taylor swift and auto-tune/ lip synching

[GostHacked]

Actually, you don't even have to be able to sing or play anymore. You can rap! If you can't even rap, there's always what we in the trade call "cookie monster metal". That's where you don't even have to speak clearly, just grunt like Cookie Monster! Just the thing for Saturday night slam dancing!

Yes but rap does not mask itself in the auto-tune. There is no singing. And it still takes skill to be a good rapper.

The saving grace is that there seems to be more and more really GOOD stuff bubbling to the surface! Perhaps the pendulum has reached the end of its swing. Younger folks are feeling unsatisfied with what the "suits" are force-feeding them so in the indie markets they're striking out on their own!

They are allready force feeding them. Press star 54236 to get this fabilous track on your smartphone. blabh blah ... Pop music is more about the dollar than ever. Corporate radio has been telling us what we want to listen to for the past 20 years. They decide what is going to be commercially popular. Much of the stuff that is good, or critically acclaimed gets left in the dust.

Classic rock radio is a perfect example. Here in Canada anyways. CRTC is a joke to try and have so much CANCON in the program. But what pisses me off is that the CANCON that is played is the same over and over again. There are plenty of great artists that could stand a couple rotations on the air, but we will never hear them. Radio today does not even promote any kind of variety anymore. It does but that is on it's own channel now. If you want a specific style of music, you hit your satelite radio. Or internet radio

But less and less people are listening to the real radio anymore. And many treat music as disposable, which makes me sad.

As some of you know I dabble in writting/creating electronic music. It's hard, and I don''t ever see me making money on it. But as long as you have it in you to make music and you are honest with yourself and your talent, then you will be happy with your music. I plan to have controll over my music though. Copywritted and owned by me. I don't care if someone wants to throw me a million for a track to use it everywhere (well that might be worth it) I think I would refuse. I don't care if it is popular or not. As long as I first enjoy it, and second others enjoy it.

The whole music industry needs a mentality shift in order to survive or even have some kind of integrity later on. But as long as the dollar is chased, integrity means nothing.

[ToadBrother]

Back in the old days we called the auto tune - the pitch corrector - If you were a horrible vocalist you could as an engineer just push the slider up into pitch or down if neccesary - now with computerized recording consoles..The howling family dog can be made a star - also there is a trend to mechanize the voice lately and make it sound like Robbie the Robot.. The best are not famous and the most corporately co-operative are exaulted...the musical culture is becoming rapidly artifical. It's a shame that good looking woman are now considered un-noticable and creepy poorly bred woman done up with plastic surgery and 700 dollar hair cuts are now considered beautiful - money has totaly taken over the arts and utiltarianism is rampant - Bankers don't like natural talent - It makes the financers feel inferiour because the are.

On the old analog mixers, it was way too difficult to do that level of pitch change. Generally you just simply rerecorded the screwy part (whether it was the vocals out of pitch, or the guitar out of tune, or whatever) until you got a good take. In the really old days, basically it was a live performance, so you just kept doing it all until you got a useful take. Later on, with more advanced multi-track mixing boards you essentially assembled a song from the tracks, some from the same take, maybe some from a different take. That's why drummers got moved into their own booth, because the "leak" from drums is far too great (it will be picked up by every other mic in the studio).

By the 1970s we got some real bonafide cheating. KISS's first live album, Alive, was probably 50% studio recordings to fix off notes, it was, in fact, a considerable feat of sound engineering and certainly pushed analog technology to the max. Then The Band did much the same with the Last Waltz, taking a year in the studio to massively rerecord vocals and instruments, to the point where when the film editors went to marry the sound tracks to Scorsese's film, they had a tremendously difficult job, because they were dealing with new vocal and instrumental tracks that didn't perfectly match the ones on film, requiring an enormously greater amount of time to assemble the final product.

