From: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org (ecto-digest) To: ecto-digest@smoe.org Subject: ecto-digest V14 #180 Reply-To: ecto@smoe.org Sender: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk ecto-digest Friday, July 3 2009 Volume 14 : Number 180 To unsubscribe: e-mail ecto-digest-request@smoe.org and put the word unsubscribe in the message body. Today's Subjects: ----------------- Today's your birthday, friend... [Mike Matthews ] Re: oh autotune, you silly little plugin [birdie ] corrected url - owl city [birdie ] thanks to Dan Stark! [Jeffrey Burka ] Re: ecto-digest V14 #179 autotune your brain [cy ] Re: ecto-digest V14 #179 autotune your brain [Greg Dunn ] Re: oh autotune, you silly little plugin [Paul Blair ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 03:00:05 -0400 (EDT) From: Mike Matthews Subject: Today's your birthday, friend... i*i*i*i*i*i i*i*i*i*i*i *************** *****HAPPY********* **************BIRTHDAY********* *************************************************** *************************************************************************** *********************** BunkyTom (no Email address) *********************** *************************************************************************** -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- - -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- BunkyTom Tue July 02 1968 Cancer Anders Hallberg Tue July 03 1962 Cancer Kevin Harkins Thu July 05 1973 Cancer Laurel Krahn Mon July 05 1971 Cancer John J Henshon Mon July 05 1954 The Year Of The Horse / Ruled By The Moon Jim Gurley Mon July 06 1959 Cancer Lisa Rouchka Fri July 08 1960 Moonchild with Java Rising Courtney Dallas Fri July 09 1971 Catte Michael Peskura Sat July 09 1949 HallOfFamer Finney T. Tsai Sat July 09 1966 Cancer Larry Greenfield Tue July 11 1950 Virgo Rising; Gemini Moon Marion Kippers Tue July 13 1965 Kreeft Ellen Rawson Thu July 13 1961 Double Cancer Mitch Pravatiner Mon July 14 1952 Cancer R. Rapp Wed July 14 1954 On a Gray Eye Sojourn John Zimmer Sun July 16 1961 Cancer Dan Stark Sun July 16 1961 Cancer Kevin D. F. Highnight Thu July 17 1975 Cancer with Pisces Moon Cathy Guetzlaff Mon July 18 1955 Cancer Vlad Sat July 18 1970 Warning: severe tire damage Jani Pinola Thu July 20 1972 Jonquil Alvin Brattli Sun July 27 1969 Lefthanded Christy Eger Smith Thu July 27 1944 Horse Crossing Shirley Ye July 27 Lioness woj Sun July 28 1968 children at play John Relph Sat July 28 1962 Leo Bob Kollmeyer Wed July 28 1971 Leo Steve Lusky Tue July 29 1952 Bike! Kate Bush Wed July 30 1958 God Chuck Smith Wed July 30 1958 Reboot Yves Denneulin Fri July 30 1971 Lion-Heart Joel Kenyon Wed July 31 1963 Leo - -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 01:51:25 -0700 From: birdie Subject: Re: oh autotune, you silly little plugin I worked with Dusty Springfield and she would...go through her vocals with a fine tooth comb. and all the best parts were used. Trevor Horn has a similiar style...record the same tracks, many times, pick and edit the best bits together. The had....budgets! On another, but related note.... artists like Imogen Heap, Kate Havnevik, Theresa Andersson all either loop or sample for live overdubs. Which is using electronics to manipulate vocals..... and while it does all fall together into the electronic vocal manipulation bag It's all just tools and how you use them.... I have vocal stems of both Imogen and Kate from different songs and when you just hear them, isolated, its clear....they are really singing. the overdubbing & looping processes definitely makes it electronica Dusty was a genius of the highest order when it came to interpreting songs..... worked very hard at it perfectionist and then you've got www.owlcity.com who uses autotune as Gary Numan used vocoder.... it's all what you do with it. I wonder what Frampton is up to ;-) Birdie On Jul 1, 2009, at 12:15 PM, paul kim wrote: > I've found it interesting to see how Autotune has exploded into public > discourse with T-Pain's usage of it in the past couple years...the > handful > of recent articles I saw in places such as the L.A. Times and online > journals rarely if ever pointed out how long the software/hardware > has been > around and in use, and how prevalent it has been in the music > industry. I > know that I had just become aware of it around the time of Cher's > "Believe" > song and immediately thought that it was used in that case (although > subsequent reports of it simply being a vocoder confused me). This > was back > in my Berklee days in the late 90's, and once I moved out here to > L.A., I > found that it was a