When it comes to the tools available to us in modern day recording and mixing, times have probably never been better. But as with everything a lot of tools get abused to point of it being silly.
This is not a new thing though, and the software and/or tool isn’t problem. It’s YOU, the user. The main difference now compared to 25-30+ years ago it’s a whole lot easier to do it than it ever was before, and it’s no longer restricted to just a few people in high end recording studios.
Warning. There might be a little rant or two in this post.
TUNING VOCALS
This is the big one that the luddites and purists hate above all. And some get unbelievably angry about it. «Waaaaah, nobody was fixing their vocals back in the day, it was all genius performances», and stuff like that. They’re both right AND wrong.
Obviously Antares and their AutoTune get the brunt of the abuse, and it’s not hard to see why. There was a period especially in the late 90s when it was fairly new that it was abused to hell and back on EVERYTHING, especially that Cher/T-Pain effect.
Fixing vocals is not new though. For decades there’s been punching in or compiling vocals from a million takes, to name a couple examples. And «back in the day», engineers had to get really creative with how to get a vocal as good as possible. Punching in at a different tape speed so the singer could do that one bum note in key was common practice. And then in the 80s the introduction of digital samplers made new ways possible.
So in that sense the belief that they were all brilliant artists that always delivered perfectly, well…that’s just not true. Sometimes the artists didn’t even perform on their own songs.
Most times singers did though, apart from one very notable exception that made headlines in the late 80s. Anyone old enough to remember that will know what I’m talking about.
These days the worst offenders are found in todays overly formulaic Nashville «Country» ,and hip hop elsewhere in the world. 3 cents out, and it gets snapped to a grid whether it wants to or not. To be fair to a lot of engineers, they’re obliged to with regards to major labels if they want to do those gigs.
As with any other tool, it always comes down to whether the mixes you’re working on actually needs that kind of processing. A note or two just slightly out won’t kill anyone, but on the flipside, don’t bin an otherwise brilliant vocal take if all it needs is just a little nudge in a couple of spots.
A tool is a tool. Use it responsibly, when needed.
Personally I’d much rather have a take that has just the right aggression, emotion, feel and drive and fix a couple of notes rather than a dull, safe take where the singer is so pre-occupied with singing in key that it ends up sounding lifeless. But hey, we’re all different. 😉
For me it’s not cheating. It’s doing whatever you can to make it sound that little bit better. If you rely on it for a song to sound just decent, then that’s a whole other game.
There’s also the factor of budgets as well these days. Most artists and labels can’t afford the budgets they used to in the 90s and before, meaning the artist can’t spend 8 or 9 months perfecting everything before it’s mixed. Reality is that a lot of stuff as a consequence often needs to be dealt with while mixing.
Also, vocal tuning software can also be used as creative tools, something a lot of people tend to forget. Melodyne for instance is fantastic at converting polyphonic material into midi so you can easily layer a whole lot of sounds just from one track. There are also a whole host of other sound design things you can do with them.
So, don’t hate the software, it has its uses. It always boils down to taste.
DRUM SOFTWARE/SAMPLES
Another thing that a lot of people just for some reason hate with a passion. And to be honest, for rock stuff in particular a well recorded drum kit played by a great drummer will always feel better, and often sound better.
In reality that’s something out of reach for the majority of song writers and independant artists though. One thing is the access to a great sounding room and racks of great preamps as well as great mics to record with. Another thing is hiring a top studio, engineer and drummer to get it done. It’s not cheap.
So naturally, a lot of people will make do with drum software and samples. In their favour, they’re fantastic songwriting tools. EZ/Superior/Addictive Drummer with their groove packs can get you a very long way.
And for the real thing, you can actually find lots of good drummers online that can record remotely for you based on the sampled rhythms you have. I can do that for you actually! And things like this aren’t necessarily that expensive. Trick is knowing where to look. 😉
As for mixing what I like doing is using samples occasionally to augment what I already have recorded – mind you, this is very song specific. Some things don’t really need it, while it works great on others.
Not a fan of fully replacing drums though. More often than not it ends up sounding stiff, robotic and sometimes just weird. A lot of modern metal comes to mind here.
Drum vsts and samples can be great creative tools used right though.
There are probably a bunch of other things I could have mentioned as well in the world of modern mixing, but the general idea is the same. A tool is a tool, and you don’t have to use it. What this whole post pretty much boils down to is don’t knock the «new» thing that’s popular, but rather ask yourself whether you can actually have any use for it yourself. And trying out something new every now and then is not going to kill you.
A rule, or guideline if you will, that I like to live by is if you don’t like how other people do things, do it differently or better yourself instead of moaning about it. 🙂