Have you grown out of really listening to music?

[Porter Stoutheart]

Uhh.. I'm open to that idea in theory, but they aren't really what people are thinking about when people refer to it, and personally, I haven't heard a super convincing example (looked up a list of tasteful uses of auto-tune and I didn't actively enjoy any of them, personally).

It's similar to what a studio laughter (canned or uncanned) does to a TV show, IMO. The idea that it can be used properly seems valid to me, but I haven't watched anything where I wouldn't rather it be done without it, personally.

Maybe you'd rather it be done if you actually heard the alternative of some of these pop singers un-autotuned? Then you'd be in favor of the auto-tune. (Although it seems a little moot since the music is probably not interesting with or without it).

But yeah, there are some electronic effects that aren't really "autotune" but do artificially distort the vocals, and that can be done to good effect as part of the creative process in some genres.

 

[Shareefruck]

Maybe you'd rather it be done if you actually heard the alternative of some of these pop singers un-autotuned? Then you'd be in favor of the auto-tune. (Although it seems a little moot since the music is probably not interesting with or without it).

But yeah, there are some electronic effects that aren't really "autotune" but do artificially distort the vocals, and that can be done to good effect as part of the creative process in some genres.

I didn't say I was actively against people doing it, really, just that I've never heard anything that I thought sounded great while relying on it.

For me, it's one of those things that probably brings awful music up to a certain baseline while seemingly preventing it from possibly reaching any heights that are actually interesting. But hey, it's not a hill I'm dying on here, I was just answering Stylizer1's question.

 

[peate]

Listen to Amy Lee live vs Studio. Auto tune at work. Same with many artists. As for canned laughter check out some old MASH episodes. It's not missing at all, actually, it's better.

 

[Roo Returns]

It's important to note that literally only one guy brought up auto-tune. It's obvious that that's a bad argument that isn't really representative of the sentiment.

Autotune and that weird robot effect is fine like any other tool, but too much of something is too much. You make pasta with too much alfredo sauce it's awful. A cake with too much cinnamon.

The problem is autotune in mainstream rap and that triplet symbol sync beat are overused and in every song. It's the equivalent of the 80s "gated drum" sound that Phil Collins used on his guest spot for Peter Gabriel's No Self-Control that he would later debate Ahmet Ertegun and leave in as the ending for In The Air Tonight which became the decade's signature sound.

It's not even really rapping in top 40 it's more chanting and sounds like the person is 20,000 leagues under the sea. Travis Scott is charismatic and in tremendous shape but his entire vocal delivery is built of of this.

It is not going to age well.

 

[Shareefruck]

Autotune and that weird robot effect is fine like any other tool, but too much of something is too much. You make pasta with too much alfredo sauce it's awful. A cake with too much cinnamon.

The problem is autotune in mainstream rap and that triplet symbol sync beat are overused and in every song. It's the equivalent of the 80s "gated drum" sound that Phil Collins used on his guest spot for Peter Gabriel's No Self-Control that he would later debate Ahmet Ertegun and leave in as the ending for In The Air Tonight which became the decade's signature sound.

It's not even really rapping in top 40 it's more chanting and sounds like the person is 20,000 leagues under the sea. Travis Scott is charismatic and in tremendous shape but his entire vocal delivery is built of of this.

It is not going to age well.

To me, it's kind of like arguing that cuisine from a certain country is really bad because McDonalds is popular and not very good, though. In my view, what matters is how the exceptional peaks compare, not what the populist norms and trends of the day are.

How badly used auto-tune is doesn't remotely move the needle for me, in that regard, and fixing it for each and every artist that uses it wouldn't remotely make me think any more highly of the era, personally.

 

[ProstheticConscience]

Pitch shifting happens on a lot of vocal tracks, even some of the great vocalists. Where it's used for people who actually can sing, it's as minor correction here and there. Usually, once the music is recorded, they'll run through the vocal tracks maybe four or five times in a row, or a bunch, or I remember hearing about Aretha Franklin's recording sessions when I was in school. The Queen of Soul was a very powerful personality, and in her sessions, they did the vocal tracks until she put her hands on her hips and said: "We gonna do the next song now?!" That meant you were doing the next song.

