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Why are people so upset that there is auto-tuning on the new Beach Boys album(s)? They have earned the right to use it, but more on that below...

Everyone knows that Brian was notorious for his quest for perfection, often demanding take after take of a song that sounded fine to everyone else the first time. It is no secret that he could hear things that most people missed or deemed acceptable. Mike called him Ol' Dog Ears or something similar, right?

Nowadays, with their scheduling conflicts and advanced age, it is probably impossible for the boys to get together for an entire album and do take after take and expect the vocals to be anything other than a little embarrassing – at least for a group known for their vocal harmonies.

For the Beach Boys, auto-tune is the auditory equivalent of a photographer taking a good image and using Photoshop to make it a great image. He can make it exactly what he was looking for, rather than settling for close-enough. The Photoshop effect may be apparent to some people, but the ability to portray the image as perfectly as he needs it to be, outweighs the ‘fakeness’ of the image - and the casual observer will not even notice the Photoshop use.

Many people have stated that they would rather hear the original Beach Boys with all of their mistakes, actually playing their instruments than what they have released. I think this would be a disaster. 

David Marks seems to be the only original member to have retained his ability to play his instrument with any degree of professionalism and consistency. Maybe Bruce,  – I don’t know. But even David flubs some of his solos when you watch them on YouTube. Brian seems as if he is not playing half the time (or if he is, it is so low in the mix that it is nearly inaudible). Even when he is playing, we cannot tell if he is playing well. Al Jardine is busier waving his giant hands around and clapping rather than actually playing, and again, it seems he is pretty low in the mix. Kind of like during the In Concert intro to Little Deuce Coupe. LOL.

The average listener would not accept this, and the average listener makes up a good chunk of the Beach Boys audience. Who wants to hear old men playing poorly and singing off-key? Well, I would buy it because I appreciate everything they have done, but you know what I mean.

Auto-tune allows us to hear what is left of the original Beach Boys sing the new songs the way Brian wants them to sound, and the older songs closer to how we expect to hear them.

As previously mentioned, the Beach Boys have earned the right to use auto-tune because they spent years giving us vocal perfection without using auto-tune. Auto-tune is not used to mask the fact that they are not talented. They have proven that they are, time and again. Instead it is used to maintain the level of perfection that we demand from them. If the auto-tune could be toned down to where it is less obvious, that would be perfect, of course.

A comparison would be the same way that Jackie Chan has earned the right to do his stunts with wires. In his prime, his stunt gymnastics were untouchable - just like the Beach Boys vocal gymnastics. Wires allow Jackie Chan to continue to do what he is known for.

If Brian Wilson is going to put his name on an album where he has any kind of control, he would want it to be perfect, just like he always has in the past. Auto-tune is the only way that this will happen and I will gladly take it if it means we can get new music from Brian and the boys. If they can pump out another album using auto-tune, I am all for it, especially if they can do as well as they did with TWGMTR.

There is no reason for this next sentence, but I just wanted to use this emoticon.  :afro

Is this an ad? ::)

Hi Joe  :hat

Dare I say it, Brian would have used AutoTune if he had it in the '60s.

Where is this mainstream audience snapping up Beach Boys autotuned material?

I'm not against autotune in theory. It's all over the radio. But the way the BBs/Brian often use it, it sounds awful. Sometimes, it seems like once the autotune is turned on, Brian stops trying to even sing in key. But then when he really tries, like on "Summer's Gone", it's palatable.

Only if Spector had done it. ;D

It's all about moderation.

I don't have a problem with autotune if someone does multiple takes, takes the best take and uses autotune to fix a bum note or two.

I do have a problem with someone doing one or two ok takes and then just smothering it in autotune to the point that the vocal begins to not sound human.

Or putting it so prominently on a live album.  They had 70 shows to choose from and instead of painstakingly going through all of them and picking the best performance of each song, they got lazy and the songs didn't even sound live anymore.  That's not right.

Then weird thing about that live album is that the songs didn't even sound anymore... at all. Can't wait for the 2062 iTunes release of the un"sweetened" recordings. Wait - I'll be 93 years old then! Who do they think I am, Kirk Douglas? :-D

Pretty much this.  When they used it on the last album though, we ended up with Isn't It Time sounding the way it did.

Seriously.

When C50 on cell phone camera footage on YouTube is truer and better sounding, than the released CDs?

Give me a break.

Though I agree with that statement, that's not necessarily due to Autotune, as they used some Autotune live.

Micha - I'm no sound expert and defer to those who are ( in abundance on this board) but just a fan who did see them live for seven C50 shows.  How lucky is that? I have no frame of reference to know the difference as between the two types of autotune, and welcome learning the differences.

