Why Do Pop Singers Have An Accent?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 12 ก.ย. 2024
- I have some theories about the reasons why pop singers pronounce words so strangely. Lemme tell you 'bout them!
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welcome to my kitchein we have bananeys and avocadois
I know this from the vine :D
"I got that reference :DD"
ævøcçædôs
hahahha
Lmao 😂
This is one of my biggest pet peeves, but when I point it out, people never know what I’m talking about. Like how can you not notice, literally EVERY artist is doing it.
Same!
If they're young, they don't notice it, because it's normal to them. They don't know anything else. Every aspiring teenage singer also just sings like this because they're (without really consciously knowing it) imitating their favorite singers. It's wild to me lmao.
Like George Carlin said - I don’t have pet peeves I have major psychotic hatreds !
Same here. And I can't sing much so I can't really copy it. All the classic rock and pop artists I listen to don't do it-it's like a thing that became big in the 90's and on...maybe it's to do with the advent of autotune?
Thank you! YES! And I’m sorry but they are FORCING themselves to sound that way
That strange-vowel singing style drives me bonkers, and thanks for addressing the issue. It sounds like a bad impression of a female toddler, or, perhaps, a talking goose. There are probably thousands of indie bands that have that vocal style.
And it's getting boring!
It sounds like a TODDLER. THANK YOU!
I think we have Colin Meloy to thank for that.
and i hate all for them for not being themselves.
@@traceylamplugh7727 It's _always_ been boring.
It irritates me. It's homogeneous. Almost every time an old song appears in a commercial now, it's a cover with this horrible thing going on. I'm SICK OF IT!
and movie trailers!!!
I think they think it’s supposed to sound ‘edgy’, but if they’re covering someone else’s song it just comes across as disrespectful. It’s like they think the original artist didn’t do a good enough job.
Oh my fucking GOD. This is literally the first I've seen this mentioned outside of my own head. They're the fucking WORST. SO CLICHE.
@@astridvvv9662 Just heard a bastardized version or Sweet Dreams in some trailer. Euch.....
There is a version of Guns n Roses-Sweet child o mine that been going on the rounds in TV add here in the uk done like this, it sounds pure shite!
Constipated Kermit sounded exactly like Shakira.
Because they are all secretly Danish? 🙂
They sound russians to me :-)
Obviously Canadian!
så sandt!
Kamelåså!
Cue soviet national anthem..
Halsey's voice drives me CRAZY. And her version of this cadence is probably the most exaggerated that I've heard.
Yesssss.
Yes! 100%. Awful. Halsey, you are awful.
Shes awful lol
Halsey and Grace Vanderwhal. God I hate them lmao.
I've never hated a person until halsey opened her mouth
Thank God somebody is pointing this out. I think the industry promotes it because they think it has a certain "sex appeal". It drives me crazy when they sing like that and instantly drains any attraction I had to the beginning of the song. I'm 25 so I'm not "too old to understand", I'm just too old too listen to garbage.
same for me. like the new Little Mix song is spoiled by their weird enunciation not even 10 seconds into the song.
I am also very mature.
ikr i hate it and i'm not that old
@@marfaxa I'm very, so, so mature for my age. I sure do hate this new music! Adults, do you welcome me yet?
Ther is no emotion in the voice!!!!!
So I’m not the only one who is bothered by Shawn Mendes saying “touich ”
Actually, even I thought I was the only one.
I can't stand Lewis Capaldi's sound too
Tbh I can't hear anything weird at all I think I'm so desensitized to this type of singing already... And I come from a classical singing background! I can't sing pop for the life of me lmao but classical hell ye
Omg same 😂😂
imagine listening to Genaye-sis " Invisible Touich" NOW!
for a while i thought i was the only one who noticed. i literally searched for this.
Mike Lopez
hahah same here
Mike Lopez me too!! Drives me crazy
Annnnnd me too
Me too! Ha!
Same!
OMG YOU SOUNDED *EXACTLY* LIKE LORDE WHEN YOU SANG 'BIRDS FLYING HIGH' AT THE END. *EXACTLY*. THAT PROVES YOUR POINT EVEN MORE
but I mean, that makes sense because she's from New Zealand
How does that make any more sense?
well she actually has an accent and she sounds weird in speaking voice too
AND she can read. 🙃
Lorde took this ridiculous mal-pronunciation thing to a whole nuthah levah. The floodgates opened and it started raining nails on chalkboards.
Advanced pop singers come with built-in pronunciational plugins.
