l

[TheBlueReptile]

l

 

[A Link In Time]

I've never had any particular problems with autotune because the dynamic beat is still in place. While robotic sounds replace natural human ones, the music has been remixed in such a way to create a powerful effect through repetition. Many people including myself have probably become desensitized to this shift due to hearing so much autotune on the radio.

All that being said, songs were definitely better in the decades prior to the release of autotune or to about the mid 90s. I hate to jump on the negative stereotype bandwagon but autotune is a gimmick. Nothing more, nothing less. T Pane and Britney Spears are two major contemporary offenders. The later can sing naturally but holds onto this contemporary artificial crutch. The former is one who can't truly sing but uses autotune as a cheap means to classify mere hollow words as music. John Lennon told us to imagine a world without war but of he knew where the music industry is today he would add autotune to the list.

 

[Hanyou]

I don't like the sound autotune produces at all--I'd rather hear bad but genuine singing than an autotuned mess. I mean, singers like Ozzy Osbourne and Sid Vicious were never good, but they did their songs justice (how much their voices were altered on albums I don't know, but their live performances worked). Farther back, Greg Lake demonstrated how to sing emotionally with controlled subtlety. This all sounds good, but even the best vocalists don't sound perfect. It's the little imperfections and nuances, designed or not, that make many songs interesting. Greg Lake, along with many of the singers of his era, sounded essentially human in his vocal performances. What happened to that? Whether a singer is technically good or not, they should be interesting; what's important in all cases is that the vocalist's voice matches the material and works well on its own merits.

I do understand electronically altering one's voice for artistic purposes or whatever else, but I don't understand how anyone thinks autotune sounds preferable to bad singing. It saps any genuine emotion from a vocal performance, and doesn't seem to lend itself well to the atmosphere of most songs where it's slapped on, if they had any atmosphere at all. The silver lining? Most of the songs that utilize it aren't very good in the first place, lyrically or musically. If there are exceptions, I'm not aware of them, but it's usually popular rap and dance music that's autotuned. It's not like Britney Spears, Kesha, or the Black Eyed Peas were ever the paragon of good taste, so what are we losing here? These are genres that exist solely to cater to trends. That autotune now dominates them might just be inevitable, since it has somehow become a very long-lasting trend.

Now, as to why people find it good... that's a mystery to me.

EDIT: Really, would this song

[video=youtube;uSD4vsh1zDA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSD4vsh1zDA[/video]

be any less obnoxious without the liberal use of autotune? I don't think so. I've yet to hear autotune ruin a song that would otherwise have been good.

 

[Gooey Fame]

I either like no autotune or for it to be autotuned to the max.

BlueReptile, in a case like the song you presented, the autotune is not to mask errors in a singers voice. It is just simply a new instrument or technique that gives a different sound to the vocals. It is like effects on a guitar pedal, or sampling in hip hop. They are using production to make new sounds that they could not be made with just their ability to play an instrument. I'm not saying that this is a good or bad thing. I am just saying how it is a legitimate musical effect.

On the other hand, I don't like when autotune is used to try to mask bad vocals subtly. I agree with Hanyou that it takes some of the emotion out of the performance.

 

[Dio]

I'm going to get myself an auto tune microphone so I can go and talk in song.
I don't mind it in pop records as I rather like the sound of a robotised voice.

 

[athenian200]

I think that Autotune has gained fairly wide acceptance. While I don't think it produces the best quality of sound, it can allow people who would otherwise not be singers to have a chance at a career.

On the other hand, I feel like it can allow those with potentially good voices to have their REAL talent obscured because it permits them to be somewhat lazy, or just buries it in general. It's definitely a double-edged sword.

 

[Cel-Shaded Deku]

What human being thinks that robots sound good? Pretty much every autotuned song that I've heard sounded like a fusion of a robot and the sound of something scratching a chalkboard, and that kind of sound gives me a headache. High pitched sounds in general should stay out of music.

 

[Johnny Sooshi]

Often autotune is popular for pop, hip-hop, and various electronically focused artists and songs. Personally, I like that they over use it rather than use it for voice corrections because it shows that they want to use it to make music. It's really no different in that aspect than the use of a voice box (or vox as some like to call it) because it's used to create and electronically enhanced voice that sounds robotic or electrical. People didn't find it objectionable when classic rock artists ran their voices through a voice box for artistic purposes so I kinda wonder why people get annoyed at modern artists using it that way for the artistic and musical aspect.


EDIT: Here's a fairly prime example of modern use of autotune done by Attack Attack!, a band that specializes in mixing metal and electronic music

[video=youtube;tfSGw4SCE9U]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfSGw4SCE9U[/video]


Now here's Peter Frampton performing Do You Feel Like We Do

[video=youtube;Nzic2vUjddg]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzic2vUjddg[/video]

Both run the voice through some sort of electronic element in order to enhance the song musically, not for the simple correction of the song. To me as long as that is what's happening then I'm fine.