Ive only just started getting onto pitch correction. Tried out autotune and it just sounded robotic the wohle time. But now i've got v-vocal which i find is much easier to use. First attempt it all sounded robotic, cause i was LOOKING for out of tune vocals rather than LISTENING. I think having the graph there makes it so easy to just go, oh thats out of place IT MUST BE FIXED! Now ive decided to look AND listen. If sometihng looks or sounds way out, i correct it as best as i can, then if i hold the b button for a while, close my eyes then let go, so its randomly bypassed and i do not know whether it is on or off, i then listen and see if i can work out whether its being tunned or not. if i cant tell, then its not worth doing. If somethings way out, i look back through my old takes and find it sung properly.

I have tried to listen for pitch correction in albums and as im only 19, i havent got much experience in this so i could never notice anything.. Im going to have a good listen to maroon 5 now and see if i can hear it. Great thread by the way, i love hearing when the pro's stuff it up, makes me feel like my stuff isnt too bad after all It get excited whenever i hear a mistake in a song!

Wow, maroon 5 is terrible! It's just too perfect! On my first listen i noticed so many problems... Can't believe it!

ORIGINAL: John

Right, it went Do You Believe in Love (After Love). The worst pivotal moment in pop history, AFAIC. What's hard to imagine is that this robotic, annoying sound has actually caught on as a 'style' (sic) and actually sells. I mean, is this how my dad thought about distorted guitars? At least they (guitars) have tone and expressive melody. But this stuff just grates on my sense of pitch.

This is truly weird. Just reading the title I was running through in my mind the point you made about the distorted guitar. Also the idea that this could be an excepted trend. You have a good mind. Outstanding post!
I think that It could become very much an every day part of most pop music.
If the general public has no problem with it then it will mostly likely continue.

Best
John

I know this will offend someone, but this is how I saw rap "music" a few years ago. I thought it was just some weird novelty thing that would quickly go away. I just knew that no one would take it seriously since it was just programmed rhythms and didn't involve any real musical talent or the ability to carry a tune. Man, was I wrong.. And I find myself sounding just like my dad - making the same comments about my daughter's music that he did about mine. I catch myself all the time doing and saying things that put me in the "old man" category!


As far as the overuse of pitch correction, I guess I just have not trained my ear to hear it yet. I hear it on what is obvious to me like the Cher song or the Faith Hill tune where it's an effect, but otherwise, I dont really hear it. Now that it's come up, I will start listening more closely. But I don't think it's the evil thing that some here suggest. I have been a guitarist for 30 years but I use a tuner. Does that make me less of a player? Maybe it does? And I love compression on a vocal. Is that so bad? I like it as an effect and I also like it to control dynamics. Is there a "correct" or "incorrect" way to use it? I don't think so.

Again, I know I'm probably setting myself up to get slammed, but I find it kind of funny how so many here are criticizing the use of this tool, when most here are probably using tons of eq, comp and fx on everything they do in Sonar. That's not "natural"! How many of us just use Sonar to record and dont edit the crap out of it?? Isn't pitch correction just another effect or tool? So, in some cases, to you, it's obvious. Well, isnt it also obvious when you hear a recording with reverb applied? "Man, I can tell they didnt use real world natural reverb (like recording in a tile room instead of using an effect)". Or I can tell they added eq, or chorus, etc. But does that make it wrong? If we want pure organic recordings, they should be acoustic intruments recorded with mics and nothing added or edited. But that isnt what the average person wants to hear. We want to hear processed, edited, artifical sounds!

All that said, I do understand that it is frustrating to hear something on the radio that we feel we could have done better. I hear it all the time. And it's frustrating to know that some pretty people get the deals when they may not be the most talented. But it doesnt mean the music is ruined when you figure out they used pitch correction!?!?? I love the Maroon 5 cd. I never noticed the horrible pitch correction. I may now that it's been pointed out, but it wont take away the fact that (to me) there are some well written, well recorded pop songs on there.



Ok, I am braced for the slamming!!!

Well, the difference between a, say, compressor (or eq, reverb, etc...) and pitch correction is that while it can make a singer sound fuller, richer and cut through the mix it cannot make a bad singer a good singer. That's what is called talent or ability. With pitch correction almost anyone can pretend to be a real honest-to-God-hum-dinger-of-a-singer. And while this may be a sort of democratization of the music industry it IMHO is just one more step down jackass hill. And I use pitch correction all the time on my singers. Because it is a great, useful tool. But like any great new digital tool it can (and is, and will continue to be) be misused. So what? That's the way it goes. So go with the flow. But it should be OK to feel just a smidge of enui, shouldn't it?

I was actually working on developing a VST plugin that is a sort of "vocal tuner". I got the idea from this software. I bought the software and found it extremely useful for warming up exercises and generally teaching yourself how to have much better control over your voice.

While the software I linked to is kind of corny and very amateurish, I thought it would be an excellent idea to have a more professionally aimed VST plugin that did something similar. I was able to come up with a very fast, accurate detection algorithm but it was taking a lot of my free time and I have not been working on it for some time now.

