♪
♪ With so many people
♪ To love in my life
♪ Tell me, why do I worry about one? ♪
♪ But you-u-u --
♪ Oh...
-The quest for the perfect vocal track...
-One more time.
-♪ We are the champions
♪ my friend
-...where artistry meets technology...
-♪ I've taken my vows
-What are you doing there?
-I'm just gonna get a rough balance, okay?
-...and pop music becomes a collaboration
between man and machine.
-Okay, fellas. Let's do a take now.
-♪ Ridin' along on a carousel
♪ Trying to catch up to you
-♪ Oh oh oh, oh-oh-oh-oh-oh ♪
-We think of the voice as the purest of musical instruments.
♪
-[ Vocalizing ]
-We worship it.
-The winner of "American Idol" is...
Carrie Underwood!
[Cheers and applause] -♪ Take it!
♪ Take another little piece of my heart now, baby ♪
-We fret over how to capture it.
-What are you gonna hear when you hear that, Sam?
You're gonna hear the vocal.
What you hear it's what's up front.
And when we play "Piece of My Heart,"
what's gonna be up front is gonna be the vocal.
-Hey, listen, but we -- -Okay, let me do both of it --
-And unless the instrumental, like, really makes a mistake,
it's not gonna sound that wrong.
-Yet we just can't resist messing with it.
-[ Through a talk box ] ♪ Do you feel like we do?
[ Cheers and applause ]
-With all the changes in sound recording...
♪
-♪ How can you mend
♪ This broken heart?
-...the voice is the soul of the song.
-♪ How can you stop the rain from falling down? ♪
♪ All I'm trying to say is
♪ How can you stop
♪ The sun from shining?
♪ And I want to know
♪ What makes the world go around? ♪
♪
-Okay, then. Okay.
-It'll be an F for you.
-Here we go.
-Just one more time.
-Right after I say, "Are you sure?"
Da da da -- yeah.
-Oh.
-Hal, here's how I want to do it. Takes like this.
-All right, it's fun time. Fun time.
-Here we go.
-Oh, really? -17, take one.
-This will be the keeper.
♪
-So, here's where the various elements begin.
♪
In the studio, speakers are always situated
across the back of the board,
and there's, like, a speaker line,
and really gifted people can jump across that line.
Garth Brooks and Mick Jagger,
Gladys Knight.
Gladys Knight was amazing.
You can be a really good singer,
you can have all this technique, but you never leap out.
It's a really rare gift.
-♪ Let the sky fall
♪ When it crumbles
♪ We will stand tall
-It's a certain aspect that cuts through everything
and makes you want to listen.
I think, if there's a recipe, it's human emotions.
Melody and human emotion
are the things that reach out to the human psyche.
-♪ Face it all together at skyfall ♪
-Adele is -- she sounds like one of these
kinds of once-in-a-generation singers.
In previous generations, it might have been someone
like an Aretha Franklin, or like an Ella Fitzgerald.
What people identify and resonate with in Adele's voice
is her ability to project emotion on this grand scale.
She just taps into that emotional heart of yourself
and rips it out or replaces it with something
that she brings in in the quality of her songs.
-♪ There's a fire starting in my heart ♪
-With vocalists, someone has to strike a balance between
technical excellence and complete emotional freedom,
and I think the two are at odds with each other in terms of
possibly the neurology and physiology of singing.
-♪ See how I'll leave with every piece of you ♪
♪ Don't underestimate the things that I will do ♪
-But there's that beautiful point when someone hits it,
you know, your, your hair stands on end.
It connects with you in a very deep way.
-♪ Bringing me out the dark
♪ Finally, I can see you crystal clear ♪
♪ Go ahead and sell me out, and I'll lay your ship bare ♪
♪ See how I'll leave with every piece of you ♪
♪ Don't underestimate the things that I will do ♪
Cool. That's four of them, yeah?
-[ Laughs ]
This is a session that hasn't been opened since,
until today, since we did it.
-♪ Baby, I have no story to be told ♪
♪ But I've heard one on you
♪ And I'm gonna make your head burn ♪
-"Rolling in the Deep," obviously,
was an incredibly personal piece of music
that was driven completely by the end of a relationship
and her anger at the situation.
-♪ There's a fire starting in my heart ♪
-Had this little studio
that was basically like a little garden shed.
It's kinda cold.
Because it opened right into this little courtyard,
there was, like, leaves blowing in,
and there was this weird little step in the studio.
This floor was concrete. And, it was, like...
You can't really stamp on this.
It's like it doesn't do anything.
And, there's this, I saw the spot with the wooden step,
and I was, like, "Why don't you go and stomp on that."
So, I put this, put the, you know, the mic down
and she did a whole track of stamping on this wooden step,
and then we sort of multi-tracked it
so, it was about eight of her.
You can actually hear her breaths in it.