Yeah, the "Winhouser 2.0"
Shmuel, Jakob -Ha! Waves AutoBjork
Ariana lol
lmfao
i'm screaming AHHHHHHHHHHHHH LMAO Autobjork
Too me it just sounds like the sung equivalent of "pouty-baby-talk".
i agree, its annoying
Britney Spears built a whole career around singing in a sexy baby voice.
bitwize no her producers did. They said she had the ideal pop voice. It eventually ruined her singing voice as she got older.
That's exactly it! I hate it.
Thats it! you got it. I think its adora ble and it makes me wanna cuddle with her. Shes so gooid!
“GOOD=GUOID” THE THUMBNAIL KILLED ME-
Reminds of me the Vine video - "WELCOME TO MAI KEECHIN, WE HAYAVE BANAINEES, AND AVOCAUHDI"
Bænænæs ænd ævæcædæs
That's some goiuoiiood research
Raghav Rao 😂
As an Australian, and a singer myself, I can assure that this weird affectation is certainly NOT an Australian accent. Even the two Australasian singers you include in your montage of people doing the weird voice (Lorde and Sia) have not a trace of their natural speaking accent (New Zealand and Australian, respectively) in their singing performances. The affected accent all these singers are adopting is still an intrinsically American accent, even though it includes some very odd vowel sounds that belong to no region of the USA, or indeed of anywhere else in the world.
This is such a bizarre phenomenon. I wonder if they are even consciously aware of it. It’s quite possible they’re not, in the same way non-American singers are usually not consciously aware of “Americanising” their vowels. It’s just become part of the style of music that they’re singing. The thing that’s so weird about this new fad is that, as far as I can tell, it doesn’t mimic any actual accent that’s spoken in the world.
I actually reckon Sarah Blasko is one of the first to widely use this technique, I remember hearing "Don't u eva" and thinking how interesting her voice sounded
@Liz Muschinski the “world” thing you identify is the lack of what linguists call the rhotic “R”. We don’t specifically pronounce the “r” in a word if it either ends a word (eg “car”) or is followed by a consonant (eg “bird”), but always pronounce it if it is followed by a vowel, even if that vowel is the start of the next word (eg we DO pronounce the “r” in “car” in the phrase “car and truck” and will often, paradoxically, insert an “r” where there is none if one word ends in a vowel and is followed by a word that begins with a vowel, eg pronouncing “Law and Order” as “Laura Nawda”).
It’s not unique to Australian accents. Among native English speakers, we share our non-rhoticness with the South East of Britain, New Zealand, South Africa, old-timey Bostonian (“pahk the cah in the Hahv’d yahd”) and New York accents, and some southern US accents. Standard American shares its rhotic “R” with Canadian, Irish, Scottish and West Country UK accents, among others.
Interestingly, they think ALL English accents were rhotic until the 18th century, when some in and around London began dropping their “R”s as a sort of affectation that caught on. America had already been settled, which explains why Canada and most of the US missed out on the shift (with the exception of Eastern-most colonies that continued to be most influenced by continued contact with Britain), while Australia and NZ were settled after the shift had already occurred.
@Liz Muschinski Well, it’s all relative. There’s no “right” or “neutral” way of speaking English. What’s your accent?
@@fromchomleystreet I wish the person you are replying to didn't delete their comments so I could understand the context of what you are saying; suffice to say that I bet a lot of Americans, and even some Australians, do not realise that most of us don't pronounce words like 'don't' (for instance) as 'doiyn't and 'no' like 'noiy' . Perhaps ironically, you hear those kinds of vowel sounds in certain American accents such as those used by cliche gangsters in old movies. Words such as 'early' pronounced as 'oily' and and 'bird' as 'boiyd'. It's just that some Australians have adapted it for different words, because its a more natural derivation for an Australian voice to make. Also, the only reason we would say 'Laura Nawda(norda)' for 'law and order' is because we are being lazy and are dropping the 'a' and 'd' on the word 'and'. Try saying 'Law norda' with most English accents, there is a break which would make the contraction pointless. Some Gaulic/Welsh English or colonial American accents might say 'Law'norda', at a stretch.
It's a plague worse than prickly pear and lantenna.
No what is weird in music when people pronounce the word “I” as “Oi” like,, no????
Oh and what Halsey did in that example 😬 why did she go “emptyiNASS”
I pronounce "I" as "Ah" a lot of times, "do" as "deeuh"/"too", can't pronounce "squirrel" (I sound like "es-quee-ah" or "sskueel" 🤣) I separate to much the words to make each sound clear, and I've been told I tend to click the "T" too much at the end of words (you would hear me saying "the exiT linghT isn'T whorkin' prropehr-lly" for example 😋 worst part is I can barely spot my own accent (or almost any accent) so ...yeah, I have a weird way to speak English 🤣🙈
UP THE PUNX OI OI OI
Oi won’t loi (lie) to you
Aimee, seriously, thank you so much. My skin has been crawling this morning listening to modern stuff my teenager is listening to. But I’m trying so hard not to be a dick about it, and I really appreciate your level-headed analysis here. You’re such a great youtuber-this video is fantastic.