After they were done, the producers all sat down and went through the tracks and it would be like, okay,*this* note in *this* word here, in *this* track here, is just a few cents sharp...so they put that note through and diminish it to put it in tune. Your ear doesn't pick up a difference on a change that small. When you get into moving it up and down whole notes or more, the whole thing gets chipmunked out really fast and hey, this thing doesn't autocorrect chipmunked. Huh.

I mean, I don't hate autotune per se, it's more that anything I've ever heard with autotune in it, I've hated it. Its proper use is fixing vocal tracks not creating them. If I'm listening to you and I can hear autotune, chances are you suck.

When I was young I seemed to care a whole lot more about listening to music. Now it seems I can't relate to most of it. I still hear lots of interesting stuff but can't find myself really adding anything new my library, or at least throwing it on once and a while.

It might have to do with Albums not being pushed as heavily as songs are.

"Kids don't buy albums anymore they rent songs" - Me

When I was a kid, I lived and breathed music for years but everyone has to grow up eventually. I don't know that I don't care about music anymore...I do know that it's been a long time since I cared or followed pop music trends generally. I have my thing that I do, and I'm still finding weird subgenres to explore, and new artists to fill the time. Lots of Van Halen lately (see av)...in terms of new things, a lot of Baltic folk metal bands, this one band Heilung (go check them out on youtube) that plays traditional Norse/Germanic music including a psycho battle chant...I dunno, do I put much effort into exploring new musical things? Not really a lot these days I guess. You grow up, have kids of your own, pop culture mutates and moves on without you, and you have bigger things occupying your time than compiling compiling lists of your favourite 500 albums of the last six months, like parenting and balancing your budget or getting the stain out of the curtains or all the other stuff you have to do once you're the mom or dad.

I still love music, I still listen to it every day, minimum the drive to and from work, sometimes the radio or other tunes at work, pretty much every time I go for a walk longer than five minutes, but am I really an avid consumer of new product? No. I wouldn't really say that I am. I mean, I'm long behind the curve now with whatever the hizzles and shnizzles the kids are listening to these days, but then of course my age group is supposed to hate it anyway.

Oh yeah, someone back there said something about there aren't new musical genres being created in pop music anymore because the internet and file sharing basically wiped out the market for prerecorded music. No one wants to pay for it anymore, so there's no longer money to be made sending people out to beat the bushes finding new bands and creating new genres.

 

[peate]

Auto tune didn't exist during analogue days. Beatles, Beach boys, etc...all worked without it.

 

[Roo Returns]

To me, it's kind of like arguing that cuisine from a certain country is really bad because McDonalds is popular and not very good, though. In my view, what matters is how the exceptional peaks compare, not what the populist norms and trends of the day are.

How badly used auto-tune is doesn't remotely move the needle for me, in that regard, and fixing it for each and every artist that uses it wouldn't remotely make me think any more highly of the era, personally.

Everyone uses it. My problem is that even the peaks like modern top 40 and hip hop when it sounds like a 1980s cyborg in all of the music. That to me is terrible and unlistenable after about 30 seconds.

If you or anyone listens to that type of stuff, nothing wrong with it. But lets hear some names and albums.

I used Travis Scott the most charismatic and #1 rapper in the world before WAP dropped. His entire vocal style is built around the cyborg/underwater autotune. It's unlistenable to me.

 

[Mikeaveli]

Auto tune didn't exist during analogue days. Beatles, Beach boys, etc...all worked without it.

You're right, but maybe you've heard the story of Mike Love calling Brian Wilson 'dog ears' because he would make the Beach Boys record the same vocal tracks over and over again? In the modern age with pitch correction (Auto-Tune) and vocal comping (editing together the best parts of individual takes) it's no longer necessary to record the same part 500 times in search of the perfect take. That's certainly a good thing in my opinion, although I choose not to take advantage of pitch correction myself.

It's like comparing recording on tape to modern DAWs. Sure we could all go back to recording on tape and there isn't anything wrong with doing that but it would make the recording process way more inconvenient for a lot of people.

 

[peate]

You're right, but maybe you've heard the story of Mike Love calling Brian Wilson 'dog ears' because he would make the Beach Boys record the same vocal tracks over and over again? In the modern age with pitch correction (Auto-Tune) and vocal comping (editing together the best parts of individual takes) it's no longer necessary to record the same part 500 times in search of the perfect take. That's certainly a good thing in my opinion, although I choose not to take advantage of pitch correction myself.

It's like comparing recording on tape to modern DAWs. Sure we could all go back to recording on tape and there isn't anything wrong with doing that but it would make the recording process way more inconvenient for a lot of people.