-[ Chuckles, claps ]
♪ Throw your soul through every open door ♪
-I don't think any of us can predict when there's gonna be
someone that comes out with the kind of power and ability
to reach people of all generations,
across all genres of music, as Adele, you know,
be able to wrap around a melody and really express yourself
a-and modulate the way that you're singing.
-♪ We could have had it all
-♪ Tears are gonna fall, rolling in the deep ♪
-♪ We could have had it all
♪ You're gonna wish you never had met me ♪
-You know, recording's a really personal matter,
and you dig deep, and you wanna be naked.
[ Guitar playing ]
You need to just really be present
and get into the emotion of it.
♪ I was in a daze, movin' in the wrong direction ♪
♪ Feelin' that I'd always be the lonely one ♪
You know, when I fell in love with the blues,
I went back and got as many records as I could
of the history that showed where this music came from.
It turned out the biggest stars of the day
were the women blues singers, the classic blues singers.
And, when I heard Bessie Smith,
like most people the first time they hear her,
you just -- you don't know what to say.
You've just never heard a voice with that kind of power.
-♪ Looka here, Daddy
♪ I want to tell you
♪ Please get out of my sight
-She was the beginning of the influence
for all those people that came after her,
whether it was Dinah Washington or Ruth Brown,
Aretha Franklin, who was my hero when I was growing up.
You go -- it all goes back to those original,
classic blues singers and shouters
who had the most incredible ability to reach so many people
and move them and were the big stars of the day.
They were the Beyoncés of their day.
-♪ Don't sit around and frown
♪ You've been a good ol' wagon
♪ Daddy, but you done broke down ♪
-"You've been a good ol' wagon, honey, but you done broke down."
There's something about Bessie Smith's connection
with all of our humanity that leaps out of the speaker at you.
-♪ And get yourself overhauled
-It just wasn't like anybody else.
It wasn't fancy, or colorful, or tricky.
Nothing but pure emotion.
-♪ to make a good woman fall
-You know, the power of her voice,
she is sort of like the blues Caruso.
There's nobody else like that.
-♪ When a real man can be found ♪
-Today, when listening to those old recordings,
it's difficult for everybody to hear the greatness
that was inherent, to say, "My God, this was special."
-1925, Columbia was one of the first companies to switch to
electrical recording.
And Bessie Smith was among the first to record electrically.
Before that, it was acoustic recording,
and they used the horn.
-Before the microphone,
the equivalent of a loudspeaker amplifies the voice.
-You yelled, screamed, sang,
or played an instrument into a horn.
-So, you can feign intimacy doing that,
but to really feel like you're up there, you know,
caressing the listener's ear, or almost whispering,
you couldn't do that.
-♪ I may seem proud, and I may act gay ♪
♪ That's just a pose, I'm not that way ♪
-The microphone changes everything
because first of all, it allows nuance.
It allows subtlety.
-♪ I surrender, dear
♪ Those little mean things we were doing ♪
♪ Must have been part of the game ♪
-Bing Crosby used this to enormous effect
and became the first multimillion seller
through the microphone.
The crooner was born.
-Bing!
-It was clear that what they were listening to
wasn't just a voice, the voice of a singer.
They were hearing this incredible invention,
this medium of recorded sound.
They weren't just getting sexed up by the singer.
They were getting sexed up by the microphone.
-It's Bing Crosby. It's Frank Sinatra.
And they're right there.
And because they're now right there,
we start to ask new things of them emotionally.
-♪ I don't know why I love you like I do ♪
[ Women cheering ]
♪ I don't know why, but I do
-Sinatra really was groundbreaking
in his use of the microphone.
He didn't just stand in front of the microphone and sing.
You can see him move in when he's emphasizing
a certain emotion.
-♪ I'm a fool
♪ To want you
♪ Pity me, I need you
-And then, when he starts to come back
and really hit a note full force, he backs off.
-♪ It must be wrong
♪ But right or wrong, I can't get along ♪
♪ Without you
-All I can say is that Frank Sinatra
played the microphone better
than any other artist that ever sang.
-♪ Time and time again
♪ I said
♪ I'd leave you
-Crosby was the first pop singer to make you hear and understand
and contemplate the meaning of a lyric.
Sinatra went deeper.
Sinatra could wring blood out of a lyric.
-♪ But then would come the time ♪
♪ When I would need you
-He could, like, cut a vein.
He made the songs much more autobiographical.
When he sang something like "I'm a Fool to Love You,"
I mean, it's like his heart was breaking
right there in the studio.
♪ I'd have to say
♪ Take me back
♪ I love you
-Microphones are like magical things.
-♪ I need you
-The microphone is the beginning of the process
of turning musical actions into texts, into artworks.
It's the doorway, right?
It takes the physical soundwaves of the acoustic event,
and it transfers them into a whole other medium.