My ears do know the difference between quality and drek.  And, in my view, the CD's did not do justice to the fabulous performances.  I dislike and disfavor anything that makes them look bad, or falsely represents those performances that we waited decades for. 

Really?  Someone who apparently would know told me there was no doctoring of the concerts at all.

At the beginning of the tour, they did use some sort of processing on Brian's live vocals. It was a terrible idea, given that it made him sound worse most of the time. They dropped it a dozen or so dates in, and by the time I saw the group it was definitely gone.

It sounded like they were processing Love's as well from the youtube videos. Thank goodness they dropped it.

Oh yeah I do remember being told that as well.

And overall, I don't think most BW fans mind some sort of digital pitch correction -- it does appear on every one of his solo records, with the likely exception of the IJWMFTT soundtrack. But there's a difference between using it to fix a bum note here and there and lathering it over every vocal track for a "contemporary" effect.

And, I've got a bridge to sell.   :lol

Damn sure they didn't! :(

David Marks tried telling me that there was no doctoring on the last live album. I didn't buy it then and I still don't buy it now. It's also very apparent in the early 50th anniversary shows that at least Brian's vocals were being fixed. It sounded horrible too.

Autotune is one of the main reasons I've stopped listening to pop music stations on the radio. I prefer hearing natural voices, flaws and all.

"Why not use auto-tune ?" Because it sounds robotic, Exhibit A : "Believe" by Cher

It's a fad like the Unplugged phase of the 90's and the disco phase of the 70's..it'll make way for some other fad one day..

My personal preference is for, not "perfection", but real, tangible, honest feeling.  I so very much would have preferred the "reunion" album to have been 5 old guys around a mic (with some some good, perhaps sparse backing instrumentation) doing as Murry once instructed and singing from their hearts to the best of whatever ability they retain.   That could have been a wonderfully vibrant and potent album, and one that, for me anyway, would have had much greater emotional impact.  I don't need "1965" again, I can have that by putting on Today! and Summer Days.   They can not sing as they used to, particularly Brian, but they have been singing together the bulk of their lives, and each were talented vocalists in their own ways and together they were incredible.   I would take a creaky oldster version of that any day over some auto tuned, overly processed fake presentation. 
Would that be the "commercial" choice?  I suppose not, but then again, who's really to say?  I have heard aged groups of vocalists sing together quite beautifully and effectively.   I believe the remnants of the BB's could have done the same.  Just my opinion though.

^
This.

Edit. Ah, the topic changed page. Anyway, SenorPotatoHead nailed it (on the previous page).

Go to bed, Joe. f*** autotune.

Brian used pitch correction in his music for at least a decade before Joe Thomas was involved, and he continued using it after Joe left for the first time.

There is a middle ground. TLOS has some pitch correction on it, I'm fairly certain, but Brian still sounds like an older guy. Ditto for BWRG.

The airbrushed textures of TWGMTR are not a necessity. (I enjoyed the effect overall, but I sympathize with those who didn't.)

 ???

Autotune is a disgusting disgrace for any well-educated ear. One thing is pitch correction, wich is OK, specially for some guys in their 70s... another thing is a robotic voice. I think it's been well established in this forum that Autotune was totallly unecessary in the latest Beach Boys production, it's pretty obvious that's it was used just as a way to make them sound more "modern" and suitable for today's (sh itt y) manistream markets.

Yeah. Kind of like they'd swapped their sweet harmonies for ten-minute wah-wah guitar orgies back in '69. Selling out to what is hip at the moment. Disgraceful.

Mods...How about a 7 day ban for such a nutty statement? Obviously drinking while posting! :lol

An old college audio production teacher of mine once said, "The best edit is the one you can't hear." 

I think this is true for auto-tune.  If it is used to fix a bum note here or there, and it is done discreetly, then it's fine.  But using auto-tune as an effect for effect's sake is something entirely different.  20 years from now, it will sound dated and bad, just like a drum machine from 1983 sounds to someone with today's ears.  Heck, I can't even stand the way it sounds today.

All of Brian's solo albums from Imagination onwards had pitch correction used, even GIOMH (listen to the strange thing that happens to Brian's voice on Fairy Tale when he sings 'and the flowers died'), although some used it better than others. Really, Brian's voice is such that heavy use of it makes his vocals sound worse. It's okay for someone who hits the notes straight-on (or misses the note straight on), but Brian hasn't been that type of singer in a long time.  Try running pitch correction on a Daniel Johnston vocal, or for a better example, Robert Plant or Bob Dylan.   Their natural voices waver too much for pitch correction to sound natural.

