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They have a very good voices and technique. In the studio recordings you can hear it.Choirs, polyphonic and impressive melodic lines.You knows. To do it just as well live is very very very difficult
The voice is like a instrument but very sensitive. There are a lot of factors, listening to monitors, mood, tiredness, throat problems, health and they can't be focused just on singing either.
So it's normal not to make it perfect. Nothing happens.
They do enough playing as they do. They play like gods and sing like humans.
You can't ask for more. Better is imposible imo
Use autotune in time in lives? This is crazy. Please don't. Naturalness.
Use autotune as in Roadwork? yes of course. It is a barely noticeable retouch and brings the composition closer to how it was created.
PD for some music journslist. Really? Try it yourself. :finger:
@ T.O.F.K.A.D.: Wasn't that a vocoder effect on Cher's "Believe"? Well – Neil Young had that used in a rather clumsy, but creative way back in 1982… Cher introduced a whole new thing though – the smooth machine sound – then still clearly recognizable as a technical manipulation, but these days wasting almost all the slimy musical trash most kids are listening today. I wonder if some of them have ever heard a recorded vocal without that kind of industrial musical straightjacket. But there you go – music is an industry more or less these days, and so you get industrially finetuned stuff, in most cases cheaply produced to satisfy dumb consumers – without inspiration, style or love for music. As long as the latter are still dominant – and with Motorpsycho they clearly are – I don't see a problem there with any effect creatively used.
@TheOneFormerlyKnownAsDaniel – I agree it does not suit rock
@Phoots Flower – I completely get the point about naturalness live
I think Bent and Snah are committed to being authentic too – and that's a big part of why we love them. That is why I say some kind of pitch correction should only be used selectively, and not on the more 'rock' material. Something is needed, however, on a less-rock-more-prog epic like The Crucible, if a masterwork with brilliant musicianship is not to be rendered unlistenable in parts.
Now, could I ask anyone interested in this topic, please, to listen to these two versions of The Crucible, with the vocals in mind, and give their explanation for why one has vocals that sound pretty much in tune (perhaps with technical assistance – I know there could be other reasons) and one has vocals that, for me, are really getting in the way of my enjoyment to the extent that I am clenching everything waiting for the instrumental parts?
Is anyone else hearing what I am hearing?
@suntripper yargh, sometimes Bent just needs that little sip of ol'Jagermeister…But seriously, the autotuning is audible I believe, and doesn't it work like this-you still have to pretty much hit the right note for it to correct it to the desired harmony? So, it still needs effort from the singer. Still, it could be worse, some 'artists' resort to pre recorded vocals and playback the whole damn show…With the vocals of MP there seem to be good nights and bad nights, and like a lot of others said here I'm willing to accept that, while also counting on their professional attitude to keep improving on it.
Another thing about (Bent's) vocals: early on he used to sometimes sing in this raspy smokers and day-after-having-screamed-your-head-off way, which sometimes added to emotional content of a song, but as well sometimes, for me, ruined songs, example Feel on Roadworks 1 (the vinyl version). I'm glad this doesn't occur anymore these days (did he quit smoking? He used to light up cigs all the time during gigs?).
To my ears they both sound unmanipulated. In Leuven he just was more on point. 7:03, though :lol:
@Johnny_Heartfield: No, that's definately the song that made autotune famous. It's taught in any audio-engineering lesson.
@suntripper: Bent just simply makes more effort singing in the first video. That's Motorpsycho. Like phoots flower said, they have good and not so good nights. You can discuss why and for sure there's much more stable singers out there. It annoyed me once at the Oslo opera house, Unicorn tour. They played at this beautiful opera house with this great vibe but the singing was really not so cool…. Well, this is Motorpsycho.
@JERO: You can be completely flat, autotune will correct to any harmony. It's just the more it has to correct, the more the artefacts of processing will be heard.You can even turn spoken word into a melody: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qSWksEXjW8
@ TheOne FormerlyKnownAsDaniel
"Believe" has both effects on the vocals. For me the vocoder was always the more prominent one – but the song became famous for its autotune. So I think we both have a point
https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/recording-cher-believe
quote:
Mark: "It all began with a Korg VC10, which is a very rare, very groovy-looking analogue vocoder from the '70s, with a built-in synth, a little keyboard and a microphone stuck on top", he enthuses. "You must mention this, because SOS readers will love it — and I know, because I've been reading the mag for years!"
Hey, wasn't that VC synth the inspiration for both music and title of the MP track Viscount Grishnah? I think I've read something like that… and if so: full circle!
edit:
ah no, scrap that. I think it was an organ by the brand "Viscount".
The only problem I have is with the extend of which it is being used. I think it is totaly fine to fix the small things. Most of the times there's limited budget and time in a studio and for this it helps a lot. But I really do dislike that they've put songs like Wishing Well on a live album while the autotune side effects make the whole thing terrible to listen to.
I truly expect and want them to choose wiser then that.
But hey, they've been around for 30 years. And in 30 years you make some mistakes. And with everything you put out in the open there are some fans that won't like it as much as others.
Imagine that version of Wishing Well would have stayed in the archives … one of the most intense guitar solos ever played left on the shelves? Nah, I can live with a few "micky moments" but totally fly with the music.
I really miss Bent's "smoker voice". He used to sound so incredibly intense. Nowadays the vocals sound so smooth, especially on the last album. Is it the mixing? The autotune? Have they just become "better" singers? A mixture of all that? I really don't mind the odd wobbly note, as long as they reocrd songs as devastatingly beautiful as Radiance Freq…
I think there are a few reasons.
First of all, Bent quit smoking quite a few years ago. Here is a quote from Leslie from this forum discussing the Tivoli 2008 gig:
Quote:Bent and I compared notes on our respective healthier laifschteilzzz these days along with the shocking mutual discovery that it's not a myth after all, the whole post-smoking weight gain thing…damn…!Incidentally, he was prompted to quit for good by the arrival of his son. A very wise and caring decision. There is nothing remotely cool about watching a (grand)parent die from respiratory disease or subjecting babies and little kids to second hand smoke. Uh-uh.
Second, i think the songs a a bit less personal, less emotional overall. Less about personal experiences and feelings, more fiction and world views. I think. This might change the way of singing somewhat i think. There a exeptions off course, like Lux Aeterna.
Third, they focus more and more on harmonies and vocal arrangements. Also i think more of the singing is double tracked on record.
Last, they have gotten better, especially on record.
Just my two cents.
@ Hans: I wouldn't call it a "smoker's voice". To me it always sounded strained when he tried to hit the higher notes, due to bad singing technique. That was the only part of MP that didn't appeal to me.
I agree with Krist, and not only is the singing better (Snah's as well) but more versatile , for example, these days even the hardcore voices from their loud beginnings might turn up at the appropriate time, I noticed during Mountain (Amsterdam 2019)or at the climax of The Wheel (Den Haag 2019) while maybe after that they'll sing in harmony for another song! Bent's 'broken' vocals/smokers voice i.m.o. did not necessaraly provide the best way to render feeling in a 'soft' song, listen to that latest gem The Dowser, which is sung in a tender but clear vocal, surely bringing a tear to my eye when I listen to it. But all the while, throughout the years, it is always Bent and/or Snah we hear singing, warts and all, and that is like the watermark of authenticity of who they are and what they do, so I have to love it!
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