It makes them into electricity.
Things that used to just be fleeting and gone,
they would still be fleeting and gone, but for the microphone.
-♪ Well, sometimes, I go out by myself ♪
♪ And I look across the water
♪ And I think of all the things, what you're doing ♪
♪ And in my head I paint a picture ♪
-Every once in a while, an artist comes along
and is beyond definition or description.
-♪ And I miss your ginger hair and the way you like to dress ♪
♪ Won't you come on over?
♪ Stop makin' a fool out of me
♪ Why don't you come on over, Valerie? Yeah ♪
-Amy Winehouse had a unique thing.
I mean, it wasn't, it wasn't black soul,
it wasn't white soul, it wasn't British soul,
even though it was all of those things.
The gal could sing her ass off and meant every word of it,
hauntingly.
-♪ I hope you didn't catch a tan ♪
♪ I hope you find the right man who'll fix it for you ♪
-When I was working on
"Amy Winehouse: Back to Black"...
-♪ Well, sometimes I go out, and again ♪
-Tommy, do you want to end the verses just with
those things that you're playing, play it quite muted,
the chucka-chucka-chu, and then you play the notes.
I was kind of a bit of a novice as a producer, you know?
I had made, up to that point, rap music.
-But we don't have you. -Can you hear me at all?
I can't hear myself at all, darling.
I can hear myself a little bit now. It's hard.
I was sounding like Rod Stewart. I'm here, like, going, "Ooh!"
Like Rod Stewart. Do you know what I mean?
♪
♪ Are you shopping anywhere?
♪ Changed the color of your hair? ♪
♪ Are you busy?
-The voice was just ridiculous.
Suddenly, like, having this immense voice
that could just unload incredible power on a dime.
♪ And I think what -- mnh, mnh -- da-da-dah ♪
♪ And in my head I paint a picture ♪
-The thing that really made that record work was his idea
of kind of putting these elements together.
-I messed up a few times, 'cause you told me
I was gonna have to re-vocal it, so, I wasn't...
-Yeah. I know.
Her songwriting with the sound of the Dap-Kings,
and then you kinda put it into this pop mixing,
compressed sound, radio sound.
You know, that's where you're gonna get
that Amy Winehouse sound, you know.
♪
-♪ They tried to make me go to rehab ♪
♪ I said, "No, no, no"
-Amy and I were carried away with kind of, like,
this music that we loved and these influences.
You think of the beginning of "Rehab," the...
-♪ I ain't got the time
♪ And if my daddy thinks I'm fine ♪
♪ He's tried to make me go to rehab ♪
♪ I won't go, go, go
-We'd been walking down the street
and she was telling me a story about her family, and she said,
"They tried to make me go to rehab."
And, she was like, "Pfft! No! No! No!"
And, I was, like, "I hate to, like,
turn your tragedy into a song, Amy, but that's pretty catchy.
Like, we should go back to the studio
and maybe write a song about it."
-♪ There's nothing you can teach me ♪
-The voice is an interesting thing.
It's so personal. You're your own instrument.
And it is vulnerable, because people can judge you,
and they can love you, and they can hate you,
and they can be indifferent to you,
but if you are an authentic singer,
really, a truly authentic singer, you resonate.
-♪ A shot glass
♪ They tried to make me go to rehab ♪
♪ I said, "No, no, no"
-It's hard to describe someone that is that unique.
-♪ When I come back, you'll know, know, know ♪
-You can't put her in a box.
And how great is that?
To have someone come along and go, "You know what?
You're your own -- you're your own mountain."
♪ Cold wind ripping down the alley at dawn ♪
♪ And the morning paper flies
♪ Dead man lying by the side of the road ♪
♪ With the daylight in his eyes ♪
♪ Don't let it bring you down
♪ It's only castles burning
♪ Find someone who's turning
♪ And you will come around
-It's an odd thing, but a lot of people can sing,
and then some people have just a sound to their voice.
♪ Blind man running through the light of the night ♪
♪ With an answer in his hand
♪ Come on down to the river of sight ♪
♪ And you can really understand ♪
-They can sing as well, but, like, Neil Young
is a great singer, but he's not just a great singer.
There's some character in his voice
that is quintessentially Neil Young.
It couldn't be anybody else.
Tom Petty, it couldn't be anybody else.
Bob Dylan, it couldn't be anybody else.
Etta James, couldn't be anybody else.
And then there's other people who can sing.
-♪ I shot the morning in the back ♪
♪ with my red wings on
♪ Told the sun he better go back down ♪
♪ If I can find a book of matches ♪
♪ I'm goin' to burn this hotel down ♪
-So, it's not just being good. It's being extremely --
you know, it's being unique.
-♪ Brave captain
-So, there might be other singers who have greater range,
or more skill, or whatever, but to me,
a distinctiveness and sounding like no one but yourself.
