The Other Kind of "Pop" Filter

Pop music has for a good long time been meant to be catchy, upbeat, and as the name implies popular. One thing that has become unfortunately popular with the advent of digital recording processes is auto-tune. I’ve got nothing against an artist fixing a take here, or using something to add a bit of flavor to a track in a new or innovative way, but it’s gotten to the point where our pop artists aren’t even singers. Our pop artists are just bodies in front of songs. Pop music went from being talented singers whose ambition was to become famous over an ambition to become accomplished singer/songwriters. 

I’m not saying everyone needs to be terrifically well rounded, and certainly a large number of people have established themselves as very popular artists without being particularly well rounded. However we are in the midst of a revolution of Milli Vanilli type acts. The difference between groups like Milli Vanilli and Ashee Simpson  and these modern pop artists is that the ones that are using auto-tune with such bold frequency is that when we hear vocal lines that clearly don’t belong to these artists, we accept it. When the boys in Milli Vanilli were caught there was a backlash, now if you’re auto-tuned to the point of ill recognition to the “singer’s” vocal line, you’re rewarded with a recording contract and a short skirt or tight pants. Ke$ha here exhibits her talent, but voluntarily will instead prefer to record songs like this and just get them fixed.

I may not have even become so frustrated with this trend until I was driving my fiancé’s Jeep a few weeks ago.  Two of the speakers in that car are blown, and having heard Ke$ha, Lady Gaga, etc. in my car (which has a nice, fully functional stereo) and then hearing them on blown speakers again for the first time in several months was an eye opener. These songs have gone through so many filters, and are so drastically digitized; I forgot the speakers were blown until I hit a song without much of these studio effects, but the biggest culprit is auto-tune. I like techno, and in fact have been playing with A Klokwork Kaos for the last few months, helping round out the sound and add some live instrumentation to the currently all electronic sound.  

What I really have to ask here is how does this happen? Most pop music recorded in the last few years has undergone such extensive filtering that it’s hardly music anymore. Last I checked, you need working speakers to hear music, but if you’re listening to pop radio you can get by with a couple of functioning coils and torn cones, you probably won’t even notice. The strangest thing about this, is that despite my distaste for how this has come around, I don’t hate this music, I just think that we’d be better off with artists  displaying their talents