Pixie Lott - is her voice completely natural?

[Kevin Nolan]

My own two-penny's worth on the more general debate on the use of production technology opening up on this thread (which I didn’t mean) -

Irrespective of the use of lots of effects/plugins even on a Pixie Lott track, I still believe that songs liked by millions of people have usually shined through for good reasons, however much they may be produced and however much we may hate them as individuals. "Cry me out", for example, is a damn good song and sung beautifully. I personally think Pixie Lott has a very special voice, and those little cute bending of the notes, words and phrases sound incredibly well and soulfully - I certainly fall for them!( OK - you can tell I'm in love!! )

On a separate point, I have to say that I did find the entire Pixie Lott album a little over-produced, a little too clean, and all a little fatiguing (which I blame squarely at the mastering engineers and producers). Individual songs on the album are great, but all together they do NOT make for a pleasing listening experience and I think that's true of a lot of albums these days. I know that's a whole other couple of debates - loudness wars - itune tracks versus albums and so on; but in this instance I believe the entire Pixie Lott album, as a sole product, does an injustice to her talent and soul, directly affected negatively by over production at the mastering stage. You can keep your izotopes and finalisers if they are going to strain out all the rough edges that make someone like this artist sound squeaky clean to the point of fatigue.

I'd even go as far as to say that, despite the amazing mastering plugins these days and the amazing skills of mastering engineers - that over mastering is killing modern music. Mastering engineers have a lot to answer for IMO, and I belive history will judge them harshely for being incredibly sheepish - en masse - in this regard these days. Even in recent interviews in SOS and the likes of Musictech Mastering Focus, even reputable mastering engineers of old seem utterly oblivious to the damage they are causing and are virtually totally willing to go along with current norms. Any issues of the 'loudness wars' are mentioned in the first sentence or two of any such intervire, before they then expound at great lenght on how instigate such mastering features as maximum loudness. There's simply no variation, and mastering engineers and mastering houses are simply killing the soul in artists like Pixie Lott in the grand scheme. I suspect that 'online mastering' services are even worse - offering the same, bland, generic mastering to all unsuspecting users who simply do not know better (and on which the likes of SOS magazine offer very little opinion analysis, insight or objective guidance I should add.)

Kevin.

[muzines]

I'm willing to bet that a lot of pop music listening these days, by far the largest amount, is a combination of radio play, youtube, and mobile phone speakers - all playback systems which introduce such a level of processing or distortion that vastly outweighs any fatigue created by the mastering practices...

Times like these...

[Tui]

So Autotune is a new toy in the studio toolbox. So what? It's just an easier way of achieving what we used to do in convoluted ways with other studio trickery.

Yeah, sure. Give people technology, and they will use it. Give them more, and they will use more.

It's just getting beyond ridiculous. We now have several generations of charts-topping acts that can't sing to save their life. Or, as Puff Daddy/Diddly/whatever famously said, he doesn't want to learn to play an instrument, because being able to play one would "dilute" his art.

At least in my time (when I was young and pretty ), the Whitneys and Kates and Bobs and Stevies of the era could easily perform live just as well as they did on their recordings, sometimes even better. In fact, I used to take it for granted and was rather disappointed when one of the superstars did not manage to live up to expectations. Expectations were generally so much higher than nowadays, not only in terms of performance, but song-writing as well. Yes, there was plenty of tosh way back when too, of course, but there was also breath-taking excellence.

Today, I'm missing excellence. There's not one new great voice in pop that I'm aware of. At best, vocalists are competent nowadays, but that's not enough to get me excited. Too many singers these days sound as if they're doing a karaoke version of their own material.

[Syncratic]

We live in an age of make believe. It's that way with most things. Say, if you offer regular people a choice between a wholesome, organic meal, or a McD hamburger, which are they going to choose?

Increasingly the Organic meal, it's not all doom and gloom..

'We live in a land of make believe.' Surely a guy singing out of a box called the radio was more preposterous, why is this a negative thing?

At the end of the day it's pop music, if you don't like it listen to something you do.

[Tui]

At the end of the day it's pop music, if you don't like it listen to something you do.

I used to LOVE pop music, and I'd like to love it again. Fat chance.

