Cheap autotune pedal for live use

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dialtone

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I am looking to get a autotune for my voice live, not to correct the pitch, but to get the daft punk and cher (belive in love) effect. Antares Autotune is pretty expensive, anything thats not a plug in I can use for live that is effective? Thanks
 
I have been considering V-vocal and TC makes a $800 one, but Id like to go cheaper, I am only using it for this one effect patch.
 
TC Helicon Voice Correct pedal at Musician's Friend for $250 is the cheapest I've seen.
 
I looked up reviews and they were great, do you know if it will do the Cher thing live though or is it weak in that dept? Thanks
 
No clue, I've never used it but I saw it in the Musician's Friend catalogue and it's the cheapest that I've seen.
 
Is the effect you're referring to on the Cher tune actually an effect you've already used with an efx processor? I thought that the Cher vocal was done with a vocoder. Does anybody know for sure?

Paj
8^?
 
Paj said:
Is the effect you're referring to on the Cher tune actually an effect you've already used with an efx processor? I thought that the Cher vocal was done with a vocoder. Does anybody know for sure?

Paj
8^?
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I thought it was an auto-tune effect, but just with an extreme setting so that it went right to the note and allowed for no human-ness. I'm not sure though, because I'm very much against autotune (as a means of pitch correction), so I have little to no experience with them.
 
I think it would have a pretty similar effect, either way. A vocoder is just going to have the formant signal (the voice, in this instance) modulating the carrier sound, which is going to be whatever note you might be playing, usually on a synth pad or something like that.

Listen to the song "Hunted By A Freak" by Mogwai...plenty of vocoder-ness going on. Is that the sound you're looking for?
 
I'm sure that you could end up with something very similar with a square-wave envelope but controlling it would require some tweaking.

If you're convinced it's an applied autotune artifact, you might want to check out the parameters available for the autotune functions in the new DigiTech Vocalist Live Pro. The manual (downloadable from DigiTech), does mention that certain pitch-correction parameters can cause a "robotic" shift in pitch.

Paj
8^)
 
It's a sad day when people strive for the "autotune sound" :(

The cher sound isn't a vocoder. The autotune setting for 'retune speed' is just set to the fastest speed setting available, and then the 'humanize' setting is set to zero. So whenever her voice gets even remotely close to the next interval, it immediately snaps to the perfect pitch.
 
The hardware version of Autotune had a midi input that allows you to play notes on the keyboard and make what ever you send into it come out the melody that you play on the keyboard.

BTW, there isn't much difference between autotune and a vocorder. They both work on the same principal. The main difference is autotune samples the input and modulates it instead of using an oscillator.

The guys that mixed the Cher song said that they used a vocorder.
 
The tc helicon c1 pedal is the efx pedal you're looking for 169.00 you can hear it their website
 
Adam P said:
Look for an Electrix Warp Factory vocoder. They can usually be had fairly inexpensively, though they seem to have gone up some in the past few years.
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I have one of these and love it. They are getting rare and expensive now. I lucked out on the price when I got mine.

However, the Cher effect is definitely pitch correction abuse and not a vocoder. Totally different principle of operation. To use a vocoder, you have to play a pitched instrument through the source input. The vocoder maps the formants from your voice onto the other instrument. You could talk in a flat monotone, and the instrument would still sing on pitch.
 
If you can't hit the notes I'd say:

Make your limitations your strength. Use your voice in strange ways, write some good lyrics, use some effects if you like. Listen to a lot of great records with tecnically poor singers who makes their lack of Tim Buckley-factor a fascinating element in their music. The list could be long, a few examples is The Fall, The Velvet Underground, Bob Dylan, Pavement, Leonard Cohen, early Nick Cave/The Birthday Party.

Or work really hard to improve your tecnique and your ears.

I dread a future of people who sing with robot-like perfection because of... robot like perfection generated by a machine. If you got interesting ideas, listen to great music and work really hard then you'll probably make it somewhere. Autotune won't do it for you.
Just my opinion of course.
 
This is an old thread, and I am certainly no advocate of autotune, but I don't think you read the OP's post. He specifically said he didn't want to use it for pitch correction. He just wanted that "daft" effect.
 
And yes, as someone else mentioned, there is quite a big difference (in practicality, at least) between autotune and a vocoder. With a vocoder, you have to play an instrument while you sing to generate the notes. With autotune, you don't.
 
And the Jury is still out on the "Cher" sound... most casual observers say auto-tune, the engineers on the project say vocoder...

but regardless, the effect can be easily replicated with Autotune...
 
MOFO Pro said:
And the Jury is still out on the "Cher" sound... most casual observers say auto-tune, the engineers on the project say vocoder...

but regardless, the effect can be easily replicated with Autotune...
Click to expand...

True, they could just as well have cross-faded the normal vocals into a vocoded track on the Cher song. The difference between that song and everybody else is that she didn't overdo it in a way that makes it obvious how they did it.
 
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