required plugin for all Pro Tools systems in the > studios. > > As others have stated, it is a tool and it can be used for good or for > ill...when it's used for ill, hoo boy, makes you wanna smack someone, > doesn't it? But its uses can be subtle as well. I'm neither a > defender or > a lover of it...I've used it, messed around with it a bit, didn't get > comfortable with it before I stepped out of the music engineering > thing. > Still, I'd like to throw a few points out there: > > 1) Even really good, really trained singers may have their recorded > performances Autotuned. You can run into the problem of spending > too much > time nuancing it so that every note is perfect, of course, but most > of the > time, when I was watching really talented engineers use it, they > didn't > nitpick the performance to death. What happened was they would take > the > comp'd vocal take (put together from the best parts of several > different > vocal takes), run it through the Autotune analyzer, and quickly > nudge the > notes to be a little closer to "perfect" while not making it strictly > perfect. It wasn't a noticeable effect on single parts, but when you > listened to vocal parts that were stacked or harmonized you could > tell the > difference: before the Autotune effect, the vocals sounded good; > afterwards > they were tighter and the harmonies popped. > > 2) I'm not sure how prevalent it's usage is outside of what I worked > on...most of the music I was involved with was Hip-Hop, Rap, and > R&B, so it > might not be in constant use in, say, the indie rock or the > singer-songwriter world for the purpose of tightening up a > performance. But > on nearly all the projects I was aware of in my studio days, it was > invariably used by the engineer in this "sweetening" manner. > > 3) I have used Autotune on trumpet parts and bass parts, and I know > others > who have used it on other instruments, usually instruments that play > single > notes and not chords. > > 4) Autotune can and is used in live vocal performances...there's a > standalone box that can sit in the rack of the Front of House mixer > that you > can run vocals through (or any instrument really, depending on what > you're > going for sonically). Dial in the settings, and it can subtly help > the > singer be in tune. > > 5) Of course, there are also the not-so-talented singers who HAVE to > have > this used on their vocals because otherwise you could never get a > performance that was in-tune from them. It's very painful for me to > hear > those, especially on the radio...mostly I've heard them in movies and > tv-shows where actors have to sing, and while they might have nice > voices > and be able to carry a tune, they need that extra help to get it to > sound > good. > > Useful tool? Can be. Used by tools? Sometimes. Fun to play > with? Not > when I was using it...it could be tedious. > > Paul ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 01:55:23 -0700 From: birdie Subject: corrected url - owl city http://www.myspace.com/owlcity www.owlcitymusic.com On Jul 2, 2009, at 1:51 AM, birdie wrote: > I worked with Dusty Springfield and she would...go through her > vocals with a fine tooth comb. > > and all the best parts were used. > > Trevor Horn has a similiar style...record the same tracks, many > times, pick and edit the best bits together. > > The had....budgets! > > On another, but related note.... > > artists like Imogen Heap, Kate Havnevik, Theresa Andersson > > all either loop or sample for live overdubs. > > Which is using electronics to manipulate vocals..... > > and while it does all fall together into the electronic vocal > manipulation bag > > It's all just tools and how you use them.... > > I have vocal stems of both Imogen and Kate from different songs > > and when you just hear them, isolated, its clear....they are really > singing. > > the overdubbing & looping processes definitely makes it electronica > > Dusty was a genius of the highest order when it came to interpreting > songs..... > > worked very hard at it > > perfectionist > > and then you've got www.owlcity.com who uses autotune as Gary Numan > used vocoder.... > > it's all what you do with it. > > I wonder what Frampton is up to ;-) > > Birdie > > > On Jul 1, 2009, at 12:15 PM, paul kim wrote: > >> I've found it interesting to see how Autotune has exploded into >> public >> discourse with T-Pain's usage of it in the past couple years...the >> handful >> of recent articles I saw in places such as the L.A. Times and online >> journals rarely if ever pointed out how long the software/hardware >> has been >> around and in use, and how