If there’s any kind of a vote or anything, I nominate this to be the next SDMB catchphrase.
How about Jethro Tull doing “Songs from the Wood”? Not the whole song, of course, but the acappella vocal harmonies were always on tape (as well as the flute fill during the intro–Ian Anderson didn’t even mime it himself; Barrie Barlow popped up from behind his kit with a flute for that one lick). Ian had some stage patter about how they were about to perform “perfect medieval harmony, almost indistinguishable from the master tape playing behind the stage!”
The Who have used taped instrumental parts onstage since at least as far back as 1971.
Sounds like the basic difference is between “song” and “spectacle.”
Maybe “unplugged” version of shows are the way to go. No one has the expectation that it will sound like the studio mix and musicians don’t have to worry about replicating some high tech vocoded vocal that was created in studio by some engineer and Protools.
Back in the 1970s, James Taylor sang his own backup vocals on tape when he performed the song “Shower the People” in concert. The reel-to-reel tape recorder sat on stage with its own spotlight, and was started and stopped by remote control by the sound man during the choruses.
I haven’t had the patience to read all of the previous posts, but please shoot me if I ever attend a concert where “a difficult or strenuous dance number” takes the place of the actual music.
Kids today. :rolleyes:
Heh. I saw They Might Be Giants back when it was just John & John, and they did rely on pre-recorded backing tracks. So that, in response to requests to the audience, they had to say something like, “We’re not the kind of band that plays the music you want to hear.”
Oh, and although I’ve never seen this, I understand Queen would actually leave the stage during the middle section of “Bohemian Rhapsody,” since there was no use in pretending that it wasn’t Memorex, so to speak.
So how does T-Pain do concerts? Does he bring the Autotune up on stage with him?