♪ Devil leaves his porch light on ♪
[ Sax solo ]
-It all has to do with the whole package,
and the heart, and the communication,
and the desire, and the calling, the anointing.
I think the main thing that makes a great singer
is the anointing on that singer,
that that singer is called to do exactly what they're doing.
-Track 13, "Lady Soul."
-One, two.
♪
-♪ Oh, come back, baby
♪ Baby, please don't go
♪ Because the way I love you
♪ You'll never know
♪ Come back, baby
♪ Let's talk it over
♪ One more time
♪ Oh, yeah
-When Aretha was on Atlantic, I used to go to the sessions.
I used to kinda stick my head in there to hear this artist,
you know, that was phenomenal.
-♪ R-E-S-P-E-C-T
♪ Find out what it means to me
♪ R-E-S-P-E-C-T
♪ Take care, TCB, oh
-♪ Sock it to me, sock it to me, sock it to me, sock it to me ♪
♪ Yes, I need a little respect -♪ Just a little bit
-And she'd get better and better.
Every time she sang the song, you know, like,
Jerry Wexler and those people would say, "I think we have it."
And, she'd say, "No. No. No. No. No.
Let me try that again."
And, you know, a lot of artists think they can do it better.
Shecould do it better.
-♪ Ooh! -♪ Just a little bit
-♪ A little respect -♪ Just a little bit
-With singers, I tell them,
"This isn't necessarily
something you can learn.
You can learn to do it, maybe you can develop a style,
but will you be considered a great singer?
I don't know.
♪
-♪ Georgia
[ Applause ]
♪ Oh, Georgia
♪ And the whole day through
♪ Yes, it's just this old, sweet song ♪
-The absolute seminal moment in my life
when I was sitting up eating sausages and potatoes
at 2:00 in the morning and heard "Georgia On My Mind"
for the first time, the Ray Charles recording.
-♪ I said Georgia, no, no
♪ Oh, Georgia
-I absolutely remember being blown completely away by it
and thinking I'd never heard anything quite so moving
and beautiful in my life.
-♪ Comes as sweet and clear
♪ As moonlight through the pines ♪
-And, I remember thinking,
"My God, if I could ever write a song that would move anybody
even a tenth as much as I'm being moved
by this experience now, I would look no further."
-♪ Other eyes smile tenderly
♪ Still in peaceful dreams I see ♪
♪ Whoa-oa, I know the road
-Ray Charles was an amazing storyteller.
Lord have mercy.
-♪ Whoa, Georgia, no
-He could take a song and, oh!
-♪ I'm calling my Georgia
♪ No, no, no peace I find
-Something has to resonate with you and, you know,
you sort of forget that, you know, there's a technique
of singing involved, and that you just sort of go
with the emotion and really just live there.
-♪ Oh, no, here comes that sun again ♪
♪ That means another day without you, my friend ♪
♪ And it hurts me
♪ To look into the mirror at myself ♪
♪ And it hurts even more to have to be with somebody else ♪
♪ And it's so hard to do
♪ And so easy to say
♪ But sometimes, sometimes, you have to walk away ♪
♪ Wa-alk away
My voice has no place on "American Idol."
I'd get laughed off, bombed off,
and kicked off of "American Idol,"
or "The Voice," or any of those shows.
I'd be booted outta there so quick, man,
it'd make your head spin.
♪ Why do I worry about one
I don't have that voice,
but the voice I do have serves what I've lived,
what I feel, and what I perceive...
I would say as well as anybody,
but I've heard covers of my own songs that are better than mine.
-One of the truisms of most of the singers I know,
and great singers, too, none of them like their voice.
The only singer, I think, that likes his voice is Rod Stewart.
Every other singer I know --
Elton tries to disguise his voice
with that strange sound he has on his mic.
Phil Collins.
No, none of 'em like the sound of their voice.
Horrible to hear yourself singing.
-♪ I remember throwing punches around ♪
♪ And preachin' from my chair
♪ Well, who are you?
-♪ Who are you?
♪ Who, who, who, who?
-♪ I really wanna know
-♪ Who are you? Who, who, who, who? ♪
-I always kinda listen like that -- my fingers in my ears
when I first hear it, but after a while,
I get used to it, and I can bear it,
and I can think through it and feel through it, so.
But when I first hear myself sing a song, it's like,
"Yuck! [ Chuckling ] This is horrible."
♪ Whooooooooooooooooo are you?
-Most singers will tell you that headphones,
the first thing that headphones do is mess with your pitch,
'cause you start singing to those headphones.
-♪ My name is Luka
♪ I live on the second floor
-You're much more conscious of what you're doing in the studio.
You hear every sound. It's very difficult to do.