prevalent it has been in the music >> industry. I >> know that I had just become aware of it around the time of Cher's >> "Believe" >> song and immediately thought that it was used in that case (although >> subsequent reports of it simply being a vocoder confused me). This >> was back >> in my Berklee days in the late 90's, and once I moved out here to >> L.A., I >> found that it was a required plugin for all Pro Tools systems in the >> studios. >> >> As others have stated, it is a tool and it can be used for good or >> for >> ill...when it's used for ill, hoo boy, makes you wanna smack someone, >> doesn't it? But its uses can be subtle as well. I'm neither a >> defender or >> a lover of it...I've used it, messed around with it a bit, didn't get >> comfortable with it before I stepped out of the music engineering >> thing. >> Still, I'd like to throw a few points out there: >> >> 1) Even really good, really trained singers may have their recorded >> performances Autotuned. You can run into the problem of spending >> too much >> time nuancing it so that every note is perfect, of course, but most >> of the >> time, when I was watching really talented engineers use it, they >> didn't >> nitpick the performance to death. What happened was they would >> take the >> comp'd vocal take (put together from the best parts of several >> different >> vocal takes), run it through the Autotune analyzer, and quickly >> nudge the >> notes to be a little closer to "perfect" while not making it strictly >> perfect. It wasn't a noticeable effect on single parts, but when you >> listened to vocal parts that were stacked or harmonized you could >> tell the >> difference: before the Autotune effect, the vocals sounded good; >> afterwards >> they were tighter and the harmonies popped. >> >> 2) I'm not sure how prevalent it's usage is outside of what I worked >> on...most of the music I was involved with was Hip-Hop, Rap, and >> R&B, so it >> might not be in constant use in, say, the indie rock or the >> singer-songwriter world for the purpose of tightening up a >> performance. But >> on nearly all the projects I was aware of in my studio days, it was >> invariably used by the engineer in this "sweetening" manner. >> >> 3) I have used Autotune on trumpet parts and bass parts, and I know >> others >> who have used it on other instruments, usually instruments that >> play single >> notes and not chords. >> >> 4) Autotune can and is used in live vocal performances...there's a >> standalone box that can sit in the rack of the Front of House mixer >> that you >> can run vocals through (or any instrument really, depending on what >> you're >> going for sonically). Dial in the settings, and it can subtly help >> the >> singer be in tune. >> >> 5) Of course, there are also the not-so-talented singers who HAVE >> to have >> this used on their vocals because otherwise you could never get a >> performance that was in-tune from them. It's very painful for me >> to hear >> those, especially on the radio...mostly I've heard them in movies and >> tv-shows where actors have to sing, and while they might have nice >> voices >> and be able to carry a tune, they need that extra help to get it to >> sound >> good. >> >> Useful tool? Can be. Used by tools? Sometimes. Fun to play >> with? Not >> when I was using it...it could be tedious. >> >> Paul ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 08:42:01 -0400 From: Jeffrey Burka Subject: thanks to Dan Stark! I'm finally listening to Rare Angels, having managed to only copy 2 of 22 songs on to my iPod yesterday before work. The sound quality is fantastic. I'm _so_ glad I didn't try to digitize it myself. (I recently digitized the N|ns on Skates tape from Bloomington, IN circa 1988, and it sounds miserable...but still fun to have! Anybody out there remember the band? They were contemporaries of Arson Garden, and even lived in the same dorm, but were nothing alike...definitely not ecto) This is great fun to have. Thanks so much for all the work you did, both back then, and now, Dan! jeff n.p. Rare Angels ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:29:10 -0700 From: cy Subject: Re: ecto-digest V14 #179 autotune your brain autotune huh. never used it. if you can't sing, please don't. i've been in studios recording since i was 17. if you missed one note, you go back and re-do it. if you start "punching" in too many times, the song loses it's feel, if i ever missed more than a couple notes per song I just called it a night and returned another night less tired. i have ALWAYS worked on a very tight budget, being poor, being in a music category that