Originally Posted by mgvsmith:
“What makes auto tune any different from reverb or double tracking, they are just recording technologies?”
I think many people latch onto the singer / vocal on a track. Sometimes a person would complain about programmed drums instead of a live drummer on a track but even more of the listening public relate to the vocal, the lyric and the image projected by the vocalist than the entire backing instrumentation and arrangement. So, this could mean that autotune would particularly grate with large amounts of people who wouldn't bat an eyelid at a gated snare or synthesized horn section.
I'm very much into singers as opposed to vocalists (although I do listen to music by people who aren't wonderful singers too!) and to apply autotune to many of these voices would be sacrilege. It's a sound that really grates with me but which rarely effects music I'm interested in, fortunately. I remember hearing a Michael Rose (ex- of Black Uhuru) single about ten years ago where his voice had been autotuned and I was livid.
Despite this, I enjoy Roger Troutman's, Herbie Hancock's and Stevie Wonder's adventures with vocoders... It works well with that style of Funk for me. I wouldn't to hear James Brown autotuned though. Some Hip Hop records use very pitched up vocal samples and that can be hit or miss for me. Works well at times, sometimes makes me think about chipmunks.
Autotune would take me straight out of the mood of a song, just as CGI and ott lighting effects draw me away from a film, or obvious and excessive photoshopping make my eyes reject a photograph. I think I am of an analogue generation.
It's quite a pop thing really, is Autotune - gets used on bright, commercial sounding current music (which I tend not to enjoy) and I can see it fitting in with other many other genres too well. I does get used quite a bit in contemporary Jamaican Dancehall but its not really spoiling all that much that would otherwise have been 'my thing'.
I suspect if a producer were to autotune the vocals of most people I listen to, the artist would go into meltdown. I'd be right with them on that.