-♪ Yes, I think you've seen me before ♪
♪ If you hear something late at night ♪
♪ Some kind of trouble, some kind of fight ♪
♪ Just don't ask me what it was ♪
My first experiences with recording vocals
were a nightmare. They were a nightmare.
♪ Too loud
First of all, my voice wasn't really trained
and I didn't really know how to modulate it for the microphone.
♪ Only hit until you cry
♪ After that, you don't ask why ♪
♪ You just don't argue anymore ♪
♪ You just don't argue anymore
There's, like, an ideal vocal that you're aiming for,
and you can get to it by doing a bunch of different takes
and then splicing them together.
So, it's great to take advantage of that.
I think it's always a mistake to try and do a perfect performance
in the studio unless you're that kind of singer.
Some people do that. They just go in,
they do it once or twice, and they're happy with it
and it's got all the emotion and it hits all the notes
and it's in time and it's in tune,
and I'd say that's pretty rare.
-There's that sweet spot, or the non-sweet spot,
from realizing that recording is more than
playing the song through and recording it --
that should only take three and a half minutes, right?
And, uh, and -- and then,
you move on to, "Oh, maybe some things need to be altered,"
like, "I could have sung that better."
And it's -- and then you're on the slipper slope to
crazy perfectionist taking three days
to get us near a sound.
-♪ When you found somebody new ♪
♪ I thought I never would
♪ Forget you, for I thought then I never could ♪
There is the art of being in the studio
and then the art of being live onstage
and I don't think everyone has both.
♪ Until now, I'm down to hurtin' once a day ♪
You can go in the studio and really focus, uh,
in this controlled setting, in a sense --
it is controlled acoustically, it's controlled musically,
where, if you get out on the stage,
your deal is to communicate to the audience
and make them happy, make them feel good,
make them cry, make them laugh,
and start it out and bring it to a climax
and leave 'em screamin' and hollerin',
throwin' babies in the air.
-♪ Oh-oh, I'll get him hot, show him what I -- ♪
Come on!
♪ Can't read my, can't read my ♪
♪ No, he can't read my
♪ Poker face
♪ She's got me like nobody
♪ Can't read my, can't read my ♪
♪ No, he can't read my
♪ Poker face
♪ She's got me like nobody
Now scream!
[ Audience screaming ] ♪ P-p-p-poker face
♪ P-p-poker face
-Onstage, an audience really gives you the excitement,
it creates the spark that sparks the music.
-♪ Kiss or hug you 'cause I'm bluffin' with my muffin ♪
♪ I'm not lyin, I'm just stunnin' ♪
♪ With my love glue gunnin'
-There's none of that in the studio.
-♪ Take your bank before I pay you out ♪
♪ I promise this, promise this
♪ Check this hand 'cause I'm marvelous ♪
-It's kind of like the difference between, say,
if you were an actor -- between doing theater
and doing a movie.
In the studio, everything is really under the microscope.
-When it comes to recording music,
it's a very exposed place.
Because you're really having to bring
the good part of your creative persona
and also, like, the doubts and the flaws
and the frustrations.
-Great recordings really weren't about technology,
so much as they were about performance,
and performance in very small spaces.
The Motown space was, what, 15x17 feet?
Musicians were on top of each other.
I wanna play Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell's
"Ain't No Mountain High Enough" from the early '60s.
-♪ If you need me, call me
♪ No matter where you are, no matter how far ♪
-♪ Don't worry, baby
-♪ Just call my name, I'll be there in a hurry ♪
♪ You don't have to worry
♪ 'Cause, baby, there ain't no mountain high enough ♪
♪ Ain't no valley low enough
♪ Ain't no river wide enough ♪
♪ To keep me from getting to you, babe ♪
-The instruments are fitted together
to dovetail with the vocals.
This is -- this is impossible to do when you're taking, uh,
production a track at a time.
-It was a vibe. It was less about the bells and whistles
and more about creating and capturing a vibe.
And, to me, you can't beat that and it's hard to find it today,
because everybody's doing productions, you know?
Wrr!
-♪ Soft and warm
♪ A quiet storm
♪ Quiet as when flowers talk at break of dawn ♪
-Today's recording world, people who play and sing
on the same records don't even see each other.
One guy's there on Wednesday,
the other guy's there on Tuesday,
and somebody's in London, somebody's in New York,
somebody's there at 5:00, somebody's there at 10:00.
But to get in a studio with a bunch of great musicians
and sing while they're playing, and they're feeding
off of each other and you're feeding off of them,
it's like doing a concert in the studio.
-♪ Oh
♪ You short-circuit all my nerves ♪
♪ Promising electric things
♪ You touch me and suddenly there's rainbow rings ♪
♪ Quiet storm
♪ Blowin'
-Everything is fragmented.
You're singing, but you're not getting
a whole take in one take, you know?
You're maybe singing 10 takes, and you're piecing it together,
what you like, just like you would a film.
