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Author Topic: Some questions about TWGMTR ...  (Read 16376 times)
Autotune
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« Reply #50 on: September 25, 2014, 03:53:45 AM »

I just disagree. I don't think Brian could have done good versions. I don't see what his "The Like in I Love You" vocals have to do with it.

It's a pretty high vocal throughout. He sounds nice anf sweet in it. The highest note in the Foskett lead on IIT is only one whole tone higher than the highest note on TLIILY. He surely could have done it.
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« Reply #51 on: September 25, 2014, 04:48:09 AM »

I have trouble picking out individual voices in the harmonies on this album because of all the Godforsaken Auto-Tune. Angry It sucks the life and nuances out of the vocals and makes everybody sound like a freaking android. It's meant to be used as a tool to smooth over a note here and there in otherwise acceptable/good/great takes. It isn't supposed to be an end unto itself. Unfortunately, somebody involved in the production of the album (I suspect Joe Thomas, or one of the lawyers/executives at Capitol who know nothing about good music and couldn't care less about such) thinks it's the modern equivalent of a good echo chamber. Furthermore, considering the way that The Beach Boys have tracked their vocals since 1963, i.e., doubling, tripling and even quadrupling the parts, the use of Auto-Tune is flatly unnecessary, as the aforementioned, tried and true production techniques create a natural form of Auto-Tune, psychoacoustically (yes, that's a real word) speaking.

Something else about the vocals on the album in question: The unfortunate absence of Carl Wilson.

It doesn't matter how many walls of Foskett and Brian you insert into the vocals, the missing -and arguably most crucial- element in the vocal blend cannot be compensated for. I've long understood that Carl's voice was (more often than not quite literally) the center of the vocal blend but it wasn't until this album came out that I truly appreciated this fact. Doesn't matter how the parts are arranged either, the richness that Carl's voice brought to the stack is simply gone. Even if all non-Beach Boys (and the Auto-Tune) were removed from the album, the blend would still not be right. (Since this is the Internet, I'll now say what I shouldn't have to: Please refrain from snarking that Carl's absence can't be helped -I'm just making an observation here.) 
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SIP.FLAC
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« Reply #52 on: September 25, 2014, 04:52:24 PM »

Brian does sing falsetto on "Think About the Days" and sounds pretty good.

Ummm... I think that's Bruce. Sure I recall reading that somewhere.

Brian is absolutely on it. Around 42 seconds and again 55 seconds.

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« Reply #53 on: September 25, 2014, 04:59:27 PM »

Its amazing that Al could sound so much like Brian back in the day and nowadays he can sound just like Mike. "You've been thinking bout some things we used to do" from FTABA sounds just like a young Mike.
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« Reply #54 on: September 25, 2014, 05:42:26 PM »

Brian does sing falsetto on "Think About the Days" and sounds pretty good.

Ummm... I think that's Bruce. Sure I recall reading that somewhere.

Brian is absolutely on it. Around 42 seconds and again 55 seconds.



That is correct.
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« Reply #55 on: September 25, 2014, 06:25:45 PM »

Brian does sing falsetto on "Think About the Days" and sounds pretty good.

Ummm... I think that's Bruce. Sure I recall reading that somewhere.

Brian is absolutely on it. Around 42 seconds and again 55 seconds.




At :42 I know that's Brian on the high part, followed by Bruce on the higher part right? Does Foskett have any falsetto on TATD?
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« Reply #56 on: September 25, 2014, 06:41:42 PM »

Brian does sing falsetto on "Think About the Days" and sounds pretty good.

Ummm... I think that's Bruce. Sure I recall reading that somewhere.

Brian is absolutely on it. Around 42 seconds and again 55 seconds.




At :42 I know that's Brian on the high part, followed by Bruce on the higher part right? Does Foskett have any falsetto on TATD?

I recall him being all over the place on it. I'll grab times in a sec.
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« Reply #57 on: September 25, 2014, 07:44:38 PM »

Its amazing that Al could sound so much like Brian back in the day and nowadays he can sound just like Mike. "You've been thinking bout some things we used to do" from FTTBA sounds just like a young Mike.
Interesting, does it mean the autotune makes him sound like Mike? Although granted, the next line is even more crammed with autotune.
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« Reply #58 on: September 25, 2014, 07:48:51 PM »

Its amazing that Al could sound so much like Brian back in the day and nowadays he can sound just like Mike. "You've been thinking bout some things we used to do" from FTABA sounds just like a young Mike.

I think that part is actually sung by Mike. I think Mike is harmonizing in there, and they're doing a little unison. There are quite a few examples of this on BB records ... 'All This is That' and a lot of the M.I.U. Album comes to mind.
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« Reply #59 on: September 25, 2014, 08:22:04 PM »

Its amazing that Al could sound so much like Brian back in the day and nowadays he can sound just like Mike. "You've been thinking bout some things we used to do" from FTABA sounds just like a young Mike.

