I HATE Autotune and almost all the other modern production gimmicks too

[ZenMaster]

I'm gonna "give up". No more faceless vocal tracks. No more lifeless music. No more wasting the days and months of life, thats possibly the only life I'll be given here on earth, to suck out the emotion from music or to help a bunch of musos that are lost.

No more discounts, certainly no more working on spec. The clients DO value what they pay for. Thats the clients first step in studio to appreciate HIS own art, HIS knowledge on the instrument chosen, HIS music, HIS time. And also mine.

Cheap studio rate combined with Pro Tools or any other DAW is a bad, bad combination. It sets the preliminary mood.

I've been doing this almost 15yrs, and I'm going to step out of the cycle. Theres nothing more to me to wait for, nothing more to accomplish. I love music, I love MY craft, I DON'T love bands that are going to take all the obvious routes to play it safe. I'm not insisting they should take chances just for the sake of it, but playing safe hardly gets anyone excited.

From now on I'll still be using the analog 24 track, and the DAW as a tape deck.

Thanks, feel already better!

[Happy Musicfan]

You are actually in the majority. It's a relatively small clique of posers, conformists and clowns who jumped on the Auto-Tune bandwagon. They felt they had to be trendy-robotic. Sadly, some can actually sing but felt they needed to be mechanically 'fixed'.

What that means, is that the natural artistry and tone of their actual voice was destroyed in their quest to join the futuristic trend.

Yes, Usher is a gifted singer who should be letting us hear the real deal.

[lordward]

Originally Posted by ZenMaster

I'm gonna "give up". No more faceless vocal tracks. No more lifeless music. No more wasting the days and months of life, thats possibly the only life I'll be given here on earth, to suck out the emotion from music or to help a bunch of musos that are lost.

No more discounts, certainly no more working on spec. The clients DO value what they pay for. Thats the clients first step in studio to appreciate HIS own art, HIS knowledge on the instrument chosen, HIS music, HIS time. And also mine.

Cheap studio rate combined with Pro Tools or any other DAW is a bad, bad combination. It sets the preliminary mood.

I've been doing this almost 15yrs, and I'm going to step out of the cycle. Theres nothing more to me to wait for, nothing more to accomplish. I love music, I love MY craft, I DON'T love bands that are going to take all the obvious routes to play it safe. I'm not insisting they should take chances just for the sake of it, but playing safe hardly gets anyone excited.

From now on I'll still be using the analog 24 track, and the DAW as a tape deck.

Thanks, feel already better!

using 24 tracks is/was, in the opinion of "true recordists", cheating and "not real". You want a real recording then just let the band play to a 2 track, or even better straight to vinyl

[Happy Musicfan]

No need to go to extremes.

Just less Auto-Tune conformity.


Thanks.

[anna_britbass88]

Originally Posted by ZenMaster

I'm gonna "give up". No more faceless vocal tracks. No more lifeless music. No more wasting the days and months of life, thats possibly the only life I'll be given here on earth, to suck out the emotion from music or to help a bunch of musos that are lost.

No more discounts, certainly no more working on spec. The clients DO value what they pay for. Thats the clients first step in studio to appreciate HIS own art, HIS knowledge on the instrument chosen, HIS music, HIS time. And also mine.

Cheap studio rate combined with Pro Tools or any other DAW is a bad, bad combination. It sets the preliminary mood.

I've been doing this almost 15yrs, and I'm going to step out of the cycle. Theres nothing more to me to wait for, nothing more to accomplish. I love music, I love MY craft, I DON'T love bands that are going to take all the obvious routes to play it safe. I'm not insisting they should take chances just for the sake of it, but playing safe hardly gets anyone excited.

From now on I'll still be using the analog 24 track, and the DAW as a tape deck.

Thanks, feel already better!

Ummm if your studio is in L.A. can I stop by? To me that's the kind of eng/prod I want in my corner!

