Mouth Off 07.19.09
Soup2Nuts Special
Listen to the show right here:
Or use this link to download the mp3 and take it with you.
In this week’s special episode, Dave gives an in-depth report of his recent experience at the famous Soup2Nuts 5-day a cappella recording seminar.For more info on the seminar, visit the Soup2Nuts website.
To download mp3s of the group’s cover of Jamiroquai’s “Cosmic Girl” and the hip-hop original track “Royalty,” visit this page.
And don’t miss these videos of what it was like inside the studio. Thanks to Cy for posting those.
Got any questions about Soup2Nuts? Feel free to ask… just click on the “Contact” page above.
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Fascinating show. It never occurred to me that part of getting that “just like the record” sound was just sitting there in the studio playing the original and mimicing it bar by bar. Must have been a great workshop to be part of, Bill and Deke know their stuff. And the tracks you guys put together in a couple of days sound beaut.
But, while I agree that Antares Autotune does appear to have more “range,” I’ll go to my grave disputing the notion that it gives a more “natural” sound than Melodyne. I can spot Antares a mile away, it shits me to tears. Nice as an effect, if used occasionally, but very difficult to conceal – it sucks the harmonics all into a narrow sound and robs a voice of its character.
Too bad it’s on every pop song since 2005, kids will grow up thinking Stevie Wonder sounds out of tune and not understand that all the stuff around the edges is the character, the humanity. Melodyne seems to be a better choice if you don’t want to sound like you need tuning – you can leave the pitch and drift correction off and just gently nudge individual notes around to sweeten up a sour chord.
But, uh, yeah, that’s a barney for another day.
Loz
Yeah, we’ll have to let Bill defend himself on that point. Who knows if I even quoted him right!
–DB
Thing is, comparing Autotune to Melodyne is like comparing a screwdriver to a full craftsman tool set. Autotune tunes very well. The newest version even copies some of what Melodyne does. But AT remains a highly specialized tool; Melodyne does far more (and always has since v1 – of which I was an original beta user back in like, 2001…even though it did sound pretty bad back then!). Both tools have their uses; studios wouldn’t have just one or the other, typically. But if they could only afford one, Melodyne offers much more for the money.
I think the larger issue is how the tools are used. Melodyne is easy to abuse, and because of this fact I often get tracks from groups taking their first stab at editing that are overtuned. Another issue is time/money/ROI – if you have the and or money to edit tuning and rhythm and formant and tempo separately (the first in AT, the rest by hand), then yes, it will almost always sound better than if you did all of this in Melodyne. This is actually how I did things for several years. Nowadays though, many groups don’t have the budget or patience to do this…and in many cases can’t tell the difference anyway, or don’t care. In one aspect, it’s not dissimilar from the whole MP3 to Wav debate of a few years back.
Anyway…we could end this whole debate if we just agreed to either sing in tune or not record! I kid, I kid.
Keep up the good work, D and C
Dave
I have to second most of what Dio said. Each program offers different functionalities, and at the end of the day the one you use depends on what sort of sound — and control over the sound — you’re hoping to achieve. Glad to be having this discussion though- it’s one for the books! (Though I always sing in tune, so I rarely have to worry about either program
-C
Mathematically, Josh is approximately the nicest person ever.
This was a really fantastic exercise and show. I learned a lot from this episode, but here’s something that I need to ask. Because the group kind of just put the song together like a puzzle, you’re left with no arrangement per se. What I mean is, after this session, you are not ready to go out and perform this live even though you have this excellent recording. Is this common? Would it make more sense to arrange it for the group, sing/record it “live”, and then start “painting” on top of it? I feel like this might give the song a different feel; I’m not sure for better or worse, but perhaps more believable. Anyway, clearly I don’t know what I’m talking about, but any input would be awesome! Great job!
Alfred: Your question goes to the heart of the issue of what’s “legitimately” a-cappella, which is an issue groups must face on their own (and then beat each other up over). Note the July 5 podcast, wherein Dave reveals Gene Puerling’s philosophy behind Singers Unlimited– that the studio provided Puerling with his ideal mode of artistic expression, or something to that effect One can also argue that arranging is piecing a puzzle together in and of itself. To make a Deke-esque analogy, they’re simply just painting the whole damn picture on the cardboard instead of breaking open the jigsaw puzzle box and piecing it together. As the end result of most jigsaw puzzles is a complete picture anyway, does it matter how it was assembled? I argue no, provided of course that there’s actual “painting”– i.e. correct harmonies and voicings– going on.
That Jamiroquai song is HOT!! Love it so much.
Again, just getting to this episode now, but LOVED both tracks from your experience. I would love to have an experience like that.