The vocal, yes, is the centerpiece of the song,
but you still have to think of it as another instrument.
♪
-♪ Baby, you come knockin' on my front door ♪
♪ Same old line you used to use before ♪
♪ I said, yeah, well, what am I supposed to do? ♪
♪ I didn't know what I was getting into ♪
♪ So you've had a little trouble in town ♪
♪ Now you're keeping some demons down ♪
♪ Stop draggin' my
♪ Stop draggin' my heart around ♪
-In my opinion, when you make a record,
all things bow to the vocal.
For me, the records that I like
and the records that I care about.
-♪ It's hard to think about what you've wanted ♪
♪ It's had to think about what you've lost ♪
-So, everything has to be based around that vocal --
that's why I don't understand what everyone does today,
which is writing songs over tracks.
-♪ I know you really want to tell me goodbye ♪
-I don't understand how they make records now
without the vocal being cut live.
When I made records, I would always insist on
the person sing live.
Stevie Nicks sang every one of her vocals live.
We'd go back and fix them a little bit,
but I don't want to make a record just listening to
a drum, a bass, and a guitar.
-♪ So you've had a little trouble in town ♪
♪ Now you're keeping some demons down ♪
-Got this mic on yet, Shelley? Okay, we ready to go? Okay.
-I want to hear what it's going to be.
I want to hear the excitement of the vocal.
-♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
Okay. So, that's loop number one.
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
Okay. So, I've got those. And, then I could do something.
So, imagine this as, like, a drumbeat.
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
[ Beatboxing ]
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
And then I could add in a bassline.
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
And then... ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o ♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o ...sing something over the top.
♪ Ah, lo, lo, oh, oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ And, you know, sometimes ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ I write a song ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ I'm playing around ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh
♪ In the studio for hours ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ And I just sing some stuff ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh
♪ That comes into my head ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ And then I'll record it all ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh
♪ And maybe then I'll listen back ♪
♪ And find some nice bits ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ And make a song out of it ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh
♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
And then, I can go back and practice some other bits, like.
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
Go back to the first loop... ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
...which is how it all began. ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
[ Vocalizing ] ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Whoa ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ La, de, da, de, ay ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
[ Beatboxing ] ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-e-e-e-eh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Do, do, do, do, do-do ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh ♪ Da-da-i-o, de-i-o
[ Beatboxing ]
And there we go. ♪ Da-de-i-o, de-i-o, oh-oh
[ Beatboxing ]
♪ Hey, oh
[ Chuckles ]
-Your voice is so much of what identifies who you are,
your character and how you're recognized.
-[ Synthesized ] ♪ Where are we?
♪ What the hell is going on?
-And, I think, as a performer, you're already inhabiting
sort of a different person, which could be the real you,
as a lot of performers say, or it could be pure escapism.
-♪ Begun
-Tonight, we present a new miracle of electricity,
the Sonovox.
Harry Babbitt, using special Sonovox units,
gives diction to the tones of the instruments as they play.
Harry forms the words, but the instruments sing 'em.
Sing it, saxes!
-♪ I'd know you anywhere
♪ I know that grin
-And we've always had this attraction from an early age
at altering our voices.
I think that happens with, you know, hookin' up to
the clown balloon dispenser at a birthday party,
and here's a way to explore different characters,
and what's more human than wanting to be something else?
-[ Synthesized ] ♪ More bounce
Whoo!
♪ More bounce
-"More Bounce to the Ounce", I mean, when that dropped,
drivin' down Crenshaw Boulevard in L.A., playin' Roger & Zapp,
you're sure to get a girl's attention.
Marvin Gaye or Roger Troutman -- can't miss.
-♪ More bounce to the ounce
-Roger Troutman and Zapp, to get that sound,
you had to take a tube, hook it up to an electrical charge,
and it would send an electrical current down your throat
that would then go through a box,
and go through whatever instrument you were playing...
-Come on! [ Synthesized ] ♪ Yeah, yeah
-...your voice, through the electrical charge
and current that was going into your throat,
was coloring whatever instrument you were playing.
-♪ Say, "Yeah, yeah, yeah!
After an hour of recording with that thing, it hurt.
So, now they have what's called Auto-Tune,
and it's just the processed version of that sound,
which sounds exactly like it, and is equally as cool,
just without the suffering and torture.
-Auto-Tune is a software.
It's basically an algorithm that is designed to take
a singer's vocal pitch imperfections,
and then put them on pitch.
-And the way we recognize Auto-Tune
is not recognizing it at all.
-Uh, hey, Dad. I need to talk to you.
The chick that wrote the theme song
to the new "Hunger Games" movie is you?
-Yeah. -Wha-- wait.
Lorde sounds like a girl.
-Auto-Tune. You wanna see how I do it?
[ Computer chimes ]
I use this program to import
the recordings I make on my phone.
