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1939 Talking Steel Guitar Face-melter

mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
edited April 2009 in Strut Central
Carl Wilson (Toronto-based music journalist) gave a talk today about the history of Auto-tune, including earlier precedents of using technology to alter the human voice and shared this clip from 1939.

I'm not even clear how they're manipulating the voice here - apparently, it's through the steel guitar itself in some primitive, pre-talk box contraption?

  Comments

  • ReynaldoReynaldo 6,054 Posts
    That clip was posted a while back in this thread along with some other cool similar stuff:

    http://www.soulstrut.com/ubbthreads/show...rue#Post1235074
  • PABLOPABLO 1,921 Posts
    Amazing. What more it sounds better (far more articulate) than the stuff from the 70's!
  • vintageinfantsvintageinfants 4,538 Posts
    i have the sneaking suspicion that i will be chased in a nightmare tonight by that talking/dancing guitar marionette.
  • OkemOkem 4,617 Posts
    Ha.

    Sounds like Carl Wilson (Toronto-based music journalist) needs to read up on his read ups.
  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
    Ha.

    Sounds like Carl Wilson (Toronto-based music journalist) needs to read up on his read ups.

    Who knows - maybe he saw the video here, first
  • tonydanzatechniqtonydanzatechniq 266 Posts
    Seems like they took down the original Pete Drake video...

    Pete Drake - Forever
  • PonyPony 2,283 Posts
    Seems like they took down the original Pete Drake video...

    Pete Drake - Forever

    This song is straight
  • pcmrpcmr 5,591 Posts
  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
    Yeah, apparently, Drake was updating/adapting the same basic technology Rey had used back in '39. Very cool song/effect on Drake's take.
  • hogginthefogghogginthefogg 6,098 Posts
    I'm not even clear how they're manipulating the voice here - apparently, it's through the steel guitar itself in some primitive, pre-talk box contraption?

    It's all there on the youtube page:

    Alvino Rey's 'Talking Steel Guitar' could actually talk, giving Rey's orchestra its distinctive sound (some of Rey's critics called it a 'gimmick'). Rey played with virtuosic skill, demonstrating his guitar's 'singing' quality by manipulating the tone and volume controls. 'Stringy' (the guitar's nickname) was able to sound as if 'HE' were saying words. Of course 'Stringy' wasn't, but Luise King, Rey's wife was. In something that describes like a sexual fetish, Luise stood backstage with a small plastic tube connected between her mouth and Rey's amplifier, forming words with her lips and throat muscles. Rey would make her make 'IT' say his name as he glided the steel bar along the strings of his steel guitar, all while playing, perfectly dressed in a perfect tuxedo.
  • deathvalley90210deathvalley90210 398 Posts
    this is great stuff. i'm glad to see it on the front page again. if it hasn't been done already, somebody needs to do a book-length history about this stuff.
  • LaserWolfLaserWolf Portland Oregon 11,517 Posts
    I remember a talking steel guitar on the Mickey Mouse Club.
    Couldn't find anything on thetube.
    I think Disney keeps that stuff reined in.

    This is a good time to mention that steel guitar players were playing solid body guitars before Les Paul invented them.
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