Crosstalk has finally passed through, more or less, and the class is excited to show off their results.
Cross dog can sneak in between the posts. Cross Dog and Sneak Bear between the bone. Sneakers ding between the mount. Snickers smuck beet ween ya mouth. Sniffy sweep Taco Bell.
A snicker from the Margin of Error. 11 stands up and goes Ralph Wiggum: “I got Mystery Man!” Somewhere between 8 and 12, I hear the words alligator music. I see my research funding getting cut off, plunging down the embankment in a poof of flames. The Taco Bell business is dropped and, mercifully, someone at the bottom of the order, maybe 20, sets things right: “Pea see sweet cherry bells.” Then 22, our best closer: “DDT Cherry Bales.” The back of his paper says, “Dude, where’s my tornado?” His teacher wonders how she’s going to turn these vocoders back into a class.
Afterward, they throw their hands in the air. “What’s your book about?” It’s about the vocoder. “What’s your book about?” A machine invented by the phone company that makes you talk like a robot. “Huh??” Your grandpa’s sore throat? “Will it be for children?” It’s got frogs and robots.
Later that night, my niece listens to the end of “Change the Beat,” eyebrows up, seaweed tangled in headphones. “Who are these people? Why did they say that?!”
I have no idea.
Word is bear.
FUTURE BEAT ALLIANCE
Author’s Future Beat Alliance certificate, arrived by mail from Tommy Boy Records, September 1984.
(illustration credit app.1)
IT’S NOT THE END OF
THE WORLD
Some Final Thoughts on Auto-Tune
In 1963, the Nuclear Limited Test Ban Treaty between the Soviet Union, Britain and the United States prohibited the detonation of nuclear weapons in “the general atmosphere.” Outer space and underwater were off limits as well. Though subterranean testing was permitted, distinguishing between an earthquake and a warhead exploding underground was a problem. Bell Labs would resolve the dilemma with the Cepstrum (the “C” is hard), aka “Quefrency,” a method for gauging reflections from the earth’s core. With the Quefrency geophysicists could differentiate between nuking a buried Pac-Man cartridge in the desert and the Golden Gate Bridge doing a sine wave. Bell Labs would use a computerized model of Cepstrum frequency peaks to determine a pitch frequency for Manfred Schroeder’s Voice-Excited Vocoder. Instead of magma reflections, engineers could measure the glottal puffs of air between speech—or pitch “periods.” According to Bell, the Voice-Excited Vocoder would be the first speaking machine to sound human, thanks to a boost from the Cold War arms race.
The Cepstrum’s main principle, autocorrelation, uses sound to measure seismo-acoustic reflections for mapping oil prospects. Autocorrelation would beget Auto-Tune, a pitch corrective implant invented in 1996 by former Exxon engineer Andy Hildebrand, and now sold by his company Antares. Similar to how Homer Dudley envisioned the vocoder, Auto-Tune can airbrush a defective singer—not by swapping vocal tracts, a trick Bell Labs would call “Digital Decapitation”—but by putting notes in their proper place. Auto-Tune knows where the vocal pitch is located at all times. Hildebrand says the vocoder “has no such knowledge” of a singer’s pitch, an ignorance that favors the tin can in the freak pants, especially if he or she can play keyboards.
Auto-Tune is better known for its imperfection, a quality more human than robotic. (Robotic is the world in which everyone sings perfectly without even knowing it.) Set the retune function to zero and the pitch seems to be scaled instantaneously rather than a natural slide between notes, resulting in hyperactive birdcall tremolo, a jagged melisma.
In a sense, Exxon could be held accountable for the reinvention of Cher, who proved that believing in life after love after age fifty was a simple matter of geophysics, artificial enhancement and abused technology. As a 13-year-old from Yemen once told me: “The people singing the songs aren’t really singing the songs.” So the adolescent listener reconstructs the voice with his own off-key pipes.
Auto-Tune can’t sit still any more than afterschool hormones. Maybe it appeals to kids because they’re undergoing a transformation of their own, their voices modulating all over the pitch scale, their speech ambushed by puberty. At times, the frog won’t let go.
Auto-Tune is the jitters—that teenage love hysteria, where the highs and lows are no less drastic than the dips and spikes of pitch-scale melodrama. (My favorite T-Pain song is “Calm the F*k Down.”) That first heartbreak is the end of the world. It’s not robotic. It is fickle and aflutter and it seems to be happening all at once. Retune to set zero. That parental back-pat—“one day you’re going to meet someone really special”—means nothing. The present is histrionics. The moment, all over the place.