[GeorgeHayduke]

I knew AT was bad when a guy posted (coincidentally) that the singer was so happy with her vocal tracks, she felt so much more comfortable tracking with him because of the AT.

It was classical songs, voice and piano, I mean like Schubert and stuff. With Autotune !?!

People make stupid decision out of fear, yes. Though many a pitchy hit album has been recorded throughout recording history.

I've been saying this the last couple of years: In 20 years there'll be a remix/re-mastering market for the Untuned Version.

[KenHR]

Overused AT is horrid, yeah, especially when it's used on a great singer.

Check "Dust Bowl Children" on the last Alison Krauss album...eccch...why'd they have to AT Tyminski?

[benherron.rrr]

You are the kind of person who gives me hope for this industry.

I could also do with more people who want quality/dynamics over loudness, I believe that as recording/mixing/mastering engineers It is our job to make the music industry the best that it can be.

[famousbass]

Today's modern production gimmicks are tomorrow's standard production practice.
Give in, I say, lt them have it. Let the person paying have whatever they want.
Finish the job and walk away, because it's not yours once you hand it over.
You'll be forgotten by the client a lot faster than you give yourself credit for.
Let the artist defend their own art.
Your gig is not waving the warning flag all day, it's finishing the job and taking the next one.

[psycho_monkey]

Originally Posted by famousbass

Today's modern production gimmicks are tomorrow's standard production practice.
Give in, I say, lt them have it. Let the person paying have whatever they want.
Finish the job and walk away, because it's not yours once you hand it over.
You'll be forgotten by the client a lot faster than you give yourself credit for.
Let the artist defend their own art.
Your gig is not waving the warning flag all day, it's finishing the job and taking the next one.

Absolutely.

I suppose for the OP, it spends if he's hired as engineer or producer.

There's a niche for this sort of producer - albini, Liam Watson etc.

As an engineer - sure fire way not to get repeat clients.

[uncle duncan]

For the last few years, the industry expects vocals to be in tune, and they won't hesitate to reject projects - or even song demos pitched to publishers - if they're not in tune. In that context, your job is to deliver a professional product that meets that industry standard, or only accept projects that are immune to that industry standard.

There is a difference between autotune in auto mode and fixing a bad note in graphic mode. Consider trying the latter when needed. The former does sound pretty terrible. (Autotune the News is the exception to that rule.)

[taturana]

The Industry is dead... go for what You like and want as a result.

everything else just leads us to the same road... and dull music.

[famousbass]

Originally Posted by taturana

The Industry is dead... go for what You like and want as a result.

everything else just leads us to the same road... and dull music.

Wow! Final judgement day!

I disagree, it's not completely dead.
Paying great players for the rights to sample recordings they did in the 70s (but never, ever booking them for a production session) is still the pie-in-the-sky, money-for-jam industry model most bedroom producers dream of. That's not dead but it's an oligopoly, so it will implode eventually.

I'd hazard to offer we're existing in a purgatorial model of music business than a pure death.

Somewhat agreed, if you don't go for whatever you like you'll never be a great writer/artist/performer.
Maybe you won't be a good producer or you'll be a good eccentric one.
But you won't be a busy engineer or session musician.

[Reptil]

nice rant. I used to do a recording studio. quit that for exactly the same reason, I was recording mediocre stuff and trying to edit some life into it, but it was paying the bills (that got more and more expensive over time) just to... record and edit more mediocre stuff.

the few times I actually got a band to play as they should, and recorded a few good takes, they expected to do endless overdubs, to make it "perfect". (i.o.w. repeat ad nauseam untill all spontaneity had evaporated), then haggle afterwards over the (already discounted) price. The last time that happened the band left out the door after a long weekend, with the message; "we got a convertor/mic preamp now we're going to record ourselves".
It did put a on my face when I heard their end result.

So... I'm back to where I started, chasing glimpses of genius.

[famousbass]

Originally Posted by Reptil

nice rant.