It just sounds so obnoxiously whiny to me. Like they are crying, whining and breathlessly whispering while wandering, slightly off pitch, all over the melody. Sounds like fingernails on a blackboard to me. 😝
@@Julia29853perfect description
Can’t wait for that singing trend to pass. I can generally avoid that music by not listening to it, but when I’m watching a trailer for an intense movie then suddenly, a crappy “serious” cover of a song comes on where a person is singing in that goofy modern style, it totally removes me from the immersion I had into that trailer.
Hey Aimee! I'm not sure if you'll ever see this, but I just wanted to tell you how grateful I am for your video. I was working on an informational-type-video on what people call "cursive singing" nowadays, and I was having a difficult time finding trustworthy sources on such a "pop" & WOM type of subject. Your video gave me so much insight on where this type of singing comes from and really gave my video an extra edge. I made sure to credit you in my latest video I titled as "The Truth of Cursive Singing" as one of my sources and inspiration during my research. Thanks for everything that you do!
Thanks so much! I will check it out! Yeah, my kids told me about a year ago that this type of thing is called cursive now. I’m glad it’s got a name. :-)
I searched for this after listening to Dua Lipa say "Break my Heaaaauuuyyyyt"
Halsey has her way of doing the "unnecessary vowel sound" with each word in EVERY song. My brain can't process it neither ignore it and certainly can NOT cope with it. So I stopped listening to her and many other artists. It's not my thing. I don't think "comfort" comes with age maybe one day you just know why it doesn't make you feel comfortable while listening. I'm not 25 yet but I know this is what I don't like. When I was a teen, I always wondered why "uis", "gouid", "touich" !?
After watching this video I understand why.. thank you for putting this forth, much appreciated!
When I hear them do this "hip sing" I automatically write them off because they're jumping on this ridiculous bandwagon with this accent they don't speak and never did. It's pretentious and has gotten boring and repetitive. It's so played out now. I find it cringy. That's my opinion. Doesn't mean I'm right but it's right for me. It's so bad I had to seek support! That's why I'm here for those who have to know why people are here. And for the record, I'm here in 2019.
totally agree.
@Tracey Lamplugh EwwwwWWWW!!!
I wish current singers would find and use their own voice, rather than use the same style as everyone else. Its a massive waste of their abilities.
That is the thing though, the vast majority of singers all sound very similar, with a mild American accent regardless of where they are from. I don't understand what the issue is with the divergence from that norm. I welcome it as good diversity.
To me it sounds like the "rich girl" speaking voice. Adding in all the vocal fry valley girl stuff. I am not bashing it, just commenting on where I hear it the most.
Matt Durrah I think it’s also a generational thing. Girls my age (35) tend to have a clearer tone of voice than younger ones who tend to add vocal fry. Unless the older ones are trying to fit in with a young crowd, in which case they’ll add vocal fry as a choice. It’s painful to listen to.
River Amazon, people have been complaining about vocal fry for ever. You're just probably too young to remember. And they are mostly wrong. There's no wrong or right accent, accents just "are". Also you don't usually complain when men vocal fry which is pretty frequent too.
Already tried by Frank (and Moon) Zappa in ‘Valley Girl’, referring to the accent of the San Fernando Valley girls. Doesn’t really sound anything like this, though.
Yeah seconded, but a rich white accent trying to sound black american
Shakira has beeeeeen doing constipated Kermit the frog.
I think the modern pop accent is a suburban accent mixed with auto tune (I'm writing this before I watched the whole video).
Lolol
Aimee Nolte Music And I'll add one more thing- I don't think Amy Winehouse is the source, I think it's Avril Laviegne.
Might be!!
Shakira is from Colombia so, she's got an excuse xq
I'm with you on the autotune thing
9:32 I guess you could say people over 30 are just out of toich
I'm not 30 yet and I hate that dumb new pop singer pronunciation...
You laugh now...until you yourself become over 30. :P
No... It's the children who are wrong
All of you missed Lime's joke. :(
All of the people in this reply missed the joke.
I really can't wait until this trend fades out forever. It truly hurts my ears and tightens my chest to hear or even think of it.
Jen Marks ‘tightens my chest’ that’s exactly what I experience too. Physical cringe
Me three!
@@Lovebug3003yes!
There's also the weird, lazy "R" noise that so many singers have been doing for the past few years.
Lorde, Lana Del Rey, Norah Jones, Florence, Halsey, Regina Spektor, etc., etc., etc., etc. It's overflowed onto children, local musicians both in original and cover bands, and everyone auditioning on TV shows, including country singers. I fear it will never go away so I cling to completely indie music, certain unique artists like Tame Impala, or just music from the past.