As the voice of pop radio, Auto-Tune is there for the confusing identity siege that is junior high. Faheem Rasheed Najm is T-Pain. T-Pain is Auto-Tune. Auto-Tune is a vocoder. (T-Pain said so.) I Am T-Pain is an App. You are T-Pain. T-Pain is a brand. No sooner did Jay-Z call for Auto-Tune’s head after seeing Wendy’s use it to sell a Frosty, than Apple made the I Am T-Pain app available for $2.99. As demonstrated on the Champion DJ track, “Baako,” babies can now be Auto-Tuned before reaching intelligibility.
New Orleans rapper Na’tee would offer some clarity on the situation: “Fuck Auto-Tune. Fuck the V-coder.”
A client recently asked Andy Hildebrand if the world’s problems could be represented as notes on a grid, could the right Auto-Tune algorithm wrangle them “in-tune.” On the popular YouTube clip “Auto-Tuning the News,” someone already attempted reducing nuclear weapons in a pop song and failed. So it’s back to set zero. Return to the magma that heard it all before and sent it back. Here, you take it.
HOW TO RECOGNIZE A PEACHTREE FREAK
I’ve included here a supplementary list of 99 vocoder songs not mentioned in the book—mostly disco, electrofunk, boogie and laser lust. Atlanta’s Geno Jordan is first, in honor of the giant Peachoid water tower just off 85-South in Gaffney, South Carolina. The vocoder versions of “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” and “Maniac” are not included. Apologies to Jodeci, Mogwai and Daft Punk.
(illustration credit app.2)
1 GENO JORDAN
YOU’RE A PEACHTREE FREAK ON PEACHTREE STREET (PART III)
(Velvetone)
2 NEWCLEUS
COMPUTER AGE
(4-track/13-minute version, unreleased)
3 MAC MALL, MAC DRE & E-40
DREDIO
(Thizz Entertainment)
4 PHIL COLLINS
IN THE AIR TONIGHT
(Virgin)
5 MAN PARRISH
MAN-MADE (JAM PONY EXPRESS VERSION)
(Jam Pony)
6 P BATTERS
BACK DROP (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Gladiator Entertainment)
7 B +
B BEAT CLASSIC (West End)
8 JAZAQ
ALL SYSTEMS GO
(Enjoy)
9 COLD CRUSH BROTHERS
COLD CRUSH (IT’S US)
(Profile)
10 CON FUNK SHUN
HIDE AND FREAK
(Polygram)
11 PETER BAUMANN
THIS DAY
(Virgin)
12 OUTKAST
SYNTHESIZERS
(La Face)
13 ABOVE THE LAW
BLACK SUPERMAN
(Ruthless)
14 PHIL LYNOTT
YELLOW PEARL
(Phonogram)
15 BBQ BAND
IMAGINATION
(Capitol)
16 ZEUS B. HELD
EUROPIUM
(Strand)
17 ROYAL CASH
RADIOACTIVITY
(Sutra)
18 ADD N TO (X)
KING WASP
(Satellite)
19 DIETER MOEBIUS AND CONNY PLANK
MISS CACADOU
(Sky)
20 STEEL MIND
BAD PASSION (DUB)
(
Delirium)
21 ARMENTA
I WANT TO BE WITH YOU
(INSTRUMENTAL)
(Savoir Faire)
22 Q
VOICE OF Q
(Philly World)
23 SYNERGY
PROJECT 5
(Time Traxx)
24 DXJ & THE BASSOLIANS
BASSOLIAN ATTACK
(Joey Boy)
25 ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
SLOW BEAT
(Profile)
26 THE TOURIST
HOOKED ON YOU (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Reelin and Rockin)
27 CAPRICORN
CAPRICORN (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Emergency)
28 TELEX
MOSKOW-DISKOW
(Sire)
29 THE BROTHERS SUPREME
WE CAN’T BE HELD BACK
(Street Talk)
30 WUF TICKET
THE KEY (DUB VERSION)
(Prelude)
31 PHIL COLLINS
I’M NOT MOVING (IDJUT BOYS REMIX)
(Box Office)
32 MC A.D.E.
HOW MUCH CAN YOU TAKE?