Mind you, some of the Thai pop music is very nice. If you can get past what sounds like bag pipes, an 80's-style production and the Thai language, obviously, I think this is an incredible melody:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0CYHmCpziE

[Syncratic]

At the end of the day it's pop music, if you don't like it listen to something you do.

I used to LOVE pop music, and I'd like to love it again. Fat chance.

Mind you, some of the Thai pop music is very nice. If you can get past what sounds like bag pipes, an 80's-style production and the Thai language, obviously, I think this is an incredible melody:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0CYHmCpziE

Wow ha, it sounds a bit like an advert for a four star hotel. And I guess it would be nice to enjoy pop music, ever since I was a kid I never really have.

[grab]

At best, vocalists are competent nowadays, but that's not enough to get me excited.

Absolutely.

That's why I'm annoyed I forgot to mention Beverley Knight initially on my list of current faves. We saw her about 2 years back at the Cambridge Corn Exchange. The opening act (an eminently forgettable R&B guy) was pretty dreadful, and FOH was cranked so far up that halfway down the hall I could literally feel the kick blowing my hair! But BK was frankly awesome - it was like you'd imagine being back in the 60s and seeing Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner at the height of their powers.

There *are* new voices in pop, and it'd be wrong to expect them to sound the same as the old ones. The trouble is that if anyone thinks Pixie Lott is the cream of the crop vocally, it's a pretty sure sign that the average standard is a lot lower than it was.

[muzines]

Beverly Knight is the real deal, no doubt.

[onesecondglance]

The trouble is that if anyone thinks Pixie Lott is the cream of the crop vocally, it's a pretty sure sign that the average standard is a lot lower than it was.

this is the sad truth. very few pop vocalists from the past 10 years have really blown me away - a fair few in other genres, but not in pop.

standards are undoubtedly lower. people keep telling us that Adele, Duffy, and Amy Winehouse etc are "great" singers when they're "good" and nothing more. they're not BAD, but elevating them to legendary status does no one any favours.

[Tui]

I forgot to mention Beverley Knight
...
like you'd imagine being back in the 60s and seeing Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner at the height of their powers.

Yes, Beverley Knight is excellent. Now, I hope someone is going to write a bunch of great songs for her that will allow her to shine.

[Phil O]

I forgot to mention Beverley Knight
...
like you'd imagine being back in the 60s and seeing Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner at the height of their powers.

Yes, Beverley Knight is excellent. Now, I hope someone is going to write a bunch of great songs for her that will allow her to shine.

Well Guy Chambers tried !! I agree she's a gifted singer but does have a tendency to over-sing. Sometimes less is more and just because you can, doesn't mean you should engage in vocal gymnastics.

Phil
http://soundcloud.com/philo

[Tui]

The question is, how many people in the west, these days, still want to hear a great song, and are willing to pay for it. The few times I've been back, and also when following the media, I got the impression young people, on average, now have the attention span of a fruit fly. If the beat isn't dead simple and the melody consists of more than three notes, they lose interest. Tina's Nutbush City Limits, these days, would probably not raise any eyebrows. Neither would Stevie's Sir Duke or Whitney's The Greatest Love. Sadly, the kids wouldn't understand the music or the sentiments that it conveys.

Life has become too fast, too transient, too superficial. It has become an orgy in consumerism.

[Simeon]

I agree but it must having something to do record labels producing these records designed to make money, quick catchy songs, Chorus's before 40 seconds, getting the tricks in early and all that. Maybe people have been moulded by these type of records and now expect to hear them.

I guess it's artificial these days. And the record label sets the trends.

A lot of musicians hate this type of music simply because they see it as being fake, If you look back at any influential album there's something emotional tied to the record, or a belief or something.

I don't see these emotional aspects in a lot of the chart music these days. There are some maybe a few but not many. Any who would you choose Pat Boone's tutti frutti or little richards..... little richards because its genuine

Maybe people download music their less emotional attached to it ie pop.

I do like pop though its catchy and it makes me happy but I couldn't care about who sings it that because they just seem like another one of many tools needed to create a hit. I also think Autotune is another ones of the tools as is mastering the way pop records are these days.

When it comes to live anything less of the record and people get disappointed so your stuck with your autotune live aswell. TC Electronic do a autotune in stomp box so no biggy ay

[TheChorltonWheelie]

Well Guy Chambers tried !! I agree she's a gifted singer but does have a tendency to over-sing. Sometimes less is more and just because you can, doesn't mean you should engage in vocal gymnastics.