Billy, they used pitch collection on BW88 and OCA as well ... (Fairlight and Melodyne respectively.)

True that...was specifically referring to autotune itself but i wasn't clear on that with my wording.

Actually,  i thought the only track using pitch correction on BW88 was one for the boys.

His vocals on IJWMFTT sounded a bit.proccessed too at times.

If you're in the studio and the 5th take of a vocal just NAILS it, except for that slightly flat note at the top of your range, using auto tune to "fix" an otherwise great take is fine with me.

Using auto tune to make singers out of people who even sound bad in the shower, is not okay. At least find people with some talent!

Mostly, on the Beach Boys and Brian, I hear auto tune being used to bring a "modern" aesthetic to the music. Slick, smooth production is what's in demand. Too much of that with the teen stars, and you wind up with plastic bands that all sound the same. With the Beach Boys, you get a too perfect sheen, but it still sounds like the 'Boys to me. Until the occasional weird artifact shows up.

Mostly, I'm resigned to auto tune in modern music, for now. The backlash is coming. In the meantime, I'm just looking forward to hearing what Brian's coming up with.

Here's the thing...pitch correction can not make someone who can't sing suddenly be able to sing. Doesn't work like that. Plus, with the way autotune is used in modern pop, you have to sing a certain way in order to get the effect to sound like that. It's not merely clicking an icon and wham there it is. Getting that 'T-Pain' sound is trickier than it seems.

I read they pitch corrected even on BB85, but I read that in "Wouldn't It Be Nice". Could still be correct.

There's a difference between using pitch correction as needed and really putting effort into an artistic creation and... uh, lazily throwing a filter over something an seemingly not even checking if the filter is really not working well in some spots. Or several spots, or most of the time. It's very, very possible to use pitch correction and have it be virtually (if not completely) undetectable.

Joe Thomas' production on That's Why God Made The Radio and especially the live album is extremely lazy and detestable and, worst of all, really hurts the Beach Boys legacy, especially in what may go down as the last albums we get from them. I'm not a fan of his.

Why shouldn't the Beach Boys use auto-tune if it gives them the results they are satisfied with, within the time-frame that they have available, given their various schedules? At this point in their lives they may not be capable of producing results that are acceptable to them without using auto-tune.

If it gives us more music from them I am all for it, even though I do not necessarily like the effect. If it is that or nothing, I will gladly take it. Especially if Brian has music he wants to get out.

Also, I will take the auto-tuned Beach Boys over a group of professional musicians who can perfectly recreate their harmonies, because even auto-tuned, I can tell it is the Beach Boys and not the Wondermints, or the touring Beach Boys band. As talented as these bands are (and they are really talented) there is something missing from the vocal blend that needs Brian, Mike, Al and Bruce.

There's a part in Shelter where I seriously can't tell whether it's Jeff Foskett or Mike Love who's singing and that's because of the auto-tune effect.

It's obvious the BB used lots of audio processing on their voices on Still Cruisin' but even on that album (which isn't a big fan favorite as far as I can tell) it sounds a lot more tastefully done than on TWGMTR.

Also, I'm pretty sure at least Al Jardine's voice would sound perfectly fine without the auto-tune effect but it's even used on his singing in From Here to Back Again. Doesn't make an awful lot of sense to me.

Give me the seventy-somethings, singing straight from their toes, any old day...

Any flaws were hard-earned, endearing, and now part of their charm... ;)

"it is probably impossible for the boys to get together for an entire album and do take after take and expect the vocals to be anything other than a little embarrassing "...

From the original post...I don't agree with this.  Embarrassing?   ???

No. :hat

Imagine Love You with auto-tune. :3d

Singing in an "age appropriate" key might be more advantageous to conserve the voice, instead of subjecting it to injury.

When we were in our Music Education for Teaching courses, we learned that different ages and genders have different vocal ranges, where they can sing "do-to-do" comfortably, and several notes above and below the scale.  

Key transposition might be a better alternative to auto tune, where greater authenticy is preserved.  I've read somewhere there is a desire to sing in the (twenty-something) original key.  Keys might need to be adjusted up or down, to accommodate the human voices as it is male/female, young, adult or "mature."

There no shame in transposing a key, but altering/robotizing a voice is another story.  JMHO

That would be a hell of a trip...

Freddie, make more autotune experiments.

Actually, the original post stated "a little embarrassing." If you remove the auto-tune, the vocals will obviously not be to their high standards or they would not be using auto-tune to begin with. Do you think any of the Beach Boys would want us to hear them sing on a studio album when their vocals are off-key?

I think we get a pretty good idea of what they can do when we hear them perform live.  Doubtful that many expect perfection in that situation.

