Auto-Tune

So, the other day, my sister described a song she heard on the radio as being "very '80s" due to the prevalent use of synthesizers. And it got me thinking.

In the '80s, the use of synthesizers was at its peak, and it has since then, slowly declined in popularity. Sort of.

And, if history is as cyclical as I think it is, and if I'm as good a predictor of trends as I think I am, the same thing will happen with that worst of music devices, Auto-Tune.

See, right now we have all of these artists experimenting with Auto-Tuning, some of whom shamelessly display it (I'm looking at you, T-Pain). And we all bemoan the current state of affairs, wondering why, oh why, do we have to be aurally assaulted by these pseudo-robotic voices? Do we want our "Aughts" culture to be remembered by posterity for, of all things, this musical abortion? Well, I submit to you, that in a few years, this whole thing will die down. Auto-Tuning will still be around, I have no doubt, but it will be nowhere near as ubiquitous as it currently is. In thirty years, we will look back, and hear a song from this era on the radio, and decry it as sounding "so aughts" (or whatever we will refer to the decade as... early 2000s, perhaps? or the "o"s?). I dread this day, the day when my current generation's music is played on the "Oldies" station. But I digress.

Auto-Tuning will inevitably fade to the background, perhaps to be used as mere touching-up, or to achieve a specific effect (i.e. creepy, soulless-sounding singers(which, admittedly, could artistically work, depending on the song)). But, again, great predictor of trends that I am, a great deal of this generation's music will fall by the wayside. We pine for generations past, when there was nothing but good music, while we forget that there was plenty of bad music back then, it's simply that the good stuff survived, while the bad stuff faded into obscurity. One can only hope that the likes of Fergie will become that "faded into obscurity" music.

I have great hope for the future of music. Sort of.

Snow

So, it is currently snowing. This irritates me for a number of reasons. See, it just snowed. About fifteen inches, to be precise. I spent all of Saturday and Sunday shoveling this snow away from my driveway, porch, and cars, and clearing a path from my front yard to my back yard. This caused my back and arms much soreness. Now, the powers that be have decided that just as my poor, aching body has recovered from such aggravation, it is time to bring on the pain again. This batch is set to reach approximately ten inches total, which has now invalidated all of my hard work. All that pain was for naught.

Compounding the irritation is the fact that it is forecast to remain below 32 degrees Fahrenheit all week, thus making impossible the chance that some of the snow might melt. This does not please me. Not only will two feet of snow be on the ground, it will stay on the ground, until, I can only assume, April.

However, I do get off of school tomorrow, which is good, because there was a draft of an essay I was supposed to write. I never got around to it.

So, this was my very first blog post. Hate to start on such a downer, but, c'est la vie.

--Preston