From what I gather, Beverley wasn't overly keen on being "too pop", which is a shame as her pop tracks very all very good without being too sacharin-laden, she was concerned about not being taken seriously as a soul singer. That's not what she told me, that's what someone else had said.

I've seen her live quite a few times, I did some promo work with her on her last album, and her voice is absolutely awesome, she really is the real deal.

[Dr Huge Longjohns]

The question is, how many people in the west, these days, still want to hear a great song, and are willing to pay for it. The few times I've been back, and also when following the media, I got the impression young people, on average, now have the attention span of a fruit fly.

As the father of three kids, I'd have to disagree strongly with this gloriously sweeping statement about 'the west' ! I think today's kids are extremely discerning about music and listen to much more of it, and more often, than kids in days of yore. There is sooooo much good stuff out there.

Whether they're keen to pay for it is another question but that comes down to a moral issue rather than a musical one (and my kids don't do pirate downloads, they spend a lot of their pocket money on iTunes). I genuinely think kids today buy the music despite the hyper-compressing/limiting/autotuning blah blah rather than because of it, too. Just like they did in the olden days with terrible crackly, jumpy, limited bandwidth vinyl 45s.

Incidentally, I don't mean to offend anyone or anything but saying kids 'in the west' have the attention of a fruit fly is, to me at least, bordering on racist. I'm far from a pc nutter but if someone on this forum said ''oriental kids are unable to concentrate properly' I'm certain a lot of people would be jumping up and down shouting 'racism! racism!' and I can't help feeling they might have a point? Sorry to add a downbeat note to an interesting thread but this statement really jumped out at me.

[Tui]

Incidentally, I don't mean to offend anyone or anything but saying kids 'in the west' have the attention of a fruit fly is, to me at least, bordering on racist. I'm far from a pc nutter but if someone on this forum said ''oriental kids are unable to concentrate properly' I'm certain a lot of people would be jumping up and down shouting 'racism! racism!' and I can't help feeling they might have a point?

Hahaha! No, I can assure you, I'm no racists.

The thing is, when you travel a lot, you notice differences it attitudes around the world. Those differences don't neatly break down into categories of "better" or "worse", nevertheless they are quite real.

Where I live now, most would consider a 3rd-world or developing country. In some ways, that's a fair assessment. I would say, the pace of life in larger cities is about 10-20 years behind that of western cities. In the countryside, life seems comparable to our 1950s, in remote regions people still live the way they used to, hundreds of years ago.

One of the defining aspects of modernity is the usage of technology. In a nutshell, I'd say the more modern a society, the more it will make use of current technology. Subsequently, the availability of technology has a huge impact on social structures and behaviour.

So, when I left "the west" in 2001, I had already observed over a decade how gadgets like mobile phones had altered people's behaviour, in particular that of young people. Many times, I watched young folk hang out in groups in cafes and hardly converse at all. Instead, they would sit around a table and play with their mobiles, perhaps even send messages to each other, rather than engage in a conversation.

I guess the trend started with the Sony Walkman, when you could see young people roam the streets like autistic children, unwilling to communicate or be a part of regular life.

Now, with all the smart phones and what not, the situation is so much worse. Entertainment is available 24/7, largely free, and anywhere. Consequently, attention spans are reduced: The mind, like a crazy monkey, constantly jumps around from one short-lived stimulus to the next one.

Where I live, I fear this process will take place too, and it won't take long. Already, I watch more affluent, better educated Thais, as they sit around in public places, yet they find nothing to talk about. They sit there, quiet, stare at tiny LCD screens and are entirely absorbed by the next fad, the next text message, the next video game.

It's sad, really.

[Shambolic Charm]

'the west' contains many Racial types - I don't think any reference to the west is Racist as such

[Combo]

maybe all singers have good and bad days,

Good and bad monitoring?

[thejazzassassin]

Listen to this and then decide if PL is a 'great' singer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsPA1BcGIbA

If there was any doubt in anyone's mind I think that this video proves that (at best) she's frighteningly average.

Unfortunately many singers of today think that vibrato is something you add by clenching your throat and then violently shaking your larynx backwards and forwards. It's not.

Why do so many of these acts sing along with another track of themselves singing in the background?

