I hear with my own ears.  I know what sounds good and what does not, what is and what is not authentic.

The enemy of art is the absence of limitations.

Music today has no value because it is too easy to create and it is available for listening at the push of a button.  Nobody cares about it or works at it or struggles for it except the few.

[Pornhubby]

Troll.

[MissBarbara]

So i am being called a liar. 

I am an experienced musician and I know what I hear with my own ears.  I know what sounds good and what does not, what is and what is not authentic.

The enemy of art is the absence of limitations.

Music today has no value because it is too easy to create and it is available for listening at the push of a button.  Nobody cares about it or works at it or struggles for it except the few.

I'm not calling you a liar.

But keep in mind that "I know what sounds good and what does not" is a subjective judgement, more properly phrased as "I know what sounds good and what does not to me."

Despite your musical expertise, you're in no position to dictate what music others may like and dislike, and what others might enjoy or not.

"Authenticity" is also a subjective judgement, and it is a determining factor for you, but not a rule that should apply to everyone and all types of music. I'm a big fan of "country blues," that is one person playing a guitar and singing with no other accompaniment. That's widely deemed "authentic." I'm also a big fan of B.B. King, and I watched a concert a couple of months ago where he was playing backed by a 12-piece orchestra. For a bluesman, that's aggressively and unforgivable unauthentic. But to dismiss that music for being unauthentic is aggressively silly.

Your assertion "The enemy of art is the absence of limitations" is precisely backward. The enemy of art is the the lack of absence of limitations. Artists thrive most successfully in the absence of limitations.

[Rainwater]

So i am being called a liar. 

I am an experienced musician and I know what I hear with my own ears.  I know what sounds good and what does not, what is and what is not authentic.

The enemy of art is the absence of limitations.

Music today has no value because it is too easy to create and it is available for listening at the push of a button.  Nobody cares about it or works at it or struggles for it except the few.

I'm not calling you a liar.

But keep in mind that "I know what sounds good and what does not" is a subjective judgement, more properly phrased as "I know what sounds good and what does not to me."

Despite your musical expertise, you're in no position to dictate what music others may like and dislike, and what others might enjoy or not.

"Authenticity" is also a subjective judgement, and it is a determining factor for you, but not a rule that should apply to everyone and all types of music. I'm a big fan of "country blues," that is one person playing a guitar and singing with no other accompaniment. That's widely deemed "authentic." I'm also a big fan of B.B. King, and I watched a concert a couple of months ago where he was playing backed by a 12-piece orchestra. For a bluesman, that's aggressively and unforgivable unauthentic. But to dismiss that music for being unauthentic is aggressively silly.

Your assertion "The enemy of art is the absence of limitations" is precisely backward. The enemy of art is the the lack of absence of limitations. Artists thrive most successfully in the absence of limitations.

I don't know why I have to explain myself.  My original post was about autotune, right?  I don't know how that got lost.  But as an experienced musician who learned to play guitar mostly by ear, what I am saying is that I can listen to a recording and tell you, nine times out of ten, if the voice on the recording is the person's natural voice or if it has been pitch-corrected.  If it has been auto-tuned, I can tell you in two seconds because it sounds so awful it doesn't even resemble a human voice anymore. 

When I speak of authenticity, I am speaking of the authenticity of the human voice, not a philosophical definition of what this or that sort of music is supposed to be. 
The authentic human voice is capable of such subtlety.  It can express the whole range of emotions.  When pitch correction software is used, it may improve the tonal pitch, but it destroys the subtle dimensions of the human voice. 

My brother once sent me a recording of his teenage daughter singing a song.  It was professionally recorded and produced.  I told him point blank, "That's not her.  What did they do to her voice?  Why did they do it?"  I knew she had a good voice.  They pitch-corrected her voice because they could, not because they should.

And if you don't have a good voice, and/or you're not able to sing a note, maybe you shouldn't sing. 

As for my quote, The enemy of art is the absence of limitations, it comes from Orson Welles.  And I agree with it.  Oh sure, the music business may thrive on having no limitations.  But as far as I'm concerned, some of the best recordings I've ever heard were one man singing with his natural authentic voice, playing one guitar.  These recordings were known as country blues.     Oh, but of course, we all know you are a big fan.

[staci]

Does Barry Gibbs have a good voice?  It is not natural but for the Bee Gees, was profitable and popular.

[Rainwater]

Does Barry Gibbs have a good voice?  It is not natural but for the Bee Gees, was profitable and popular.

It was his real voice.  However he manufactured that pitch, he did it naturally, without a fucking machine. Was it good? I don't know.  Did you like it?  Fine.  Go listen to it.

I can guarantee you that when I take my Uber ride in the morning, the driver will have on the pop station, and between the pitch corrected voices, drum-machines, and digitally programmed music, I won't hear anything natural between the time I say "Hello" to the driver and "Goodbye".