(4-Sight)
33 HERBIE HANCOCK
TELL EVERYBODY
(Columbia)
34 G-FORCE
FEEL THE FORCE (INSTRUMENTAL)
(SMI)
35 THE B BOYS
GIRLS (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Vintertainment)
36 ANDRE CYMONE
GET IT GIRL
(Columbia)
37 PEPPERMINT LOUNGE
PERFECT HIGH
(World of Music)
38 BOSE
SLOW JAM
(Rockwell)
39 AFRIKA BAMBAATAA
BAMBAATAA’S THEME
(Tommy Boy)
40 DAYTON
MEET THE MAN
(Monk One Edit) (Capitol)
41 KEITH SWEAT
HOW DEEP IS YOUR LOVE
[UNMADE DUB VERSION]
(Elektra)
42 TOM TOM CLUB
SPOOKS (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Sire)
43 X-REF
DREAM SIX-0
(Citinite)
44 IAN BODDY
THE SENTINEL
(New Media)
45 JOCELYN BROWN
SOMEBODY ELSE’S GUY
(Island)
46 STEVIE WONDER
RACE BABBLING(Motown)
47 AFRIKA BAMBAATAA
AND THE SOUL SONIC FORCE
LOOKING FOR THE PERFECT BEAT
(Tommy Boy)
48 SPECIAL REQUEST
SALSA SMURF
(Tommy Boy)
49 JIMMY LEWIS AND THE L.A. STREET BAND
STREET FREEKS
(Write On)
50 MISTAH F.A.B.
WE GO STUPID IN THE BAY
(New Bay)
51 DANCE REACTION
DISCO TRAIN
(Siamese)
52 DAVY DMX
THE DMX WILL ROCK
(Tuff City)
53 DYNAMIX II
JUST GIVE THE DJ A BREAK
(Bass Station)
54 AVALANCHES
SINCE I LEFT YOU (STEREOLAB REMIX)
(Elektra)
55 AWESOME FOURSOME
FUNKY MAKOSSA
(Party Tyme)
56 DAM FUNK
LET’S TAKE OFF
(Stones Throw)
57 JOHN ROBIE
VENA CAVA (DISCONET VERSION)
(Disconet)
58 LCD SOUNDSYSTEM
45:33 (V)
(DFA)
59 MANTRONIX
NEEDLE TO THE GROOVE
(Sleeping Bag)
60 NEW ORDER
BIZARRE LOVE TRIANGLE
(Factory)
61 D.J. BATTLECAT
DJ N-EFFECT
(Techno Kut)
62 SYLK 130
BEAUTY OF MACHINES
(Six Degrees)
63 VERY CHERI
69 CANCER SIGN
(Zakia)
64 ONE WAY
MR. GROOVE
(MCA)
65 RODNEY STEPP
BREAK-OUT
(Chique)
66 PRETTY TONY
JAM THE BOX
(Music Specialist)
67 MAGIC TRICK
CHECK US OUT
(Orla)
68 VELOCITY
UNEMPLOYMENT (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Velocity)
69 BOARDS OF CANADA
IN A BEAUTIFUL PLACE OUT IN THE COUNTRY
(Warp)
70 RICHARDO VILLALOBOS
EASY LEE
(Playhouse)
71 PYRAMID PLUS
COMIN’ AT YA
(Lifeworld)
