Spencer's commentary

Fresh Voices On-Air commentator Spencer Carlson, takes a stance against the music industry’s auto-tuning trend.

Spencer Carlson is a 16 year old sophomore at New Hanover High School. He's been playing guitar since he was nine years old. He enjoys playing with many local musicians and someday hopes to become a musician himself.

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The Sad End of Real Music

Modern popular music is a topic that I am very concerned about because it is becoming more and more computerized. I recently went to a music festival in Atlanta and I was very disappointed when listening to some of the bands- I seemed to only be hearing background recording that sounded identical to the studio recording that is played over the radio.One performer even had an entire band on stage with him that had their volume turned all the way down, pretending to play what was coming out of the speakers.The only performer who was actually doing something was the lead singer.

If you listen to pop stations on the radio, all you hear is auto tuned singing and a computerized beat that any ten year old with a Macbook could create. There are so many talented musicians and singers who practice hours a day learning scales and music theory who never get their music played over the radio.All that anyone wants to hear is Kanye West rap about his seventeen Lamborghinis. I recently took a tour of my family friend’s recording studio. There was a band about my age recording so I listened to one of their cds and I thought they were really good. I then went into the room where the band was actually recording the song and they were just awful! The owner of the studio later told me that the lead singer of the band I had heard had his parents pay a famous producer to go into the studio and mix for them. If all that it takes to record a decent song is paying a producer to mix it for you than any rich person can record a hit. This would make actual musicians obsolete and their efforts to become successful would be pointless.

Thankfully there are still genres of music that do not incorporate computers. Genres like Jazz, Blues, most Rock, Alternative, and bands like The Lumineers or Train that are technically considered to be pop but still have musical talent. Some genres are actually based entirely off of computerized sounds and noises. Music like Dubstep is just a collage of robotic sounding noises stacked on top of each other in a rhythm. Dubstep sounds interesting but music is meant to be played by a musician, not someone who is good at pressing buttons on their laptop. Another problem with modern popular music is that record companies are signing people based on the way they look, and not caring as much about their music. This is largely because of the success of music videos. Companies earn money when people view their music videos so they sign attractive people. The illegal downloading of mp3s from websites like Pirate Bay are making music available to the public for free, which steals money from the producers and artists that created the song. When companies stop making money from their music they resort to making music videos. If these problems persist music as we know it will be changed for the worst.