♪ Sparklin' thoughts give me the hope to go on ♪
[ Farts ]
-Dad, Lorde's music is actually really good.
-Thanks, but it gets even better when I add the drum loops.
[ Drum kit playing ]
♪ Yeah, yeah, feelin' good on a Wednesday ♪
Then, with the computer, I can actually quantize everything,
backup instruments,
and then finally, I use the Auto-Tune.
-♪ Sparkling thoughts, feelin' good on a Wednesday ♪
♪ Givin' me the hope, givin', givin' me the hope to go on ♪
♪ What I need is a little bit of shelter ♪
-Stan?
Would you Auto-Tune Patti Smith? No.
Carole King? No.
Janis Joplin? Oh, my God, she --
if they, uh, put Auto-Tune on Janis Joplin,
she would sound like that "Believe."
-♪ Oh, do you believe in life after love? ♪
-And you know that's where that came from.
That sound came from, and I love Cher,
but they must have accidentally
left it on while she was singing.
I know this is what happened.
And then, it went [vocalizing] and they were, like,
"What is that? That's cool."
♪ Inside me say
♪ "I really don't think you're strong enough, no" ♪
-I bought that Cher record, "Believe."
I loved it. I thought it was brilliant
and what I'm told is that they put --
the engineer put that much of it on there kind of as a goof,
you know, and Cher took home a rough mix,
and they were planning to moderate
that whole thing massively and she went,
"No. No. Keep it all on. It's fantastic."
But, whatever it was, they left it on there,
and of course it became a template
for many vocals to come.
-What happens a generation or a half a generation later
is that R&B artists and hip-hop artists,
they discover they actually
really like the sound of Auto-Tune.
They like the sound of this kind of robotic other-worldliness,
something that sounds completely unnatural.
[ Bass thumps ]
One of the first people to do it in a big way,
that surprised a lot of people, was actually Kanye West.
-[ Auto-tuned ] ♪ I'm not loving you, way I wanted to ♪
♪ What I had to do, had to run from you ♪
-Previous to this, Kanye is best known for
really soulful samples and funk and jazz samples.
And then he puts out this album called "808s & Heartbreak",
which is all cold, chilly, metallic,
and he's using Auto-Tune.
-♪ Till it's over, love
♪ Till we lose control
[ Distorted ] ♪ System overload
-And a lot of his fans just didn't understand.
"Why are you messing with Auto-Tune in a way
that just sounds completely inconsistent
with sort of what you've put out musically before?
But, I think for Kanye, I mean, this is partly him
wanting to experiment with something new,
with trying a new technique.
"808s & Heartbreak" also comes out
after his mother has passed away,
after he's been through a major breakup.
-♪ Your love lockdown
♪ Keeping your love lockdown
-And he creates this album whose mechanical sheen of it
is very much, I think, reflective, one could say,
of perhaps his emotional state when he recorded it.
-♪ I'm not loving you, way I wanted to ♪
-If you are an artist,
and you take a bit of technology
and you're gonna use that to sort of distinguish your sound,
some people are gonna do that and make it sound really cool.
Other people are gonna make you turn off
whatever it is you're listening to.
-♪ In the danger zone
-I don't care what people do, if it works. I don't care.
I don't care how that magician did that magic.
I don't care. Fine by me.
I'm really not a purist in that respect.
-♪ I ain't even know it -♪ Even know it
♪ Know it
♪ Till they call you to the stage ♪
-You taking advantage of what the technology is.
Like, what makes the song sound its best?
-♪ Booty going up, down
-I think it's kind of future-y and -- I don't know.
I think it's an interesting effect.
-♪ I can do this all day like it ain't nuttin' ♪
-I don't listen to a lot of records
that have Auto-Tune vocals on 'em.
You know what I mean? Like, I'm sure I do.
I hear them, but it's not like I'm puttin' my money down
to be, like, "That's my..."
-There's something great about not fixing stuff, you know?
I leave funky notes in all the time and slide notes
that aren't quite up to it, and I'll tune it back up
and it just loses a lot of the edge to it, you know?
It's sorta like going around a corner on two wheels.
Let's hear it. Come on.
-So, I'm not a big anti-analog, or anti-digital,
or anti-anything, because I'm a groove and a performance person.
I would always say to Madonna,
"Give me as much emotion as you can,
because I don't have any button that I can push
that can put that in," right?
I can fix your pitch. I can fix your timing.
I can fix all sorts of stuff.
I can't fix emotion. Put that in there,
and I'll figure the rest of the stuff out if I have to.
-Now that Auto-Tune has become a sound,
if you want that as part of your sound, by all means.
It's a sound, and it works.
So, if you want that as your sound, go,
but if you want your voice as your sound, no effects...
start workin' on scales.
[ Playing jazz outro ]
-[ Vocalizing ]
-There's not a lot of Christinas.