I think that part is actually sung by Mike. I think Mike is harmonizing in there, and they're doing a little unison. There are quite a few examples of this on BB records ... 'All This is That' and a lot of the M.I.U. Album comes to mind.

It's Al. Mike's nasal tenor doesn't show up at all on the rest of the album. Seems an odd time to start using it.
Al has a similar delivery Mike-like delivery on the "pacific coast getaway" line, where its more obviously just Al.
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« Reply #60 on: September 26, 2014, 06:56:57 AM »

I'd rather have the BBs sing the lyrics in a lower key, or slightly off key, rather than the robotic patchwork of autotune and Jeff that we ended up with.

I don't care if a word or a whole line is off, i don't care if the falsetto is shaky. These are 70 year old human beings, not Beyonce. i don't expect a flawless performance, i expect the Beach Boys to SING the majority of their own songs.

It's a missed opportunity they didn't take a production approach similar to Postcard from California in it's final (current?) form - perhaps there is some auto-v jiggery-pokery on PFC, but if so, can't say I've noticed.

The production of Al's album is absolutely fantastic - with a very crisp sound to the engineering/mixing. He's using some seriously high quality gear but for the most part going for a very dry sound. The final production (as well as the ad-libbed vocal parts) give it a major "performance" vibe, which works quite well with the songs, arrangements, etc. Looking at TWGMTR, I can't think of any way that this could've been applied to Brian's arrangements, certainly not the second half, without strongly affecting the emotional impact.

Producing TWGMTR like APCFC would be like taking this:



and presenting it as:



My apologies that the perspective is different on the two.



Thanks for the interestin' response and differentiation re the dry approach on Postcards, gives me a different perspective/approach for when I next listen.  Smiley

Just to clarify my vague post, I was specifically talking about the vocal production on TWGMTR - ie, the obvious use of autotoon; as opposed to Postcard - if there is autotune on the Postcard vox, I haven't noticed, and wish they'd pull it back a tad on TWetc

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« Reply #61 on: September 26, 2014, 09:16:31 AM »

Brian does sing falsetto on "Think About the Days" and sounds pretty good.

Ummm... I think that's Bruce. Sure I recall reading that somewhere.

Brian is absolutely on it. Around 42 seconds and again 55 seconds.




At :42 I know that's Brian on the high part, followed by Bruce on the higher part right? Does Foskett have any falsetto on TATD?

He's the first falsetto you hear on the song. Contrast with Bruce's "woooah" at 10s and 40s.
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« Reply #62 on: September 26, 2014, 09:18:15 AM »

Its amazing that Al could sound so much like Brian back in the day and nowadays he can sound just like Mike. "You've been thinking bout some things we used to do" from FTTBA sounds just like a young Mike.
Interesting, does it mean the autotune makes him sound like Mike? Although granted, the next line is even more crammed with autotune.

I don't think so. I know I've noticed other times where Al has sounded like Mike, but can't think of any examples at the moment.

It might be more accurate to say that Al could quite often sound like Mike, but its more obvious nowadays that Mike's voice is more breathy and less nasal.
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« Reply #63 on: September 26, 2014, 10:03:32 AM »

"You've been thinking bout some things we used to do" is Mike!

"Thinkin' bout when life was still in front of you" is Al.

Given the way they punched in vocals, it's not too much of a stretch that they traded off lines like that. Al himself said he sang FFTBA one line at a time.
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« Reply #64 on: September 26, 2014, 10:09:01 AM »

It's all Al.
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« Reply #65 on: September 26, 2014, 11:00:52 AM »

It's all Al.
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« Reply #66 on: September 26, 2014, 11:49:49 AM »

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« Reply #67 on: September 26, 2014, 12:14:07 PM »

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« Reply #68 on: September 26, 2014, 12:19:00 PM »

Nevermind
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« Reply #69 on: September 26, 2014, 05:26:30 PM »

"From There to Back Again" is definitely all Al (up until Brian's part obviously).

The reasons the vocals are sometimes hard to discern on that album include:

1. Autotune

2. The way the voices are layered and overlap, both in terms of performance and mix. Sometimes sounds good, sometimes turns the recording/mix to mush. Not talking about harmonies, but lead vocal parts. One of the reasons why even that huge amazing band was turning live takes of "TWGMTR" into a trainwreck, because it was impossible to replicate the way they stitched that song together in the studio.

3. The processing. This all kind of weaves in and out mixing and autotune issues. But listen to Al's vocals (and Brian's bits for that matter) on Al's "Postcard" album. Al still sometimes (if not usually) cuts basic tracks on analog tape and then dumps into ProTools to edit/mix/overdub, etc. But there is more purity and warmth to some of the stuff on that album, simply because they were more simple recordings.
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