I know the R sound you speak of. I started hearing it first with John Legend years ago. Shortly after I started hearing it more frequently. The thing is....it sounds natural and cool in John Legends voice and you can hear it in his voice when he speaks during interviews. For all those who copy the sound, it sounds like they're trying to be someone they're not. I'll never understand how this music sells...teenagers and kids i guess🤷♂️
When John Legend sings the word "her" for example it subtly sounds like "hurl". There's a weird R+L combination with every R. Like i said though for some reason it sounds cool when John Legend does it. When some of these mainstream and indy artists do it they sound like a mentally challenged walrus/seal.
@@dennisantle5905 😄
@Nope Nope 😄 Fitting.
Im actually surpriced alle the "Me"'s turning into "Mæh" wasn't mentioned :O
Would have been another five mins! 😂 Rufus Wainwright prime example of that
Sune Hesselbjerg guys.. thats what you have to do when you sing in overdrive.. my vocal coach tells me that all the time.. that’s a technique.. what even is this I
Love the Ruference! I actually consider the James Heffield “me” to go somewhat mehhhehhll
"It's gonna be may"
-Justin Timberlake
Yes, it's somewhat normal in singing to make your vowels more open. So all ee's become eh's or ay's, oh's come closer to ah's and sometimes ooh's become ow's. Listen to classical singing, some opera, sometimes it seems to be just one long ooooaaaaaaoooaaeaeaeae :')
I jest wanna lewk goid for yo goid for yo oh oh
This is a nightmare for people trying to learn English xD
that why i don't use music to learn english, or else i will just learn how to sing in english.
Tristan what I meant is that people who lives in other countries (Spain in my case) the only English we're exposed to is on TV and music. And we take for good a lot of things that are actually wrong. For example in my case I just recently understood that writing "I'm gonna love you" is wrong. And there's a lot more of that in pronunciation, which is (in my opinion) the most difficult part of learning English.
Tristan I know nobody that doesn't lol
Tristan I picked up alot of Korean listening to kpop. Of course I can't fluently speak any of it so from that point youre right.
Now that I think about it, music is really repetitive and easy to remember, so, besides the weird pronunciation, it should still make learning a language a bit easier...
I’ve been asking this question for so long and nobody seemed to know what I meant!!! Now I don’t feel so crazy. I hope you’re right about this accent thing passing. I can’t even listen to the freakin radio anymore. Thanks for the video👍
🙌🏼🙌🏼thanks for watching
Ditto!!!
I found this video two years after you left your comment when some song drove me crazy enough to spend half my workday searching for an answer. Sadly, it is taking it's time getting out of here (or is it he-uh, I dunno anymore. Stupid dipthongs) THANK YOU AMY!
I'm so glad someone pointed this out....I have been trying to complain to my friends about how annoying pop singers' pronunciations are for years and people always say that they can't hear it!! So frustrating
Whoever can't hear it needs their 'earing checked.
They’re sheep 🐑
I think you nailed it. It may very well have started with Amy Winehouse's purposely-retro jazzy-bluesy pronunciations and somehow morphed into mindless millennial diphthong roulette.
**Generation Z, or the generation that came after millennials....unless you're including the britney spears example. I clarify because Shawn Mendes and Alessia Cara are arguably the worst offenders of this "weird vocal style" but their music is predominantly popular among teens and tweens, not us Millennials.
The funny thing is Amy's pronunciation also came from her very thick british accent, as well as she tried to mask it behind that jazzy "Supremes" type speech
@@TheKtwStudios Throw in Halsey as well
Mindless Millennial Dipthong Roulette, new band name, I called it
@@SeanPeckham-xe2gt Everything I like is genius and everything that came after that is stupid and bad, of course.
I'm only 18 and I can't stand these weird vouica'als. You've explained why I can't stand listening to Shawn Mendes and Selena Gomez. Thank youiou!
tan nenottup good for you! 🙌🏻
Vouicaieels
no you can’t stand them because you’re jealous of them. admit it
Top notch Aimee, this should be a TED talk (and I mean that in a guid way ;) )
Ugh thank you so much for this. I thought I was the only one who was bothered by this. I hate that it’s being normalized.
Yesss. They all sound the same now. It's boring and doesn't take much talent. Autotune + strange pronunciation.
I loved Amy, now I love Alexandria. : )
I wanted to end it all when I heard:
"I-eee won't lie-eee to you
I know he's juh-eeest not right for you."
"Juh-eeest"? Seriously?!
This is what makes me wanna smash my phone! I literally hold my breath at that part cause the cringe is so real.
