what is it about I must be missing
something they just keep doing nothing
till intoxicated topi Billy Eilish has
finally dropped her long-awaited debut
album when we all fall asleep where do
we go if we look at the credits we see
only four names there's Billy
Phineas O'Connell who's Billy's brother
and did the most of the producing here
Rob can L ski on mixing an industry
veteran he's worked with Kanye
Drake Justin Bieber and a ton of others
and John Green Aman mastering another
industry veteran it's kind of incredible
that we would only see four people on
such a big pop album despite this they
still make an album full of incredible
production and unique effects out of all
of the effects on this album one stood
out to me the most this thing on zani
something Crazy's goin on with the vocal
here it sounds like the bass is
distorting it somehow so what's
happening how are they doing it and why
is it here if we want to figure this out
the best way is to probably recreate it
now obviously we're not going to know
exactly how they did it unless someone
in the song comes out and tells us but
with some trial and error we can get
pretty close here's something that
sounds kind of like sandy it's got a
female voice in a bass underneath
not perfect but good enough for what
we're trying to do here I don't have
anything that sounds like Billy if we
want to better understand how they did
this effect we can look for other
examples at other spots in the album
I've managed to find - there's this one
in bad guy and this part of you should
see me in a crown also sounds kind of
similar these effects don't have a giant
bass like zania but they still sound
similar so how are they happening we can
get a better idea if we zoom in on the
waveform looks like the volume is going
up and down really quickly while the
effect is happening changing the volume
like this is something called amplitude
modulation and it might not seem like
something that could affect a sound that
much but at high rates of speed it can
change how a sound sounds let's take a
sine wave at a constant volume we want
to change the volume of the signal and
we can do that by applying a sine wave
so the volume changes at regular
intervals going up and down
this effect is pretty straightforward
but what happens if we change the volume
really quickly use a sine wave with a
really high frequency
what started as a simple change in
volume started to impact how this signal
sounded and if you apply this effect to
a vocal it gives it a choppy distorted
feeling this gives us a place to start
on our example we need to change the
volume of the vocal really quickly but
what's the frequency or the rate that we
should change the vocal at if we go back
to zani and listen to the effect it
sounds like the rate depends on the bass
note playing underneath the higher bass
notes have higher frequencies and make
the vocal modulate faster so the
amplitude modulation frequency depends
on the base note frequency making this
in our example we need to set the
frequency of the modulation to the same
frequency as the base notes which are
C&A so let's set it to 65 and 55 Hertz
if we put the bass underneath it starts
to sound something like zani
with the bass and the amplitude
modulation x' at the same frequencies it
sounds like they're working together but
this doesn't quite sound like the vocal
in zani we're still missing a couple
things when the effect happens the vocal
goes into stereo it sounds like it's all
around you we can't recreate this by
slightly delaying the left and right
channels when the effect happens it
tricks your brain into thinking in these
sound is all around you the vocal and
zani also sounds like it's been
distorted it's really gritty and crunchy
it's hard to tell if it's just on the
bass and it's so loud that it cuts
through or if the bass and the vocal are
on the same channel and there's some
kind of clipping distortion to recreate
this we just need to add some distortion
to our example
if we put everything together and add in
the base it sounds pretty close to
what's happening in zani now that we've
made a rough version of this vocal
effect we still need to answer why they
would let something through that could
almost sound like a mistake
first there's the discussion of how
these effects fit with the theme of the
song thankfully we don't have to get too
metaphorical Billy has already come out
and told us what everything means you
know what a smoke look like how can we
make it sound the way that smoke looks
in the way that smoke feels your lung
and your lungs and the verses are like
what smoke looks like and the choruses
are like what it feels like yeah using
vocal effects like this is a good way to
try and represent things that are hard
to express in a song
so cigarette smoke damaged lungs in
trouble breathing what kind of makes
sense with the choppiness of this vocal
this effect also kind of subverts the
norm in pop music typically the vocal is
the main focus of the song it's out
front and you don't want anything
detracting from it an artist like maroon
5 or ariana grande is never gonna have
something like this on their lead vocal
in fact they'll probably just double up
as many vocal takes as they can to make
it as clean and bright and loud as
possible
in contrast Billy is at least somewhat
experimental she's not making ambient
field recordings or hardcore industrial
hip-hop but she is trying to at least
push against what you would expect in a
pop song it's always good to hear some
experimentation and that covers Billy
eyelashes vocal effect in zani how she
did it and why it's there let me know
what you think of when we all fall
asleep where do we go
Billy Eilish and anything else that you
think sounds good you can find sound
selection on YouTube Instagram or iTunes
