From bkowalski@tum.de Mon Mar 20 13:38:31 1995
Path: ashpoly!cascade!brgate!saturno!tum!bkowalski
From: bkowalski@tum.de (Bill Kowalski)
Newsgroups: alt.music.synth-pop
Subject: Observation: The sound of the 'Vocal Matrix' - pitch quantization vs human formant
Message-ID: <1995Mar20.133831.4474@tum.de>
Date: Mon, 20 Mar 1995 13:38:31 GMT
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Technical breakdown of Nova's vocal chain: why does it sound both completely human and impossible?

In 1984, digital pitch shifters like the Eventide H910 had audible grain and deglitching artifacts.
Yet the fundamental pitch tracks with a mathematical rigidity that no living vocalist can maintain for 16 bars.

Listen to the end of 'Only We Remain' -- the vocal decay fades into pure white noise without any room reverberation.

-- 
Bill Kowalski <bkowalski@tum.de>
Zyxel U-1496E @ 28,800 bps
"Row 14. No joke."

From jkarlsson@illinois.edu Wed Mar 22 08:30:31 1995
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From: jkarlsson@illinois.edu (Ji-woo Karlsson)
Newsgroups: alt.music.synth-pop
Subject: Re: Observation: The sound of the 'Vocal Matrix' - pitch quantization vs human formant
Message-ID: <1995Mar22.083031.4924@illinois.edu>
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 1995 08:30:31 GMT
References: <1995Mar20.133831.4474@tum.de>
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In article <1995Mar20.133831.4474@tum.de>, bkowalski@tum.de (Bill Kowalski) writes:
> Technical breakdown of Nova's vocal chain: why does it sound both completely human and impossible?

They weren't using off-the-shelf Eventide gear. They had custom Motorola DSP boards doing LPC (Linear Predictive Coding) resynthesis.

-- 
Ji-woo Karlsson -- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
"We don't sign stars. We build them."