Thank you for understanding my pain.
I feel your pain. Last year when you got a paper cut and poured cactus juice on it, then rubbed it over a burner, I felt that too. JK, I like your comments actually.
Seriously though, I want to stop them mid-sentence and ask them if they're okay. Like 'honey, do you need a doctor? Are you having a stroke? Did you just hit your head?'
Ultra cringe
The Amy Winehouse thing seems legit -- I think it's got to be something that people unconsciously associate with sounding "sexy" or exotic, perhaps just British. Also kind of "valley girl" vocal fry, which is a bit more universal in American teen culture.
This has been driving me insane for years. Thank you for researching it!
that unpleasant "er" sound must be why a lot of people hate Country 6:40
Dew yew remembuhrrr the twenny furst naiyt uh septembuhrrr
You just blew my fuckin mind
Hahahahah you hear that in post-grunge singing as well. Wrrrth errrms wrrrde opawwwn
@Mr.ManMakesLotsOfCan Tyler Childers, Cody Jinks, Sturgill Simpson, and Colter Wall would disagree ;)
@Mr.ManMakesLotsOfCan Yeah, even the indie stuff is a more conservative genre, I'll freely admit it. Conservative as in holding on to traditional themes, not necessarily political. It's cool, I don't bash people for their musical tastes so if those artists arent your cup of tea, no harm done.
Selena gomez literally can't sing i'm impressed of how far she's got without having any actual talent.
Especially after that horrendous live performance
@@nik1128 i know right? it was literally so embarassing, i never saw one good live performance for her they're all bad
Nostalgia and sex appeal.
she can sing! go look out for the carpool karaoke with james corden She is a popstar in the genre of dance thats why her singing may be different then folk styles
Anshu I really like Selena Gomez babes but thinks like car Karaoke is all edited. It’s not their naked voice babes
I know I'm late to the party on this but I think that the modern origin of this isn't Amy Winehouse, but Alanis Morissette. If you listen to her hits from the 90's (pre everyone you mentioned) you can hear these distinct vowel changes. I think it was mostly because of her Canadian accent. Let me know what you guys think?
A bit, but I think her style was a put-on more than anything. Listen to her earlier pop music and you might agree. That said, the good news is Morrissette sounds and sounded nothing like, say, Lana Del Rey or Selena Gomez or Regina Spektor. They and countless others all sound alike.
Agreed, and Tori Amos
Alanis and Bjork.
Agree on Morrisette
Tom DeLonge - "You're already the voice inside my YEAD"
Lol where r yaoh, and eim so soohry
Doin’t woist yoir toime oin me
Have you ever noticed how "Red Hot Chili Peppers" uses an L at the beginning of some words. For example, "Li (long i) = I. So they may say "Li don't know" which is "I don't know".
Oh yeah totally!
I don't have a problem with weird pronunciations as long as it works for the song. That example of Britney Spears is a great example - she knows what she's selling and she does a great job at it. We must remember that music is just an illusion. Great songwriters and performers know how to make you believe the magic trick. ;)
Roy Maya Exactly. Music is art and there should never be strict guidelines for it.
However, that being said, there's still a line to cross between artistic and negligent/ignorant
Roy Maya i
I disagree slightly. Michael Jackson knew how to twist things and excel. Much modern music goes overboard in mispronunciation and too often lacks real talent. Overall, popular music has simply gone downhill over time.
Sorry, but this is one magic trick I’m NOT falling for. Britney Spears’ “bae-beh bae-beh” is one thing, but the Lorde/Halsey/Shawn Mendes nonsense is preposterous in a grating, ignorant copycat way. It doesn’t make sense because none of them are selling an attitude, they’re just copying each other’s ridiculous mispronunciation.
After 2 years, this over-affectation just won Grammy's with Billie Eilish, the so-called "big change" in pop.
I’m sure Billie Eilish is a great person, but my God… If only she sang as though English was her first language…
I’ll just work around the issue by pronouncing “good” as “gucci”. That way nobody panics.
this video was guoid.
It’s called a hipster accent
Exactly, did you see that girl's video? She called it hip-singing.
Pop is mainstream as fuck
It's called terrible
*hoipstahya aieycceynt
There is nothing hip or cool about this. When you hear it in every mainstream pop radio atrocity, you cannot pin it on hipsterism. That’s not what being hip is about.
I think part of the issue is what happens when auto tune meets a slided note. That perhaps combined with the modern aversion to holding a long, sustained pitch.
No, this is definitely a choice being made. Not an accident of Autotune.
Finally found my people. Lol Everybody says I'm crazy when I bring this up.
I found this video when I was listening to Lorde and asked myself, "why does she make her words sound so weird?"
