T-Pain: The EM interview

Feb 26, 2009 12:26 PM, By Jason Scott Alexander

           
 

BRINGING THE SOUND OF AUTO-TUNE OUT FROM BEHIND THE CURTAIN

Other than Antares Auto-Tune, of course. Which brings us to the inevitable question, What originally turned you on to that effect? What was the decision for using it?
I had to do a remix of a Blackstreet song and I couldn’t have done it without finding that effect. At that time, I was using a PC and Cakewalk Sonar, and I had my friends just find me a bunch of cracked plug-ins to try out, and so I found Auto-Tune. I just loved the effect it gave. The next song I did after that was “I’m Sprung” and after the success of that, it stuck and I kept using it.

Step us through your Auto-Tune process. Some people have hinted that you’re secretively inserting vocoder in there as well. What’s the effects chain?
It’s just Auto-Tune, there’s no vocoding or anything else in there at all.

It sounds like you have it set for “slow tracking” and “fast tuning.” Are any parameter changes drawn in and automated?
No, no, I just know how to ‘play’ Auto-Tune. There are no secrets really. I just know how to use it to get the right response. But they are pretty much different settings every song.

What do you think about the trend that your vocal effect has sparked, now with so many artists trying to copy it. Do you view it as watering down your signature sound, or is it a form of flattery?
Well, it’s only flattery when it’s done by somebody bigger than me. (Laughs.) You know, a Lil’ Wayne, a Kanye, a Diddy, or Snoop.

But, you’ve also ended up collaborating with those artists, so it must be a mutual agreement between friends to experiment with the sound?
A little, yeah. Kanye flew me to Hawaii to work on his album just to show him how to use Antares. Then Lil’ Wayne told me I’m the only reason he’s even singin’. (Laughs.) And Diddy gave me points off of his album just for using Auto-Tune. So I mean, that’s when it’s flattery.

Do you see yourself ever abandoning Auto-Tune, perhaps in re-defining T-Pain down the road?
No. I think I’m going to stick with it. It’s all about who originated it, you know what I’m saying? I mean, I brought it all back from the original vocoding days.

Walk us through one of the more interesting tracks, from conception to tracking, that you produced off Thr33 Ringz.
Well, the big hit “Can’t Believe It” (featuring Lil Wayne) is interesting in that it came together so quickly and has only about four tracks to the beat. There’s like nothing on that beat at all.

Basically, from the pressure of not having a first single, I pretty much just had to come up with something real fast. So, I had my keyboardist in the studio with me and I started twiddling around with the (sings downward celesta hook) and I was like “Oh man, let’s just add something to this.” So I put that down, and then he came up with all these different kind of chords. Then I was like, “Man, I don’t know if this needs to be pretty or if there needs to be some kind of hard Atlanta beat on top of this.”

I pretty much worked up six different drum patterns but it eventually came out as it needed to, as that Atlanta thing -- tough. There was a really hard snare on it originally, but I made a breakdown out of it instead, and I just left a snap on there and I was like, “Man we just need to leave the snap like that the whole time!” So, we took the snare out completely, left the snap in there. I actually wrote the song in my head as we were making the beat so I was already at it. As soon as we’d finished the beat, I just went into the booth and I pretty much had to wait on them (the engineers) to put it in Pro Tools before doing my thing. It was that fast.

You say you were coming up with the song in your head during production. Are you the kind of rapper that jots notes down, or do you go with the flow, so to speak, once you step into the booth?
Never. I never write nothing’ down. Nah, I just go in there and if I don’t know what I’m about to say I mumble it, and whatever it sounded like I was trying to say as I was mumbling, well that’s what I go back in and record.

The production value on Thr33 Ringz seems fuller sounding than on the first two albums.
It really is, yeah, you’re right on, thank you!

What would you say accounts for that? A personal development musically ,as well as technologically?
Both. You know, I didn’t have a keyboardist on the first two albums, and on Thr33 Ringz I had a keyboardist and a guitarist, which helps out a whole lot. It makes everything sound a lot fuller to bring in those elements.

“Change” is another interesting track. It’s absolutely beautiful. How’d you come up with the concept to do your own take on the Clapton classic, “Change The World”?
I actually wrote that song for Michael Jackson, but he said that he doesn’t do samples, recreations, and that kind of stuff. Well, if he couldn’t use that, I was like, I’ll take it! (laughs). You know, I was trying to do a new “We Are The World” type of thing for him, ‘cause he was kind of aiming for that. So, that’s pretty much what it was. I mean, it was just something I was trying to make for him, and it came out as mine. 


And, around that theme is naturally why you brought in friends like Diddy, Akon, and Mary J Blige to be on that song?
Yeah, that’s right.



Particularly for outside artists that you work with, do you approacheach song from scratch or do you have a stash of beats like a lot of producers do?
Nah, if they come to me, I want to give them something fresh. I don’t want to give them something I’ve been sitting on for a long time. So, I make it right in front of them, that way they know every element that’s in the track. You know, only they know what they want out of it, and what they don’t want in it. Yeah, they know every element’s got to be cool.