Having worked with both, tapes had that warm natural feel to them, but what a pita to handle. Digital makes it so easy to cut, paste and edit, anyone can do it.

 

[Shareefruck]

Everyone uses it. My problem is that even the peaks like modern top 40 and hip hop when it sounds like a 1980s cyborg in all of the music. That to me is terrible and unlistenable after about 30 seconds.

If you or anyone listens to that type of stuff, nothing wrong with it. But lets hear some names and albums.

I used Travis Scott the most charismatic and #1 rapper in the world before WAP dropped. His entire vocal style is built around the cyborg/underwater autotune. It's unlistenable to me.

My point was that the Top 40 pop and hip-hop that regularly uses auto-tune egregiously are kind of the bottom feeders of music anyways and are not really worth considering when talking about what makes the era good or bad, in my view (nor is the equivalent of that type of music-- like Disco from the 80s-- usually the peak of other eras that this one is being compared to). Hell, a decent chunk of what's good doesn't even employ vocals to begin with, from my perspective.

That said, I didn't realize that you apparently love that type of music but just hate auto-tune, though, so I guess that doesn't apply to you.

 

[Ouroboros]

Auto tune didn't exist during analogue days. Beatles, Beach boys, etc...all worked without it.

That's true, but it's not like there weren't any vocal manipulations going on in those days.

Automatic double tracking was pretty much invented for the sole purpose of allowing The Beatles to mess with their vocal and guitar tracks. They also recorded vocals through a Leslie speaker, added tons of tape delay, lots of slapback echo and all sorts of other effects.

I think If those bands had access to modern pitch manipulation techniques they'd have used them.

 

[holy]

People who can't find the nuanced changes in more mainstream music as it evolves are actually uncultured swine imo. The songs that are slaps have something differentiating them, but it takes a fine tuned ear and lover of music to hear and understand what those changes are.

Just a simple tempo change can change the way people are living their lives. Craziness, and should be more appreciated. Of course, everyone is a musical expert, studying under the tutelage of Mozart himself. Newsflash, you're looking at it all wrong. You elitists make me vomit in rage.

 

[Stylizer1]

People who can't find the nuanced changes in more mainstream music as it evolves are actually uncultured swine imo. The songs that are slaps have something differentiating them, but it takes a fine tuned ear and lover of music to hear and understand what those changes are.

Just a simple tempo change can change the way people are living their lives. Craziness, and should be more appreciated. Of course, everyone is a musical expert, studying under the tutelage of Mozart himself. Newsflash, you're looking at it all wrong. You elitists make me vomit in rage.

Or maybe music is too digital now.

 

[Shareefruck]

That's true, but it's not like there weren't any vocal manipulations going on in those days.

Automatic double tracking was pretty much invented for the sole purpose of allowing The Beatles to mess with their vocal and guitar tracks. They also recorded vocals through a Leslie speaker, added tons of tape delay, lots of slapback echo and all sorts of other effects.

I think If those bands had access to modern pitch manipulation techniques they'd have used them.

Yeah, but it's not like people dislike them because of some fundamental problem with the idea of manipulating vocals. They just don't appreciate the effect that this specific type of manipulation has on the satisfaction/value that they see in the music, and even if these bands would have used modern pitch manipulation if they could, it would likely lead to a less satisfying sound that would be appreciated less, in these people's eyes (I'm certainly in that camp-- double-tracking sounds cool as heck, and I've yet to find a clear and noticeable example of the type of auto-tuning we're all talking about that I really love, personally).

People who can't find the nuanced changes in more mainstream music as it evolves are actually uncultured swine imo. The songs that are slaps have something differentiating them, but it takes a fine tuned ear and lover of music to hear and understand what those changes are.

Just a simple tempo change can change the way people are living their lives. Craziness, and should be more appreciated. Of course, everyone is a musical expert, studying under the tutelage of Mozart himself. Newsflash, you're looking at it all wrong. You elitists make me vomit in rage.

I think it's ironically far more egregiously elitist to complain about people being unable to detect nuanced changes in things that you value more than they do and are therefore wrong and uncultured swine that makes you vomit than to merely disagree about what music they consider good or bad based on what they value (if someone from the opposite camp said the equivalent, it would be obvious how similarly obnoxious they were being). Nobody claimed to be an expert-- we all just have different views and are unwilling to go along with perspectives that we disagree with.