So... I'm back to where I started, chasing glimpses of genius.

Thank you. Rants Are Us.

We still run a recording studio.
However, we take the cheaper, tiny rooms for the luxury of overdubbing, even overdubbing the life out of it, if that's what the client wants.

Music studios are a service industry.
If you're a hairdresser and they want a mullet, you give them the best mullet you can.

I'm getting the vibe you are a producer working your magic from the vantage point of the engineer? That's fine. Most of the guys who work as engineers and editors in our studio are notoriously good musicians and the client often searches our faces for approval. We check our roles at the start or part way through a project and charge accordingly.

[Reptil]

Originally Posted by famousbass

We still run a recording studio.
However, we take the cheaper, tiny rooms for the luxury of overdubbing, even overdubbing the life out of it, if that's what the client wants.

Nice gig.

Originally Posted by famousbass

Music studios are a service industry.If you're a hairdresser and they want a mullet, you give them the best mullet you can.

I agree. Client is the boss, and what the boss says, goes.
I really think that was clear already, for me it goes without saying.

Originally Posted by famousbass

I'm getting the vibe you are a producer working your magic from the vantage point of the engineer? That's fine.

A great sounding room (no really it was perfect, I still miss it's atmosphere), small but good selection of gear, and my earflaps.

But, and that's the BIG issue: not only from an engineering POV, also from the "makeshift producer" role. I had to, since even seasoned musicians are like fish on the cay, without a producer (or anyone) giving them directions. And producers cost money so that's out.

Originally Posted by ZenMaster

No more discounts, certainly no more working on spec. The clients DO value what they pay for. Thats the clients first step in studio to appreciate HIS own art, HIS knowledge on the instrument chosen, HIS music, HIS time. And also mine.

THIS sounds very familiar to me. People that have to learn first to appreciate what they do (good or bad that doesn't matter) instead of looking for a bargain. It's the mindset that's totally off. They don't know who they are anymore!
And don't even have a clue that they don't. And I'm NOT the one that's going to figure that out for them, in a few hours.

Experience dotted with some positive ones too, of course, but overall too many people in this country went for the bling-bling:
Rock musicians that are concerned as for what the guy behind the desk wears for clothes, etc. sure..
Instead of working on their sound, and know that when they stop playing, the album is not ready quite yet.
I don't think it's strange that the scene here bled dry the last few years.

Originally Posted by famousbass

Most of the guys who work as engineers and editors in our studio are notoriously good musicians and the client often searches our faces for approval. We check our roles at the start or part way through a project and charge accordingly.

Good for you. I tried the same. Clear and uncluttered deals, on paper.

I think if I'd be interested in bands and production of these, first thing I'd do is move to Spain, or London, or Croatia, ....
But I'm not interested anymore.

Got better things to do.

[zwatrif]

Originally Posted by famousbass

Today's modern production gimmicks are tomorrow's standard production practice.
Give in, I say, lt them have it. Let the person paying have whatever they want.
Finish the job and walk away, because it's not yours once you hand it over.
You'll be forgotten by the client a lot faster than you give yourself credit for.
Let the artist defend their own art.
Your gig is not waving the warning flag all day, it's finishing the job and taking the next one.

Great response! It is always about what the customer wants!

[Ward Pike]

The first time I heard AT, I had no idea what it was... and yet I knew what it was. I knew what was going on but didn't know what it was called, exactly, and I HATED IT. (You know who you are... )

I still do. It's destroying the work ethic of singers, messing with humanity, destroying reality and causing world wide famines, epidemics and preventing us from colonizing Mars.

Frig sake, people, I want a vacay on Mars. So give up the auto-tune already!

[KenHR]

AT for minor correction here and there is okay. When my old band recorded an album, I asked the studio to do a bit of correction on one of my songs as a key change in the bridge was giving me issues; rather than spend money and time doing a take over and over, we just nudged two or three notes a bit. The edit is unnoticeable.

