The music scene today strikes me as a market where every single competitor’s strategy is differentiation. Monarch Studio’s founder and Sauder alumnus Tom Dobrzanski said as much during the Question and Answer period with him the other day.
Each band employs Porter’s differentiation approach to their sound. Bands employ a fade here, a drop there. Genres, like rock and roll, or smooth jazz, are born out of the need to differentiate. But the greatest differentiator that I have heard in the music industry is the voice, the sound, of a band or artist. Frank Sinatra, booming over the roar of the crowd or Freddie Mercury’s falsetto soaring through the scales, it’s what makes a band stand out.
Yet today, that is too easily achieved. Don’t get me wrong: the same proportion of artists have this incredible gift, yet so many others employ producers who, armed with programs like Autotune, bend and stretch the abilities of an admittedly average voice into something extraordinary.
In the pursuit of differentiation, and hence success, and the creation of a new sound, artists become nothing more than acts, singing into a magic microphone.
Artists are speaking out now, calling for a halt to the imitation game that pop has become, and I feel like it is only a matter of time before bands that cannot perform live simply won’t be able to tour and hence earn massive profits.
In the music industry of the future, the ethical choice to be honest about your voice your sound and your group’s abilities will be worth far more financially than a creative producer.
I hope producers like Tom feel the same.
http://www.hometracked.com/2008/02/05/auto-tune-abuse-in-pop-music-10-examples/