Please assist a (probably) tone-deaf Doper with this question. This performance of Cosmic Love raised every fine hair on my body, and I ranked it among my top 5 favorite performances of all time. (And I’ve seen everyone live. Everyone.)
The comments on the YouTube copy claim this performance is autotuned, and I must admit that Flo’s album “Lungs” is nowhere near the quality as her live performances available online. Can anyone criticize this performance for me, and/or offer opinions on the quality of her live performances vs. the studio version?
Sure sounds like it to me. I should mention that I have no problem with auto-tune other then it’s general over use is starting to get annoying, but yeah, it sounds auto-tuned (or some other editing effect to get that ‘stepped’ sound).
Ah, Joey P thanks for your quick answer, and I guess I am tone-deaf. Because this performance sounds similarly moving to me.
I guess I can finally call my mother and razz her for all the money she wasted on my piano lessons as a kid.
I think your first link is, indeed, auto-tuned. It’s unfortunate, and based on this acoustic performance where there is absolutely no auto-tune, it seems an insult to have an auto-tuner in the same building with her.
I have trouble believing a vocalist of her caliber would OK auto-tune on her mic, but there could be extenuating circumstances. Can’t tell by her hair whether she had an earpiece in, she doesn’t seem to use monitor speakers, and if her earpiece malfunctioned she would have a very hard time hearing herself on stage, and possibly OK’d it as a fail safe when she really didn’t need it anyway, and it just accentuated when she went flat a couple times. (or she had even more trouble following her own voice when she heard it from the auditorium, sounding weird from the effect) Or the production staff did it without her prior knowledge, or it was a mic from a previous performer and they gave her the wrong one. What’s she going to do once she started singing and realized the damn thing was “correcting” or “effecting” her, she couldn’t just stop. She rolled with it like the pro she is.
On preview - you linked to the same radio performance in your second post. How can you not hear the difference?
That makes two of us. Can you explain what the electronic correction is? Is it vibrato? Because vibrato generally annoys the heck out of me when done by Mariah Carey, Jessica Simpson; Josh Groban. But occasionally, as in Florence Welch’s music, it sounds like strong emotion. Can you explain why, or am I beyond comprehension?
Autotune, when used by a competent recording engineer to smooth out the rough spots in pitch, is undetectable. Many modern recording artists use it, and you can’t tell, because all it does is put their vocal on the correct pitch without changing the timbre of their voices. When dialed up to 11, though, it results in that robotic snap-to-pitch sound so common in pop music today. Kanye West and Owl City are a couple of artists off the top of my head who use it as part of their signature sound in virtually every song.
OK now that I’ve actually listened to the clip from the OP, and comparing it to the clip posted by SeaDragonTattoo, I believe there is some kind of effect being applied to the Fox performance. It is not the usual use of Autotune, and this comment from the Fox post thread might be right: To those who do not think this is autotuned, I assure you it is. Autotune has many, many different settings, amongst them is the rate at which notes are corrected. Basically, what you are hearing is Flo’s natural vibrato being hammered into a single pitch, and sometimes when it’s a bit between two notes autotune picks the wrong one and it sounds out of key. Shame, wish they would just let her sing as we all know she can, but remember that she was most likely not in charge of that decision.
In addition to Autotune, there are all kinds of effects that can be applied to vocals. At some points in the Fox performance, her voice almost sounds as if it is being octavised. At any rate, it seems like it’s enhanced somehow. And just because you can’t hear any effects on the live in studio clip doesn’t mean it isn’t Autotuned. See my comment above. After hearing Ben Gibbard sing live with DCFC I am almost certain his voice is Autotuned for their studio recordings. You would never know it, though. And I suspect Florence doesn’t need Autotune to hit pitch.
Wait wait wait! I can hear it. I haven’t touched a piano in 15 years, but played with a virtual keyboard, and compared both performances again. I’m still tone-deaf, but enlightened. Thank you