 

[Frankie Blueberries]

I always separated auto-tune and pitch correct (probably the same thing, just varying degrees of the extent/intensity).

Pitch correct seems like it's usually done in good taste and not overbearing, but maybe I'm biased because a lot of pop music I grew up on used it. Good examples of it being used tastefully are the peak Blink 182 albums, like Enema of the State and Take Off Your Pants and Jacket (or really any pop-punk album produced by the late Jerry Finn).

Autotune really exploded when T-Pain made a career out of it.

 

[Roo Returns]

My point was that the Top 40 pop and hip-hop that regularly uses auto-tune egregiously are kind of the bottom feeders of music anyways and are not really worth considering when talking about what makes the era good or bad, in my view (nor is the equivalent of that type of music-- like Disco from the 80s-- usually the peak of other eras that this one is being compared to). Hell, a decent chunk of what's good doesn't even employ vocals to begin with, from my perspective.

That said, I didn't realize that you apparently love that type of music but just hate auto-tune, though, so I guess that doesn't apply to you.

What type of music exactly? I try to be open and like all kinds of music. Even country a genre I'm not traditionally or naturally drawn to because I'm from the Northeast NY and it wasn't programmed into my DNA at a very young age like rock/funk/RnB were, I've learned to appreciate it.

I'm not trying to be sarcastic or contradictory what is good music in 2020 to you or anyone? The WAP and trap of the world I'm not into at all, but I dig new releases. Many new releases.

 

[Xelebes]

All the genres of music that I listen to are at their peaks. Techno, swing (I honestly prefer listening to the newest recordings over the scratchy classics), dnb, electrobass, fiddle and so on. I will dip into the past but I have to admit, what the new kids are doing are up my alley.

 

[Shareefruck]

What type of music exactly? I try to be open and like all kinds of music. Even country a genre I'm not traditionally or naturally drawn to because I'm from the Northeast NY and it wasn't programmed into my DNA at a very young age like rock/funk/RnB were, I've learned to appreciate it.

I'm not trying to be sarcastic or contradictory what is good music in 2020 to you or anyone? The WAP and trap of the world I'm not into at all, but I dig new releases. Many new releases.

The type of music that uses auto-tune (just going off of what you said, top 40 pop and hip hop). For the record, I wasn't trying to be snarky either-- I assumed that because you were initially complaining about auto-tune, you didn't think highly of the music either, but from your last post it sounds like you're really into the music but just hate the auto-tune part specifically (which surprised me), so that was my mistake and what I said about it can't apply to you.

The most recent two albums that I liked were Crumbling by Mid Air Thief and parts of NTS Sessions by Autechre (still need to finish it), both from 2018. Keep in mind that I'm one of the guys in this thread who are underwhelmed by modern music compared to other eras and arguing against it, so I'm probably not the right guy to ask for recommendations (especially when it comes to something as recent as 2020 specifically-- there's too little payoff for me and too much hype that doesn't hold up for me to keep up year-to-year, IMO, so I tend to lag behind a few years and see what people like in retrospect).

For the record, my top albums from the 2010s as a whole (based one what I've heard so far) are:

1. Ravedeath 1972 by Tim Hecker
2. Tomorrow's Harvest by Boards of Canada
3. Syro by Aphex Twin
4. Crumbling by Mid Air Thief
5. You're Dead by Flying Lotus
6. A Moon Shaped Pool by Radiohead
7. Atrocity Exhibition by Danny Brown
8. The Magic Place by Julianna Barwick
9. Cosmogramma by Flying Lotus
10. Alvvays by Alvvays

... But I don't think any of them are brilliant or among my overall favorites or anything-- I just find them moderately solid. Again, I LIKE when something from this era clicks with me, and would love to find more (balance from era to era is cool when it actually happens), but I disagree with the ongoing sentiment that if it doesn't land that way for someone, it must just be some getting older, nostalgia, or not digging enough thing. From my perspective, it just seems to be a relatively weaker decade/lull to me (I didn't start listening to music as a whole until around 2008 anyways, so it's not like I formed my sensibilities around older stuff). Maybe if I was really into Metal and its subgenres, I'd feel differently, but I'm not.