That woman can sing.
-♪ I could feel it from the start, oh! ♪
-And she can change her voice
and do so many wonderful things with it.
-♪ Caught my eye
♪ Something moved me deep inside ♪
-Her problem is her perfectionism.
That's where she gets into trouble,
when she tries to perfect the vocal.
-♪ Mother, my brother, my sister, and my friend ♪
-Troubled waters there, but when Christina just sings...
-♪ And every time I see you, everything starts making sense ♪
-I'm a crazy, uber-perfectionist.
I like to hear everything a certain way.
Even if I do a great take, I have to do it again
and again and again, just to make sure it's, like,
"Oh, okay, that's great. Let's get another option.
Let's, let's try it this way. Let's do it that way."
And to a point where I drive myself a little cuckoo crazy,
and me always striving for the best, you know,
vocal acrobatics that I could do and challenging myself,
all about challenging myself, all my life.
[whispering] Don't look at me.
-As soon as she said, "Don't look at me," I heard it,
the vulnerability in her voice, the insecurity that,
oh, she really doesn't think she's all that.
-♪ Every day is so wonderful
♪ Then suddenly
-It's letting go of ego and being open to failing.
-♪ Now and then I get insecure
-The beautiful thing about that version is
when Christina sang it, it was just -- it was emotional.
That was the take that I knew, right,
that that was the master take.
I added the drums and everything after the fact.
And Christina kept on coming to me, "I gotta resing that."
You know, "When can I resing that?"
I'm, like, "Resing it?
Are you crazy? This is magical.
Like, people would die for this emotion."
-♪ So don't you bring me down today ♪
-So, she kept on saying, "But, wait a minute.
It's not -- that was my first take."
I'm, like, "I know!"
She's, like, "But I can do better."
I go, "I know you can.
That's why you're not gonna resing it."
-♪ To all your friends, you're delirious ♪
-It was like seven months of this.
Like, the album is, you know, done.
It's being mastered, and she's still going at it.
So, we go in the studio, put it all up,
and she starts singing,
and I just literally just one time she -- I mean,
we were, like, maybe a minute into the song,
if even that, I just stopped, and I'm, like, "We're done."
And she's, like, "What do you mean we're done?"
I'm, like, "I can hear already you're oversinging,
you're overperfecting, and you're ruining this song."
-♪ Down, oh, no
I'm, like, "Oh, what does she mean?
God, what am I doing? What am I doing wrong?!
I don't understand this form of perfection."
And then, I finally realized there is no perfection.
It's about finding the beauty in the cracks and the holes
and the imperfections that's so perfect
and beautiful, and I didn't really get that.
You know, the raw quality of vocal cracks
and grainy-ness, and all that beautiful stuff
that goes along with just pure honesty,
which I always got lyrically,
but I really didn't quite understand vocally.
♪ Don't you bring me down
♪ Mmm, mm, mm, today
-It's actually about people allowing themselves
to be vulnerable and insecure and not always feeling like
they're gonna get everything right,
because that's what the true beauty of life is.
It's about not really getting it right.
It's just getting it right in the moment of who you are
right now.
-Certainly, while all music can be a mathematical equation
to varying degrees, soul isn't.
Soulfulness isn't.
There's such a huge,
great soulful place for technology in music.
There is, but there is a place where you just go over the edge
and lose the center of the circle.
-Every generation of people who listen and write
and think about music always fear that technology
is gonna create this homogenous sameness,
and that everything's gonna sound the same.
And you can find those complaints going back
to the 1920s and '30s.
You know, here we are almost a hundred years later,
and, if you look back on the history of it,
you would never say, "Oh, yeah, music in all of these
different generations and eras all sounded the same."
We can always find difference.
We can always find things that stand out to us as being unique.
♪
-The ones that we remember are the ones that did it really well
and were different and innovative enough
to stand the test of time.
It's not the technology that makes great music.
It's what's in your heart.
-We don't really judge a vocal
on an intellectual level.
What we respond to is some feeling
that they're honest performances,
and when we start to feel like the singer
is carrying some truth to us, we make the deeper investment.
This is not just the singer-songwriters.
It's not just that confessional mode.
It's James Brown. It could be Chic.
But, we know when it's, you know --
this is where we start to run out of words,
and we turn to authentic.
[ Playing "Bohemian Rhapsody" ]
♪
♪ Too late
♪ My time has come
♪ Sends shivers down my spine
♪ Body's aching all the time
♪ Goodbye, everybody
♪ I've got to go
♪ Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth ♪
♪ Mama
♪ Ooh ooh ooh
♪ I don't wanna die
♪ I sometimes wish I'd never been ♪
♪ born at all
♪
-"Soundbreaking" is available on DVD.
The companion book is also available.
To order, visit shopPBS.org or call 1-800-PLAY-PBS.