The advantage of this type of plugin would be that it does not try to fix your mistakes, instead it teaches you how to sing in tune. You can see the result of your singing in realtime as a graph, and then experiment until you find out how to prevent that bad pitch slide to occur in the first place. You can visually see where you overshoot the pitches, and you can practice in realtime to see how to prevent it. You would be able to enter "target notes" (similar to the Singing Coach software) and you can then practice until you hit all the notes. For myself, I found that after I played around with Singing Coach, I was much less dependent on Melodyne, and that should be everyone's goal.

Anyway, I am just wondering that if I go ahead and finish the plugin, if there would be a market for that kind of software? What do you guys think?

SilkTone

Yes, the discussion is going in a direction that I was thinking about this morning. You know, back when MIDI sequencers first came out in the 80's, everybody got excited about quantization. Naturally, it got overused to the point of oblivion.

But eventually, folks started to figure out that they were sucking all the life out of the music. So, by the early 90's most were pulling back on the quantization, or even abandoning it altogether. Quantization did give rise to robotic styles that are 100% quantized, but they all galvanized into their own genres, while everything else went back to 'normal'. Finally, sequencers starting sporting features like 'percent quantization' and 'shuffle', providing for more flexibility and control, and making quantization more of a natural editing tool than a de-facto process.

I'm thinking (hoping?) that vocal retuning will take on a similar life cycle.

I'm sitting here listening to Maroon 5...

The use of autotune seems, to me, to be completely for aesthetic reasons - it's used as an effect. A very effective one too - it helps to acheive that slightly surreal sheen to the vocal. I don't see there's anything wrong with it... It's just like using any other effect such as reverb or compression, it's just used here to create a different effect.

I don't have an auto-tune product but I wish I did. They're currently too expensive for me.

I'm not interested in taking vocal lessons and I have no illusions of becoming a good vocalist. But, I sure like writing chord changes and melodies and lyrics and harmonies etc. Sure wish I had auto-tune.

With a background in bluegrass and gospel, I can really appreciate the effort and talent these folks really have. These folks would perform a capella on stage, around a single mic, and hit every note in four-part harmony. Today, the industry can manufacture an artist (as stickman393 alluded to in the documentary "Before the Music Dies" - which I highly recommend). I understand why a tool like Autotune is so popular. For me, the problem is when it is used as a crutch, and not a band-aid. When the 'looks' of the performer outweigh the talent, cause they can 'correct' the voice.

On my way home today, I saw a bumper sticker that kinda sums up how I feel; Bluegrass - Acoustically Correct!

ORIGINAL: Daddy?!

I know this will offend someone, but this is how I saw rap "music" a few years ago. I thought it was just some weird novelty thing that would quickly go away. I just knew that no one would take it seriously since it was just programmed rhythms and didn't involve any real musical talent or the ability to carry a tune. Man, was I wrong..

Stratcat,

Please tell me that you have not entered the 'other side'...that being that you are a 'rap music fan' now. Please say it ain't so - I don't want my image of you and your fine posts over the years tarnished for me. I'm quite sure all the Jay-Z's of the world couldn't sit around a campfire and make good 'music' that actually had chords and harmony and get this...a modulation to a new key, etc.

I believe that hip-hop/rap's prevalence in music today does NOTHING to encourage our young people to pick up a legitimate instrument and learn how to create on it. If this trend continues, in 30-50 years (possibly less), there will be no 'songs' to sing, just 'dope beats' to 'bump' to.

Aside from the mega cash that rap generates, I honestly believe that if these 'rap artists' had real legitimate 'musical talent', they'd earn their initial money off of the rap and then quickly move onto something more challenging and musically stimulating - I've yet to see this. A lot of the decent rock guys seemed to get tired of the basic major/minor scales and needed more stimulation, thus moving towards jazz, etc. Those guys seem to be in it for the right reasons: music and the stimulation generated by creating it, not the Benjamins generated by selling it to the sheep.

Rant off!

Hope I didn't offend anyone - I just think it's important that we try to create good songs and not rely on samples and programming too much. I believe our songs should largely transfer decently around a campfire.

You definately read something into my post that was not intended!! I hate rap "music". And before anyone calls me names, I dont hate the "artists", I just do not consider it music. I do think there is some skill involved in the creation of these sounds, but that is what they are - sounds. They are rhythms, and some of the rhythms aren't half bad, but it's usually because it's been ripped off from a talented artist!! I use samples to create music, but it's samples of single notes that I then manipulate into music (drums samples, piano samples, etc) not performances of another musician playing.

From the view of a real musician, no, I do not care for it and do not consider it music.

What is really sad to me is watching my 12 year old daughter. She took piano lessons for a few years and was quite good. But now she has no interested at all. She listens to rap and some new rock (Panic at the Disco, etc). She had a breif interest in Maroon 5 when that cd was big and I thought there was hope, but now they are old news to her... It's funny, to her anything 6 months old is "old"!!! I guess I feel a little disappointed that I am probably in the best band I have ever been in right now and my daughter has zero appreciation for it. This is what the media has done to the next generation...