 

[Ouroboros]

Yeah, but it's not like people dislike them because of some fundamental problem with the idea of manipulating vocals. They just don't appreciate the effect that this specific type of manipulation has on the satisfaction/value that they see in the music, and even if these bands would have used modern pitch manipulation if they could, it would likely lead to a less satisfying sound that would be appreciated less, in these people's eyes (I'm certainly in that camp-- double-tracking sounds cool as heck, and I've yet to find a clear and noticeable example of the type of auto-tuning we're all talking about that I really love, personally).

Plenty of people dislike Auto-tune because of issues with blatant vocal manipulation. They think it's 'cheating' or 'taking the soul out of music' or whatever. I thought I picked up a little of those vibes in the post I quoted.

All the effects that were used in 60's can easily be replicated in Auto-tune or Melodyne or any other modern plug-in so I don't see why it would necessarily be worse. Whether those groups would have utilized the particular effect in question - which is essentially just setting retune speed to zero/instantaneous - who can say? Maybe they would have found a way to integrate it in a more appealing manner. Or maybe not, maybe it's just totally irredeemable.

Kraftwerk achieved a similarly detached, robotic effect through the use of vocoders. That's not entirely the same, but it's fairly close, and it leads me to think that perhaps in the right hands something good could be produced with even the most conspicuous of Auto-tune effects.

 

[ItsFineImFine]

I haven't really had an album in the 2010s that I absolutely loved tbh, The Jezabels' debut and Rose Elinor Dougall's 2nd album Stellular and maybe The Joy Formidable's debut came the closest but I wouldn't give any of them five stars. Some of the albums which Shareefruck for example mentioned from this past decade like the Radiohead or BoC or Alvvays albums, I thought they were pretty good but not exactly ever gonna be my favourites.

I still do find a lot of songs to listen to but rarely any new albums I love. And I realize the reason for this....quantity. It's not that I like music less now than I did before. It's that I like a very particular style of music (let's call it guitar based non-metal music plus Keane) and that there is a smaller quantity of this type of music being signed and promoted and finding success than there was in the 90s or 00s. As a result of that, I still find albums I really like from the 90s or 00s I'd never heard before but it's harder to find them from this decade because there is a smaller quantity and therefore not as much quality.

Think of it as the Slovakian hockey team. Let's be honest, they declined. They still produce good players but it's just not the same star power as before.

 

[Shareefruck]

Plenty of people dislike Auto-tune because of issues with blatant vocal manipulation. They think it's 'cheating' or 'taking the soul out of music' or whatever. I thought I picked up a little of those vibes in the post I quoted.

All the effects that were used in 60's can easily be replicated in Auto-tune or Melodyne or any other modern plug-in so I don't see why it would necessarily be worse. Whether those groups would have utilized the particular effect in question - which is essentially just setting retune speed to zero/instantaneous - who can say? Maybe they would have found a way to integrate it in a more appealing manner. Or maybe not, maybe it's just totally irredeemable.

Kraftwerk achieved a similarly detached, robotic effect through the use of vocoders. That's not entirely the same, but it's fairly close, and it leads me to think that perhaps in the right hands something good could be produced with even the most conspicuous of Auto-tune effects.

Personally, I tend to think of "cheating" and "taking the soul out of music" as two completely different things, with the former being silly/nonsensical, and the latter alluding more to what I'm referring to and having more to do with the resulting effect that the sound ends up having rather than the principle behind it, which I do relate to and find reasonable. Voices do feel like they lose a certain character/charm/personality and become a kind of soulless when they're heavily auto-tuned in a noticeable/common way, whereas I haven't really come across that issue with heavy use of double tracking (I can't say I've ever loved the vocals in Kraftwerk songs either-- their actual sound has always felt very dated to me, although I like the music overall-- on top of that, music that's going for a very cold and mechanical feel is a completely different story anyways, I feel). If you can get auto-tuning to have the same effect as double-tracking using modern technology, go nuts, I say. I sure as hell wouldn't complain about that.

 

[End on a Hinote]

A lot of complex answers here, so I'll keep mine simple.

I haven't grown out of listening to music per se, but rather new music. I either listen to classics or podcasts.

 

[cupcrazyman]

I have never bought a download & never will.Spotify has a free version so I have that.My ipod still works & has over 3,000 songs on it.

I think all that free downloading really hurt the music industry for years.

 

[Aladyyn]

I'm not old enough to grow out of music but with all the stuff going on this year I've definitely been slacking in terms of discovery and falling back on my comfort artists and albums.