What WAS embarrassing is [back in the day] when they played the huge arenas and stadiums and really couldn't hear one another properly.  Next to impossible to nail it in that situation...and they didn't.  When they played the smaller venues...like they did when they went out to promote the 4 disc box ste in the early 90s...the harmonies were tight and ON the mark.  Nowadays with the little ear-pieces they use...they CAN hear and that makes all the difference...usually.

'They' say the last thing to 'go' is the voice...  So I think that they can still do pretty well with all of this and that tweaks are probably all they need much of the time.

----------------------------------

By the way...just so we're clear here...*I'M* not saying it was embarrassing 'back in the day'.  The guys commented about it on stage during the box set tour.

The use of Autotune should be invisible, or damn near so. Especially in the case of BB product.

Autotune (when it's used to draw attention to itself as an intentional weird-sounding effect, as is the case on many hip hop/pop albums these days) makes my ears bleed and stomach turn. I don't really think that Joe Thomas was quite going for that style. Maybe he was going for something that sounded a bit "modern", but I can't quite figure out what the intentions were, honestly.

But if there was ever any intent for the use of Autotune to not be blatantly apparent on TWGMTR, it didn't work. It took me a long while to be able to enjoy the album and just “tune out” the annoying autotune, to the best of my ability. I mean, it's still there, but because I love many of the songs on the album, I just try to listen “through” and despite it. I have grown to really love about 60% of that album (even with the Autotune annoyingly audible), but the implementation of Autotune really should have been done better, IMO.

Are the Beach Boys even doing a new album, or is that some kind of new news?  ???

Strars and Stripes vol 2..  ;D :lol

After the dreaded, highly combustible SIP, the RIAA issued a 50 year ban from releasing any new albums. :-D

This thread is not supposed to be about the shortcomings of auto-tune, whether you like the effect or not, or whether it sounds fake or robotic. There are a ton of threads about this already.

Have the Beach Boys earned the right to use the modern technology of auto-tune (or other pitch enhancement) to enhance new recordings? "New" meaning music since pitch correction has been available to them or even new recordings of 'old' music, but most recently the TWGMTR and C50 albums.

Brian has always doubled vocals, pieced together vocals and snippets, enhanced live recordings with additional vocals, etc. to make the records sound better. This is another effect that saves time and effort in the studio. Their live vocals are enhanced and often doubled with the actual Beach Boys voices being lower in the mix (than Jeff Foskett, for instance). The same with the instruments for that matter.

Regardless of what you want to hear from The Beach Boys or whether you will ever listen to them again if they use auto-tune, have they earned the right to use it, and would you rather have nothing from them at all, or new music using auto-tune?

I don't think you'll find many (if any) real fans who would rather have zero new recordings as opposed to recordings with some autotune on them. Of course the BBs have earned the right to do what they want to do (or what they approve, whether happily or grudgingly, a producer to do their voices). But that doesn't mean that it's not worth noting that many instances of autotune that the BBs have used don't sound all that hot, and ideally could have been done more transparently. Just an opinion.

What kind of a question is that? Have they "earned the right to use autotune?"  What does that mean? That they are part of the "over the hill gang?"

They don't owe anyone anything.  50+ years of wonderfull-ness.  They've earned the right to have their concerts fairly represented.  And, I don't think it was with C50.

The question is whether it was "over used" to the point the C50 live was wrecked and inferior to amateur YouTube?  Is it an apology in advance?  It is insulting, I think.  They've done impromptu "concerts" with little else but bongos, acoustic guitars and their voices and sound pretty good to me.  

Isn't it better to arrange music to "fit their voices" rather than take their voices, and for lack of a better term, (because I'm no sound expert) and "process them" after-the-fact, and I do really apologize if it is explained badly.  They have not lost their voices.

Sure, a little "enhancement" or "doubling" which has been great and done for years is fine. They were really innovative at achieving their "sound"  The issue, for me is overkill.

No one will convince me that the raw footage from C50 was not "good enough" to cobble together for a decent CD.  It was so disappointing to open that CD, load it onto a laptop, connect my iphone and listen to it, expecting that sheer magnificence which was their night-after-night M.O. and have the finished product so disappointing.  

I almost feel disloyal to write this, but it is the only time in nearly 50 years I didn't savor every single second of one of their recordings, and was further disappointed to think that all those other people who never got to see them during C50 would never ever know just how great their performances were.  Because that CD was just awful and the "disconnect" as between BB "performance" and CD "product" was so complete.

And, I found it so disappointing that I removed it from the phone, and just run YouTubes, (good luck with my phone data plan!) everyday, to catch some of that magic that was C50.  Those C50 YouTubes are on my Roku, Apple TV, etc. and that is what C50 was, unvarnished. Fire and excellence.  