Others that played with word sounds, Kate Bush, Joni Mitchell, David Sylvian, Sade, Bjork, and the secretly Danish lol
THANK YOU FOR THIS!!! "guoid" and "touich" and such have been driving me crazy for yeeeears. i get that others like it, but it's really not my cup of tea unfortunately :/
Lauren it makes me cringe and slightly angry lol
I’m so so so happy I’m not the only one that’s been hearing this over the years. It makes me so incredibly uncomfortable.
No doubt Amy Winehouse influenced a generation of female singers, and the current crop seem to all be imitating either her or Adele. But before her there were singers like Fiona Apple, Tori Amos, Hope Sandoval of Mazzy Star and Gwen Stefani of, well, No Doubt (see what I did there?).
Oh man! Hope Sandoval indeed. "Faaaaaaaaaaaayde iiiiiieeeento you...strange you nyeeeeeever knew". To transcribe her singing in IPA would be horrifically difficult.
I should add, though, that I wouldn't change the way that Hope sang that for the world.
Yeah, Tori Amos have done this in more or less every song since forever.
Thank you Aimee for showing this to the world. As a musician, and have good ears, this type of singing is so repetitive and irritating. As soon as they open their mouths, my face just scrunches' up. Too many copy and paste singers, not unique at all. I wish these singers would just use their normal voices. This is why I go back to listening to old school and other Artists.
Aimee, you’ve just validated my irritable attitude about this singing style. Thanks for giving it a name. Yes, I’m old. I’m not changing.
the all pretend. in their head they are just thinking : "omg i'm just a dork" " im so querky"
🎶Do you belieeeeeeeve in life after love? 🎶
There are definitely lots of examples of this from before Amy Winehouse. Gavin DeGraw's album Chariot came out several years before Amy's breakout album and these weird pronunciations are all over his stuff. Ashlee Simpson and Avril Lavigne were doing this well before then too. The earliest example I can think of is Blink182's stuff dating back to the 90's.
They copy Bjork. I was listening to her greatest hits the other day and it struck me... Thats what it is.
David Paul Very good examples
Voyce insoyd moy eeeaaaad
Nailed it Russ. Bjork can give the word "line" 11 syllables and she can growl for no reason.
David Paul Green Day did it before Blink
Watching this a year later. It's still here. Please make it STOIIIIP
I know I'm very late to this video, but I LOVED THIS.
The way they sing now really bothers me, and I didn't know there were others that noticed it. So nice to see a whole video about it. Now I know I'm not just hearing things or losing my mind.
Thank you.
I subscribed the minute you brought up Amy winehouse. I’ve been saying that that sound originated from her for a while now. We’re very much on the same page
Thanks so much
Creed and Pearl Jam certainly didn't have a problem with the "errrrrr" sound...
I love the snark, but more than that I love how you didn't treat the subject snobbishly and actually researched it. I love it! Super interesting
You are already one of my favorite people. I am 59 and have been singing for about 55 of those years. not professionally, but I do not think it disqualifies me. I have been singing along with professionals, so I have had many great coaches. However, there is no reason to pretend you are anyone else when you sing. Singing is just about the same as talking, at least as pronunciation goes. People start to disguise their voice the instant they begin. Perhaps it is a lack of confidence. My biggest yuk right now is when people pronounce you as yo, and me as may. There are many others, but those are 1 and 2. Thanks for the video. Now I feel better knowing there is a whole group of people that I am like. God bless your efforts.
My favorite bands enjoy odd unintelligible sounds. Gorillaz with Damon Albarn's British slurring, Red Hot Chili Peppers with their "Kehlifownya," Pearl Jam with Eddie Vedder's baritone, and Nirvana with their... everything.
At 31 years old, I hear these young singers and it sounds to me like 1920’s gangster/flapper kind of “m-yeah see” talk. But instead of extra consonants, they’re putting extra vowels. Ex: “ima gonna rubs hims out”
thank god someone has finally made a video like this that isnt just bashing modern pop music
I put a lot of it down to nice middle-class kids trying to sound 'street'. The easiest way to do that is to ditch final consonants and slur everything, as if you've barely woken from a drug-induced coma and are still groggy.
Yes Paul B!!!!! Trying to sound street.
100%!
Yeah, I think that's pretty much it. They're putting on fake street accents. It's kind of a early 21st Century version of the old Mid-Atlantic accent.
Paul B: Yes -However, over pronunciation of final consonants is just as annoying. "Waiter. this 'forK' is dirty.
Paul B Anemia music lol
So glad someone pointed this out. All the singers sound like Phil and Lil from Rugrats.
But at the same time, my generation had a bunch of pop acts that sang with an overtly nasally sound. “It’s gonna be MAAAAAY” so I can’t complain.