But I do think there is hope. We play mostly classic rock and it amazes me that some places we play college kids show up and love what we are doing. It's kind of like back in the 70's when "oldies" from the 50's were cool.

Regarding Auto-Tune, this post has made me re-think some things. I need to develope a better ear for hearing the apprent over-use of it! Then again, maybe I don't want to know!?!? Someone mentioned Carrie Underwood's abuse of it, and I actually thought she was a very talented singer - now I'm wondering...

BUT, I have to go back to something I said before. There is more to a great vocal track than just perfect pitch. You've got to be able to project, have good tone, good phrasing, dynamics, etc to pull it off..........right?

ORIGINAL: jamesg1213

There is more to a great vocal track than just perfect pitch. You've got to be able to project, have good tone, good phrasing, dynamics, etc to pull it off..........right?

Absolutely right...you have to be able to sing. I'm quite honestly staggered at the number of new bands I hear with a vocalist who quite plainly cannot hold a tune. At the risk of sounding like a BOF (which I am anyway!), I can't think of one band that I grew up listening to who had a sub-standard singer.........(insert your exceptions here)

James

Hmmm... I think back then, if you couldnt sing, it was obvious because there were no tools to fix it. But there were some sub-standard singers that got radio play (at least in my opinion). Bob Dylan is at the top of my list!

True, and Dylan, Tom Waits, Van Morrison are the exceptions that proves the rule...it just grieves me that it now seems to be 'I'm going to sing because I want to be the singer' rather than 'I want to be the singer because I can sing'.

Mind you, I'm using Paul Rodgers as my yardstick to measure by, so I'm never going to be satisfied

ORIGINAL: Daddy?!

I know this will offend someone, but this is how I saw rap "music" a few years ago. I thought it was just some weird novelty thing that would quickly go away. I just knew that no one would take it seriously since it was just programmed rhythms and didn't involve any real musical talent or the ability to carry a tune. Man, was I wrong..

Stratcat,

Please tell me that you have not entered the 'other side'...that being that you are a 'rap music fan' now. Please say it ain't so - I don't want my image of you and your fine posts over the years tarnished for me. I'm quite sure all the Jay-Z's of the world couldn't sit around a campfire and make good 'music' that actually had chords and harmony and get this...a modulation to a new key, etc.

I believe that hip-hop/rap's prevalence in music today does NOTHING to encourage our young people to pick up a legitimate instrument and learn how to create on it. If this trend continues, in 30-50 years (possibly less), there will be no 'songs' to sing, just 'dope beats' to 'bump' to.

Aside from the mega cash that rap generates, I honestly believe that if these 'rap artists' had real legitimate 'musical talent', they'd earn their initial money off of the rap and then quickly move onto something more challenging and musically stimulating - I've yet to see this. A lot of the decent rock guys seemed to get tired of the basic major/minor scales and needed more stimulation, thus moving towards jazz, etc. Those guys seem to be in it for the right reasons: music and the stimulation generated by creating it, not the Benjamins generated by selling it to the sheep.

A few weeks ago I heard the most ridiculous quote from Kanye West. He said "When I want to make new music, the first thing I do is go to the record store and find a good original track I can sample".

That's sort of like saying "When I want to bake a home made pizza, I go to the pizzaria, buy a pizza and put it in the oven". I was once in the studio with a local rapper. This was a studio that excusively recorded rap/hip hop. It was quite an experience. It was the first time that I ever saw a song being sampled, tracked and mixed all in one night. It goes to show you how "hard" they work to have a perfect product at the end. I had always thought that everyone tracked and mixed songs in two sepeprate stages over a period of a few days. They just put everything together in a few hours. That seems to show the rapper philosophy. "Record as much as you can as quickly as you can so we can get the cash as soon was we can." R&B artists are starting to have the same phillosophy. Back in the 70's and 80's, albums were recorded over a period of months and every sound was carefully tracked to get its own sound. Today it's all done ridiculously fast with no care whatsoever. Beyonce recorded her new album in less than 2 weeks.

ORIGINAL: Daddy?!

Mind you, I'm using Paul Rodgers as my yardstick to measure by, so I'm never going to be satisfied.

Actually, I've enjoyed all the Bad Company vocalists they've used: Paul Rodgers, Brian Howe, Robert Hart - all great! Not sure who they are currently utilizing, as I believe Rodgers is still getting rich on that Queen tribute.

Not sure how that Queen thing can work, but apparently it does and I'd imagine Brian May is pleased as pie to work with such an R & B fan that is Mr. Rodgers.

Which singer was it on the album with One Night Aint No Loveaffair?? What a great tune!! We did that one in band years ago - cool voice.

ORIGINAL: Karim
A few weeks ago I heard the most ridiculous quote from Kanye West. He said "When I want to make new music, the first thing I do is go to the record store and find a good original track I can sample".

I really don't know whether to laugh or cry at that one!
Wow.