But all these technologies required new takes. It was theoretically possible to do some pitch modulation through the mixing board, but it was just a lot easier to tell the vocalist or musician "can you redo this section"? Generally, by the 1970s, the tricks being used were more for effects (like multitracking, which lots of 60s groups had used, but guys like Queen, Abba and ELO used to much greater effect). I read an account on Queen's making of A Night At The Opera, and the recording took four months of dedicated sessions (whatever their flamboyance and rock star status outside the studio, inside the studio Queen was apparently the hardest working guys in the business), with a huge number of overdubs and effects. The thing was back then you had to work your ass off to make a record like A Night At The Opera or Dark Side of the Moon. I mean, even after the musicians went home, engineers and producers could spend months getting to final mix. That's why an album like Fleetwood Mac's Rumors took the better part of a year to go from rough takes to the finished product.

Now, of course, especially with the likes of Britney Spears, they go in, do a few takes, and then go away. The "artist" is practically disposable. Some of these people, particular Spears, have their vocals so heavily processed that it's all but impossible to hear what the person actually sings like. The purity of the record has probably been more myth than fact since Buddy Holly started playing with overdubbing (people don't give him the credit he deserves for basically pioneering a lot of modern recording techniques), but still, Elvis and Dean Martin could sing, Jimmy Page could play a mean guitar and Freddie Mercury really was one of the greatest singers in popular music history. Now, I dunno. I don't think a terrible singer could be made to sound like one of the Three Tenors, but still people who need a lot more vocal training than they get can make a record, have the engineers get rid of the bad bits, and instead of recording as an artistic process, you have it as a cookie cutter assembly line approach.

And the music industry wonders why their sales are failing.

[GostHacked]

This is one of those rare moments where auto-tune is usefull

and

[DogOnPorch]

You'll love my nuts.

---Vince Offer

[Oleg Bach]

Literally I had my tunes ruined on occassion using the old 24 track system - Even back then you would get caught up in over production...and lose the spirit of the song..Live off the floor is best...I always said the a performer should be able to sit down with on guitar or piano in the living room and knock you out _ I wonder if Lady Ga Ga can do that?

[bush_cheney2004]

....I wonder if Lady Ga Ga can do that?

She would sure try...with and without clothing.

[Oleg Bach]

Have to admit the lyrics are pretty bold and poetic - She must have a huge production team - God the videos must have cost a fortune - "I want your love and I want your revenged" Kind of nasty but cool - I actually like GA GA even though she is totally a corporate sell out troll.

[GostHacked]

Have to admit the lyrics are pretty bold and poetic - She must have a huge production team - God the videos must have cost a fortune - "I want your love and I want your revenged" Kind of nasty but cool - I actually like GA GA even though she is totally a corporate sell out troll.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Gaga

Any star will have a big production team. She has had people co-write and co-produce with her. I don't really like her music, but I love her stage setups and getups.

LoL this is awesome.

Every day, when Stef came to the studio, instead of saying hello, I would start singing "Radio Ga Ga". That was her entrance song. [Lady Gaga] was actually a glitch; I typed 'Radio Ga Ga' in a text and it did an autocorrect so somehow 'Radio' got changed to 'Lady'. She texted me back, "That's it." After that day, she was Lady Gaga. She’s like, "Don’t ever call me Stefani again."[16]

—Rob Fusari

I'll classify her as Electronic Glam. And there ain't nothin wrong with Glam baby.

[DogOnPorch]

I don't really like her music, but I love her stage setups and getups.

Sia is the opposite of Lady Gaga...simple set-up + great music.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xU_wted-wPI

[Oleg Bach]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Gaga

Any star will have a big production team. She has had people co-write and co-produce with her. I don't really like her music, but I love her stage setups and getups.

LoL this is awesome.

I'll classify her as Electronic Glam. And there ain't nothin wrong with Glam baby.

Don't tell anyone - but the videos are very artful -- the tunes are right up there with Quincy Jones productions of the Jackson stuff - I believe that GA GA is much better than Jackson --- I do get put off by the high production value of the videos and the tunes because I have been on set and in the studio - and you are basically like rich corporates buying the best brains available.