*_"I SOAR a film today, oh boy..."_*
The British end a vowel sound with an R whenever the next word begins with a vowel. For example, "She was wearing a brar (bra) and I asked where she bought it." Certain northeastern American natives have this same habit.
Floraline's right, it's called intrusive R if you want to look it up
THIS IS WHY I CAN'T UNDERSTAND ANY OF THE LYRICS OF SONGS THAT PLAY AT H&MS
When you said "touich and uis and gooid" in that way, it reminded me of the valley girl dialect from California. They pronounce words with dipthongs, and with the questioning upswing at the end. When you popped the first video clip in the beginning, I was baffled as to what she had just said and had to hear it a few more times to get it, though that Halsey clip I would still not know if the lyrics weren't on the screen. Matt from Muse is also guilty of this, it's a cocktail of british accent and bending words into a frenzy of morphing sounds, which is beautiful, but I need a lyric sheet. Maybe some of this is the modern version of scat, concentrating heavily on vocalizing the sounds of words to compliment the rhythm, and concentrating less on getting the songs meaning across.
The one I have been noticing is instead of saying "tonight" they say "tuhnoyte"
I'm still hearing
this current version, it's so common I can't tell singers apart. I found the term and have already forgotten it.
This has literally drove me crazy for years but everyone I rant to doesn't get it! Thank you for this it's like therapy 😂
Hi Aimee,
I have to agree that the affected way which a lot of 'pop' singers sing is perhaps a troublesome, or at least hard to digest. I'm a 46 year-old male from the UK. I listen to a variety of music from rock, alt rock, pop, jazz, funk lots....I have a 16 year old daughter, who is a fine singer singer/piano/guitar player. When she sings she can adopt an 'affected' or modern phrasing. I am, of course, immensely proud when she sings, which she has at school in front of a large audience. I think you are right in saying that Amy Winehouse has definitely been instrumental in influencing vocalists of the past 10 -15 years. You could argue, however that jazz is the real problem: Winehouse was majorly influenced by the very great jazz female vocalists you've cited (Fitzgerald, Holiday, Vaughan)...
Thanks for your videos
regards
Tony
If this trend continues, in a few years all singers will sound like Elmer Fudd.
gwilled cheese
Don't cwy foh me Awgentina
Da twuth is I nevuh weft you
Sure, and why not? Most British and a lot of American television program narrators and news reporters already do, replacing their "r" with a "w". I'm amazed that this habit which sounds like a genuine speaking impediment but isn't has caught on with the general public, too. "Once I was in a weally wough pawt of town so I walked 'wound until I could bowwow (borrow) a bike and take the safe woad out." Insane.
And, the use of an "f" or "v" to replace the "th" is rampant, as in, "He was my bwuvva (brother) an' we used to bovvuh (bother) ouw neighbows togevvuh (together)". It's made it to the states and drives me up a wall.
The only elmer fudd i know is the one Terrence Fletcher kicked out from his band. I know the original one is the reference but idc.
The first artist that I ever noticed having a unique way of pronouncing things was *Lisa Loeb* and I instantly fell in love with her, her voice and her words. She had so much influence on me when I was young that I unintentionally modelled the way I eventually learned how to sing after her. People started telling me I sounded just like her when I started doing karaoke semi-regularly in my early 20s. I hadn't realized how pronounced it actually was until I sang Barenaked Ladies' "Brian Wilson" one night and this girl came up and asked me which Lisa Loeb album that was from. While it's flattering to hear that I sound like one of my idols, I'm now trying to un-condition (for lack of a better term) myself and find my own voice.
I used to really love this sound... Back around in 2009. Now it just feel like people learn to sing with the accent first before they are officially trained.
It is like an artist imitating a stylistic art style before they learn the fundamentals. Some of the current singer are good, but some of them sing it as a crutch.
I still like to listen to indie music and some aren't the best singers either but it sounds a bit different than the pop indie voice. I just can't get behind the Selena Gomez-esque singing voice. It sounds less unique than something like Milky Chance? IDK.
I really really want to hear more Constipated Kermit. Let's make this the new big thing, people.
YASSSS
I thought I was the only one who thought this new pop vocal style sounds bad. I've finally found someone who agrees with me. I was feeling my way through the darkness..wake me up when it's all over and that's fine by me.
super informative, super cool
Where was the analysis?
Mikasacus for some reason, I knew Id find you here.
HI MIKA FROM 3 YEARS AGO
As a non-native English speaker, I have to say that American English in its most basic "TV spoken form" is a lot "flatter" and easier to pronounce than all British accents I've been exposed to. There are of course more difficult regional dialects in the US, but there is a reason, beyond the cultural influence of the US, that most Europeans speak with an American sounding dialect. You can also see this in the way that few Americans are able to pull off a convincing Received Pronounciation dialect, but there are plenty of British actors that sound like they've lived their entire lives in the US.