Maybe some "magic" but not done-to-death, over-processing.   ;)

The Beach Boys have earned the right to jump 600 feet into a two foot cup.  They've earned the right to just give speaking engagement tours.  They've earned the right to tour collectively and/or individually.  The Beach Boys have pretty much earned the right to do whatever they damn well feel like doing...and they do it.

As for using the latest gizmos?  Ya they've earned the right to play with those too...if they want to.

"earned the right"?

What kind of a question...or remark for that matter...is that? :lol

Sorry I am not being clear.

"Earn" as obtaining something for one's services. The Beach Boys have given us many years of services as entertainment and hundreds of non-auto-tuned songs. If they want to use it (or need to) then why not? They have certainly done the time and provided us with 5 decades of gorgeous harmonies. It is not a big deal.

It is not like new "artists" that use effects to mask that they cannot sing well, or get caught lip-synching.  The Beach Boys have earned it.

Why not use auto-tune?  Because it sounds like merda.

I understand what you meant, and I agree. They've earned to do the right to do whatever they hell they want. If they want to do a cover of Avraham Fried songs, or maybe an album of them belching the alphabet, or whatever...it's their perogative. They don't owe us jack.

The argument makes no sense.  No one "earns a right" to use some sound technology - if the technology is available and an artist wants to use it, they can - they don't need to earn it.  But we as fans of good music can dislike its' use and be disappointed and dismayed at its' overuse.  And it's not clear who really wants the autotune - is the producer 'pushing" it on willing singers, or did the singers request it be used from the start?  I suspect the former.  And if we do not like the end result, we can fault both the producer and artist.

From my point of view there are only 3 reasons to use autotune, namely when the feeling of a vocal take was perfect, but the note was not in pitch exactly, to add a high voice nobody can reach (Jeff does it on the last BB album, Sweet did it always - but they slowed the tape down to sing that) or to use it as an effect (Cher in "Believe").

Oh, another reason would be to work with young children.

The argument makes plenty of sense once you are willing to differentiate between simply "getting" something and "earning" it. It has nothing to do with who wants it, who approved it, who used it, when they used it, whether fans like it or whose fault it is. That is not what I was asking. A "new performer" using the effect for pitch correction just because it is available is just plain lazy or probably does not have the talent to sing on key to begin with.  :deadhorse

What you say has interested me because it made me wonder... If the auto-tune was done afterwards, that probably means that there is the possibility of hearing the pure vocals prior to adjusting them. Maybe the answer is that each release should be 2 disks? Disk 1 with pitch correction and disk 2 - exactly the same recording without pitch corrections.  ;)

Hey nice you brought that up - the Beach Boys have used varispeed to make voices higher before - Be Here in the Morning comes to mind.  That's a nicer effect than autotune on my ears at least. 

There are as many (possible) reasons to use pitch correction as there are to record: infinite. Just as there are infinite numbers of potential reasons to use distortion, choruses, flangers, phasers, gates, compression, reverb, harmonizers, limiters, different mics and miking techniques, instrumentation, arrangements, words, notes... The entire spectrum of options is just that. And as others have said, nobody earns the right to use whatever they want.

Then it's up to listeners to either enjoy the results or incessantly bring it up on message boards.

Funniest thing about auto tune on the last album was people (one asshole in particular, since seen off by AGD after some other nonsense - thankfully - was particularly wearing in this regard) who didn't have a fucking clue, moaning about it then the whole thing being picked up by mainstream print journalists (who also clearly didn't have a fucking clue), who then highlighted its use as one of the album's failings, as if this is the only album EVER to use audio legerdemain...

"the Beach Boys have used varispeed to make voices higher before"

Yes ! and as well to lower them, think of Wind Chimes (The wind chimes tinglin' tinglin' .....) that tape loop is used like people did years later with a sampler. Clever idea back then !

There you go being all rational and sh*t.  This is a thread about Autotune.  There's no use for logic in a thread about autotune, even the plug in they use isn't called Autotune but we still bitch about it, using the wrong word, anyways. 

Also in all threads about Autotune somebody has to use the words 'natural', 'warm', and 'aural'. 

I don't know about anyone else, but I definitely prefer aural to be warm....though it doesn't necessarily have to be "natural"   :happydance

This is it for me too. I don't care what kind of studio tricks a producer or artist wants to use as long as it's not overdone or sucking the life out of a performance like too much vocal processing can do.

The Fairlight makes sense but didn't OCA come out (1995) before the first release of Melodyne (c. 2000, if memory serves)?