I think AT as an effect is cool, too. Nothin wrong with having more colors on the palette.

It's when a "naturalistic" performance is doctored to the point that it sounds robotic (as in my above post, "Dust Bowl Children" on Alison Krauss's Paper Airplane) that it's just wrong. It's neither one nor the other. It just sounds bad.

[jordanvoth]

For the guys who really practice what they believe, cool. If those are your convictions that pitch correction, editing and stacking takes up is ruining music and you want to fight the good fight, go for it. There are some people who don't use it and make great music but the music is going to stand on it's own whether it's been put through these paces or not. It's a style, not using autotune and beat detective and giving shitty songs a real documentary style rendering isn't going to make them great. You better hope that all of your clients a) see eye to eye with you and b) are extremely, EXTREMELY talented musicians beyond your wildest dreams.

I use all the tools that are commonly associated with bad mainstream music. I wouldn't be opposed to not using them if I thought that would support a song and a style that was appropriate for the song. More often than not, these are the tools that create the style that is sought after. Styles come and go.

[verve92]

Auto-tune. Boll-ocks.
Just like the whole tired pop song arrangement: money, bitches, rims. Boring.
Also the verse followed by the same word three time times times

[GeorgeHayduke]

Originally Posted by jordanvoth

...Styles come and go.

Ok. But you were just saying that NOT using autotune (and beat detective) is equivalent to

Originally Posted by jordanvoth

..a real documentary style rendering..

Seriously?

Originally Posted by jordanvoth

You better hope that all of your clients .... are extremely, EXTREMELY talented musicians beyond your wildest dreams.

Really?! Can only 'extremely, extremely talented musicians' do without autotune? Wow! Not where I'm at.

[wakestyle]

lol, I read in another thread that compared to a violin or fretless, fretted instruments are like cheating

[Happy Musicfan]

The fretted instruments do not actually hit the correct notes for the instrument player. AT actually hits the correct notes for the singer who is way off, whether that is Lil Wayne off or just Kesha off. The singer is not hitting the target pitches, the software program is hitting the target pitches *for* them.

AT is simply a sonic gimmick / entirely disingenuous cheatfest. Conformist minds and cowardly singers love it and are addicted to it.

[theDAWstudio]

I just finished a gospel album with a talented vocalist. We often put AT on tracks, but removed it because it destroyed his performance and some of his vibrato just drove it crazy. I was so happy to look back at him and see him having the same expression as me, "that killed the vocal" so I could take it off. Still on some songs we needed the sound of AT and they stayed there. Those tracks with out it have so much life and emotion. When people hear stuff like his album, I hope they will realize that no AT lets something special happen. It lets a vocal have life!

[ZenMaster]

Originally Posted by anna_britbass88

Ummm if your studio is in L.A. can I stop by? To me that's the kind of eng/prod I want in my corner!

Oh no, I'm WAY too far! But you're definitely welcome if you happen to travel in Scandinavia

[ZenMaster]

Originally Posted by famousbass

Music studios are a service industry.
If you're a hairdresser and they want a mullet, you give them the best mullet you can.

Yeah. Autotune is the new mullet.

[GeorgeHayduke]

Originally Posted by ZenMaster

Autotune is the new mullet.

Signature material right there...

[ZenMaster]

Originally Posted by Reptil

nice rant. I used to do a recording studio. quit that for exactly the same reason, I was recording mediocre stuff and trying to edit some life into it, but it was paying the bills (that got more and more expensive over time) just to... record and edit more mediocre stuff.

Originally Posted by Reptil

People that have to learn first to appreciate what they do (good or bad that doesn't matter) instead of looking for a bargain. It's the mindset that's totally off. They don't know who they are anymore!
And don't even have a clue that they don't. And I'm NOT the one that's going to figure that out for them, in a few hours.

Got better things to do.

Amen my Brother! There are easier ways to pay the rent. The big money () is not why I got involved.