I've always assumed this to be the case of why most British singers sound so American when they sing. That English sort of naturally falls into a "flatter" type of English when you sing it, due to having less control of minor sounds in the individual words.
I know this to be true in my native language and in my second language, as both languages fall into a sort of "standard" variety of the language when singing, unless extra effort is put into the pronounciation of local dialects. It's usually just by the choice of words in the songs themselves that you can point to a geographic location and not by the actual sound.
So interesting!
There's also the issue that British singers were heavily influenced by American Blues (roots of rock & roll) music. So they were not copying the standard flat "TV announcer" sound, they were copying American singers who were mostly black. This continued to the point that some British white singers you would swear were African-Americans if you had never seen a photo of them. Steve Winwood, Eric Burdon.
This is exactly what I have noticed. It is just straight up easier to sing with a slight American accent than anything else so almost everyone has the same sound. I actually really like the more interesting sounding accents because it just makes the song that much more engaging, what is wrong with being different with something people can just skip to the next song?
I loved your description..and the last little demonstration of the young jazz singer.. thank you
low key halsey is the definition of "sounding weird"
out of breath and her stupid jaw shaking thing
And then Taylor Swift comes in and sings "Do you remembeR" 😂😂
😂😂
" I go back to Decem-Ber-er " T. Swizzle
I love your observations! Can you do one on vocal fry? I’m an over-30 (hehe) who cringes when she hears vocal fry overdone in pop music, especially with females, as they start a word. I blame Paris Hilton for this! Vocal fry used to be a tasty condiment to add-once in a while-to a song to give that little extra feeling (think Marvin Gaye’s “III’m aaaaskin’ you bayy-beh, to git it on with meee”). And note how vocal fry-queen Britney Spears pronounces her ‘g’s way back in her throat (e.g. in the word ‘gurl’) and almost licks her upper lip when pronouncing the letter ‘l’ (you can see better in the vids). I think this is to sound/look sexier.
There’s a similar new trend with the over-melismatic style of singing nowadays, where the song becomes about someone’s vocal showboating rather than the singer just conveying the meaning of the song. Singers like Whitney Houston and Marvin Gaye knew how to use melisma....but then Mariah Carey came along. I think MC is super-talented, but I blame her for setting off the cookie-cutter over-melismatic singing style that is the standard of today. I miss singers like Linda Ronstadt, Barbra Streisand, etc who did a good job of convincing us that they actually meant what they were singing. Sheesh, I’m definitely in the ol’ fuddy-duddy crowd XD
Don’t forget Lulu who had a natural fry that was so perfect 👌
I'm so happy I see more vocal coaches/musicians talk about this because I've been wondering this for years.
I KNEW I COULD FIND MY PEOPLE IF I SEARCHED THIS
So glad to see more people discussing this! A few years ago, when I first started noticing the trend, I would ask everyone what was going on and they all made me feel like I was hearing things! I finally found an article discussing the Indie-pop vocal trend. I'll be okay when it dies off, too.
Very interesting video, Aimee. I was fully expecting a takedown of the current vocal trend, but you've reminded me that, of course, pop music has a grand tradition of such things. My personal theory is that access to varied cultural sources is the key. TH-cam has allowed unprecedented access to a glorious mish-mash of musical styles with minimal "gatekeeping" so naturally things have got a bit weird for a while!
Omg Aimee, as the music director of a School of Rock, I have been facing this dilemma for the better part of this decade wondering what is going on! Now I’ll learn to embrace it. Thanks for doing the research on this one :-) Great video… Love your videos.
LOVE that attitude! 😍🙏🏼
discord.gg/6sMzhAp
Don't embrace it, Andy! This nonsense has got to go. As a teacher, you're in the perfect position to show the kids a better way to sing. So DO IT.
Paul McCartney's father, after listening to the very first performance of 'She Loves You' in the McCartneys' living room: "Well, that's all good and nice... but boys - couldn't you sing 'she loves you, yes yes yes' instead? We already have so many of those creeping Americanisms."
I came here for the pop music critique, but I didn't expect so much phonology. As an aspiring linguist, I'm very happy to have watched this.
It is sooooooooooooooooooooo irritating and all the guys try to sound like Ed Sheeran or mumble their words with super weird pronunciations. Thank you for making sense of it. I get it that every era has their thing but there is so little uniqueness out there these days with both male and female singers. Hope pp music gets more unique vocalists
This is a great video, I watched some years ago. Then recently saw a performance online and this singing style is still in full swing if not even more. nearly a decade now. 2024 in the house.