Why do so many of these girl singers have so much trouble singing relatively low notes? I'm not saying that every pop singer should be a Gheorgiou or a young Whitney, but it seems that no-one's really interested in becoming a great singer, just approximating a (usually bad to begin with) sound that they hear on the radio without a thought as to how to do it effectively and naturally.

Pixie Lott wasn't signed up for her voice and musical talent

[Tui]

I remember watching an interview with William Shatner. Shatner, of course, is a classical Shakespearean actor. He said that young actors walk up to him all the time to ask him how he managed to deliver his lines so believably in Star Trek. They ask him about gestures he made, certain mannerisms and facial expressions. Shatner's response is always the same: It doesn't work that way. It's not that simple.

He went on to explain that today, actors are imitators. They try to imitate those that have gone before, rather than develop their own approach. He said, today we're looking at several generations of imitators who imitate imitators.

Same goes for music, I guess.

[muzines]

Yep. If I had a pound for every cover version sung *exactly*, phrasing and adlib for phrasing and adlib, like the original recording, I'd be... well, better off than I am now by some margin.

An easy way to spot a singer with musicality and talent is when they deliver a good vocal their way, and phrase and adlib it really well but in a way unique to them - they don't just follow a pre-existing roadmap note for note.

Imitating and being influenced by others is a good way to learn and understand and develop, but to be good you have to progress past that, use those experiences and knowledge to develop your own voice, and *that's* where things start to get interesting.

Unfortunately, many "singers" don't understand that and never get to that second part, even if they have a good sounding voice and competent delivery.

[Simeon]

Pixie Lott wasn't signed up for her voice and musical talent

I absolutely agree I'd say she was signed up for marketability if theres such a word. I guess she ticks the "good enough to get away with it box". Being marketable means that you can adapt your image, style, idiolect etc to what the record company is asking you too. Similar things happened with Duffy. She was a house karaoke bar singer in Wales (I think) that got spotted for her talent by a songwriter and promptly got moulded into what we see of her today.

All solo acts like Duffy and Pixie go through "personal Development" maybe even Winehouse, the first I saw her on TV she was in full trackys singing for some young rapper on local radio.

[hollowsun]

Similar things happened with Duffy. She was a house karaoke bar singer in Wales (I think) that got spotted for her talent by a songwriter

What?!! Where do you get this made up shite from?

Duffy has been singing since she was a dwt (Welsh for small child) and influenced by videos her father had of 'Ready Steady Go' and when she was older, made quite a name for herself in the Welsh and Welsh language music scene over a period of many years before she was signed. I was aware of her presence here in Welsh Wales long before she hit the Jools Holland show. She had self-penned, self-produced and self-financed records out that did well in the scene.

Pixie Lott attended the Conti school as a child and appeared in several West End productions and part of the chorus in Pink Floyd's Roger Water's opera before she was signed.

You don't achieve any of this by being shabby!

And both write their own tunes.

[Simeon]

The reason I said I think is because I couldn't remember that well and I was told in brief by a songwriter for the first album Rockferry, so ye sorry. He told me this in brief. Him and some other guys from rough trade went about making her marketable. He said she looked completely different after they'd finished with her. I also know one of the guys on the same publishers writing for the new album right now.

But TBH reading the tiniest amount about her history and you get the essence they did something with her, but I think now, maybe what I was told was a bit exaggerated. Either way she wouldn't be around if he hadn't written "Oh Boy". The Karaoke bar story was probably adapted for the press, everyone likes a good story behind a band, well the magazines do.

Either way they all go through this marketing phase in their career whether they write the songs or not.

But Pixie Lott doesn't do all the work.

"Powerline A.D.: You worked with some powerhouse songwriters for the material on your album, including the songwriter and American Idol judge Kara DioGuardi. Do you write songs on your own as well? If so, will any of those appear on the album?
Pixie Lott: I think it’s great to co-write with people because it always pushes you to be your best. I’ve been so lucky to work with the most amazing songwriters and producers and it has definitely helped my songwriting develop. I do write songs on my own…either on the piano, garageband or to tracks but none of the ones completely written by me are on the album – they are more personal."

I know probably not the most reliable source. But when it comes down to it she's probably has less to do with the songs than the songwriters do especially the standard of songwriters she's working with. The kind that mould some random auditioned singers into a candidate for a christmas number one.