Funny Sound Effects

The Auto-Tune Revolution — political satire videos fuel political action ...

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Over a pounding beat and blasting synthesizers, Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi pumps his fist in the air, looking as if he belongs in a dance club rather than behind his podium.

As two scantily clad women dance seductively next to him, he emphatically sings the catchy Arabic chorus that would soon catch the world’s attention: “Shebr shebr, beit beit, dar dar, zenga zenga!”

The words mean, roughly, “Inch by inch, home by home, house by house, alley by alley.” In a different context, they would refer to the dictator’s plan to systematically eliminate the Libyan rebels. But in the “Zenga Zenga Song,” Gaddafi’s words inspire an urge to dance instead of an urge to cower in fear.

Gaddafi probably never thought he would become an international pop star. In fact, unless he’s seen the YouTube videos featuring his performance, he probably doesn’t even know it. And he almost certainly doesn’t know that a new breed of video creators just loves making politicians sing, whether they like it or not.

Auto-Tune makes news a hit

In 1997, California music software company Antares released a tool called Auto-Tune, designed to help music producers correct slight imperfections in a singer’s studio recordings.

“When used correctly, you never know it’s being used,” Antares spokesman Marco Alpert says. “That’s the intent— it keeps the inherent timbre of a singer’s voice, preserves all their expressive gestures in the song and just fixes those little problems that might have crept into a performance,” like singing a note slightly flat or sharp.

But Auto-Tune quickly became much more than that. In 1998, Cher used it in her hit single “Believe,” manipulating Auto-Tune’s settings to make her voice sound unnatural and robotic, an effect Alpert calls the “Auto-Tune Vocal Effect.” When rapper T-Pain used it heavily on his 2007 hit album “Epiphany,” the world started to take notice, and artists and fans alike began dividing over whether Auto-Tune enabled a new kind of expression or simply allowed incompetent singers to become pop sensations. Even the New Yorker

In 2008, a New York-based group called the Gregory Brothers started working with Auto-Tune. The group includes Andrew, Michael and Evan Gregory and, despite the name, Evan’s wife Sarah. While playing with the software, they realized it was powerful enough to turn even normal conversations into melodies.