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I have used auto-tune in the past with singers I've recorded in order to correct small pitch deviations that didn't warrant a total re-take of a vocal section, and it's effective in that scenario.
But what I think is going wrong with the "abuse" of the program is a lot of mix engineers tend to apply the effect to the entire vocal line in a way that presents the vocals as unnatural and artificially tonally "perfect", which can be clearly spotted if you listen to a majority of new rock acts on the radio. Using such an effect to transform the natural state of a vocal, instead of using it to correct isolated mistakes, can be a creative application, but more often than not it's used to make a bad singer sound good, which is the main concern in terms of honesty to the music itself and the fans who expect consistency in the bands they love whether in the studio or on stage. |
By the way...
For anyone who is possibly confusing the application of Auto-tune: The T-Pain effect is Auto-Tune used in an EXTREME application with absolutely no humanizing settings. The intention is to sound robotic. But Auto-Tune used in a realistic manner is even easily spotted when used consistently along a vocal line because of the audio phasing it introduces to the vocal itself, which is unavoidable. Some producers actually add phasing effects on top of this to balance it out and make it less noticeable as a corrective action and more noticeable as an intended "effect". It's either a deception or taking advantage of a situation. It's really up to the listener to decide. It should be known that Auto-Tune is most certainly a corrective function, but it's also known that it has made singers a lot more lazy than they used to be, that's for sure. |
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Auto-Tune allows a person to modify an audio file using an algorithm similar to timestretching, except instead of modifying tempo without modifying pitch, it modifies pitch without modifying tempo. It's basically drawing a pitch envelope. Vocoders are more in a re-synthesis vein that has more to do with filters and melodic reproduction based on filter settings. |
Both of Freebases comments are correct. It is not a new effect by any means. Engineers have been using it to correct subtle, and not so subtle, pitch deviations for years.
Sometimes in the case of an artist who's image sells, but can't carry a tune with a wheel barrel, the effect is used much more liberally both in live and studio applications, such as in this humorous example of an atist's vocals before being sent through the auto-tune processor: It wasn't until pop, hip-hop, and yes offshoots of genre's ending in "mo" started utilizing the effect creatively by maxing out the effect's parameters, (aka a vocoder), that the general public became hugely aware of it's usage. |
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...lmao
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I can't stand auto-tuning, it makes it possible for tween celebrities with no singing talent and Kanye West to make **** albums. It'll become unpopular soon I hope, just like the super-chorusy guitars and reverbified drums from the 80's.
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Vocoders are polyphonic chordal & vocally manipulated filters.
It's nowhere near the same thing as AutoTune, in any instance, and in any extreme. We really have to stop calling AutoTune a Vocoder... Unless we're just using that as a slang term or something. |
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