72 N.W.A.
PANIC ZONE
(Ruthless)
73 NIGHTLESS
CRAZY NIGHTS (INSTRUMENTAL)
(Jago)
74 TOUCHÉ
WRAP IT UP
(Emergency)
75 CASCO
CYBERNETIC LOVE (INSTRUMENTAL)
(House of Music)
76 FREESTYLE
PARTY HAS BEGUN
(Music Specialists)
77 DAZZ BAND
JOY STICK
(Motown)
78 CABARET VOLTAIRE
COLOURS (CLUB MIX)
(Mute)
79 NACHO PATROL
STRATUS CHANT /
FUTURISTIC ABBIS ABBEBAV
(Kindred Spirits)
80 COSMIC TOUCH
NOTHING EVER CHANGES
DOUG E. FRESH
NUTHIN
(Serious Gold/Reality)
81 METHUSALEM
ROBOTISM
(Ariola)
82 RAHUL DEV BURMAN
THE BURNING TRAIN MAIN THEME
(EMI)
83 WHO’S WHO
PALACE PALACE
(Carerre)
84 GERALDINE STEWART
WALKING WITH THE KING
(Lord Records)
85 SHIMOKITA BAMBAATAA FEATURING
KAWASAKI ROCK ZA HOUSE
JAM ON THE PLANET
(File)
86 OTIS CLAY
LOVE BANDIT (12 INCH VERSION)
(Reliant)
87 LUKE VIBERT
I LOVE ACID
(Warp)
88 PAUL MCCARTNEY
BE WHAT YOU SEE
(Columbia)
89 HOUSEMASTER BOYZ
TRAX U LOST
(House)
90 COMPUTER JAY
MAINTAIN (FATTY DL REMIX)
(Ramp)
91 JAMES BLAKE
FOOTNOTES
(R&S)
92 AFRICAN CONNEXION
CITY LIMITS (MIDNIGHT PRESSURE)
(Oval)
93 MTUME
HIPS
(Epic)
94 ANTHONY ROTHER
BIOMECHANIK (VIDEO VERSION)
(Psi49net)
95 THE MAGGOTRONICS
RADIO MARS
(4-Sight)
96 DE LA SOUL
THE RETURN OF DST
(White label)
97 USJE SUKATMA
WAITING FOR YOUR LOVE
(Tjampuran)
98 TRUS’ME FEATURING DAM FUNK
BAIL ME OUT
(Fat City)
99 I-F
SPACE INVADERS ARE SMOKING GRASS
(Purple Eye)
DEATH OF A
MONK
GOOD IDEA
The last message I got from Rammellzee was that he had received the vocoder book. He said he no longer needed to throw me off his rooftop.
I met with Stephen Torton in June 2010, days after Rammel passed. An artist himself, Torton worked closely with Jean-Michel Basquiat and Rammellzee while also documenting their first trips to Italy and Los Angeles in the early Eighties. (The LA mission would be commemorated in the Basquiat piece “Hollywood Africans.”)
Torton to
ld me a story about how Rammel once approached the MTA and City Hall with a proposal. If they let him camouflage the entire subway system, graffiti writers would be so confused and discouraged that they would just give up.
The MTA said, Nice try, but we’d rather dip the trains in acid.
DISNEYLAND
Torton’s 1984 photo of Rammel and Jean-Michel Basquiat entering Disneyland, at dusk, appears back on this page.
Rammel is glancing over his tweeded shoulder, clearly up to something. Basquiat’s tie appears to be yearning toward some unseen electromagnetic force. Not surprisingly, nobody else is near them. They are in their own Walley World. Maybe Wall-E World—Rammel being an apocalyptic garbage-recycling robot himself.
By the time we get to the scene, it will be too late.
BABY GRIMACE
Torton once showed me two short films he did with Rammel. The first, Live at the Squat, was a 1982 performance/Ikonoklast Panzerism screed at the Squat Theater near the Bowery. (Squat marks the first time I’d ever seen Fab Five Freddy’s eyeballs). The other short, titled Baby Grimace, was shot in ’84 and has never been shown. We find Rammellzee amok in the town of Martina Franca in Italy, where he’d been commissioned to cut an armed letter sculpture from granite. He is wearing two—maybe three—pairs of slit-lensed lizard glasses on his forehead. His pants are tucked into his boots. Schoolchildren point and laugh at this alien, slouching across steep cobblestones in earmuffs. But they do it from a safe distance.
In another scene, Rammel looms over knee-high model churches, spritzing medieval plaster with color. (He’d already bombed a sawed-off Renault.) In the background, you hear “Planet Rock” and “F-4000,” to the hiss of aerosol compression. The gallery owner is upset. Rammellzee is snapping off all the crosses.
RODEO BIG DUCK
I bought “Beat Bop” while on a family Christmas trip in 1983. I was 14. Having lost my parents to Macy’s, I escaped to a nearby record store (which may have been Rock & Soul) and blew my Christmas shopping money on 12 inches. A guy who kind of resembled the manager of the First Avenue club in Purple Rain (“What’s this one-song shit!”) recommended five records: “Fresh” by Fresh 3 MC’s, “Rock the House” by the B-Boys, “Death Mix” by Afrika Bambaataa, “Bad Times” by Capt. Rapp (produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis), and “Beat Bop,” which was credited to Rammellzee Vs. K-Rob.
How to Wreck a Nice Beach Page 25