doesn't fit in anywhere, being unsigned, it's always been my dime (with great musicians sitting in with me as a favor)...usually producing also so the whole song is laid down, all the different little parts (drummers take the longest!) and then, once I was out of money, it would be "my turn", the singer, the lead, the songwriter, having to do it sometimes one time through due to money. "One take Cyo". But these singers you talk about are rich, with rich record companies and full touring set up, their own systems, their own sound men and still they suck. sad. sick. sad. that clip Michael Pierce sent out of Britany's isolated mic at first made me laugh very hard, then made me bitter. she's horrible! Hey, just add lots of echo to everyone performing, lots of reverb, auto tuned and photoshopped and airbrushed and spray tanned and boob jobbed and there you go folks, a star for the masses. Push em up, pull em down. again, if you can't sing, don't. their are so many who actually can and they might slip thru the cracks. find em & support em. that's why i love this list because you are music NOT for the masses. love, Cyoakha Blind, Druids, Azigza http://www.landoftheblind.com/ ordering BLIND's CDs direct/Gig Listings http://www.myspace.com/landoftheblind samples new CD: Shamans of Sound http://www.faeriefotos.com Cyoakha's new faerie photography calendar 09 http://youtube.com/user/cyo2cyo blind videos, Peace Concert/ & Burning Man ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 14:45:20 -0400 (EDT) From: Greg Dunn Subject: Re: ecto-digest V14 #179 autotune your brain Someone please bronze this and post a copy in every major recording studio. :-) - -----Original Message----- >From: cy >Sent: Jul 2, 2009 1:29 PM >To: ecto@smoe.org >Subject: Re: ecto-digest V14 #179 autotune your brain > >autotune huh. never used it. if you can't sing, please don't. i've >been in studios recording since i was 17. if you missed one note, you >go back and re-do it. if you start "punching" in too many times, the >song loses it's feel, if i ever missed more than a couple notes per >song I just called it a night and returned another night less tired. >i have ALWAYS worked on a very tight budget, being poor, being in a >music category that doesn't fit in anywhere, being unsigned, it's >always been my dime (with great musicians sitting in with me as a >favor)...usually producing also so the whole song is laid down, all >the different little parts (drummers take the longest!) and then, >once I was out of money, it would be "my turn", the singer, the lead, >the songwriter, having to do it sometimes one time through due to >money. "One take Cyo". But these singers you talk about are rich, >with rich record companies and full touring set up, their own >systems, their own sound men and still they suck. sad. sick. sad. >that clip Michael Pierce sent out of Britany's isolated mic at first >made me laugh very hard, then made me bitter. she's horrible! Hey, >just add lots of echo to everyone performing, lots of reverb, auto >tuned and photoshopped and airbrushed and spray tanned and boob >jobbed and there you go folks, a star for the masses. Push em up, pull em down. > >again, if you can't sing, don't. their are so many who actually can >and they might slip thru the cracks. find em & support em. that's why >i love this list because you are music NOT for the masses. > >love, Cyoakha >Blind, Druids, Azigza > > > > >http://www.landoftheblind.com/ ordering BLIND's CDs direct/Gig Listings >http://www.myspace.com/landoftheblind samples new CD: Shamans of Sound >http://www.faeriefotos.com Cyoakha's new faerie photography calendar 09 >http://youtube.com/user/cyo2cyo blind videos, Peace Concert/ & Burning Man ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 14:51:47 -0400 From: Jeffrey Burka Subject: live Thea Thanks to Adam and the others for reminding me that Thea Gilmore had released a live album; I'd meant to pick it up when it came out, but forgot. Listening to it now and it's as wonderful as everyone was saying yesterday! jeff n.p. _Recorded Delivery_, Thea Gilmore ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 2 Jul 2009 20:36:29 -0400 From: Paul Blair Subject: Re: oh autotune, you silly little plugin On Thu, Jul 2, 2009 at 4:51 AM, birdie wrote: > I wonder what Frampton is up to ;-) > > Birdie Since you're very connected, I'm sure you know he's still kicking around; I saw him open for Jethro Tull last year. Here's what he looks like these days: http://blog.syracuse.com/news/2007/07/070207Frampton2.gif ------------------------------ End of ecto-digest V14 #180 ***************************