Daily Marauder

GET RETRO: SENSUAL SEDUCTION

After loving on this video from Snoop Dogg (Sensual Seduction), I got to wondering about the weird plastic tube hanging out of his mouth. It’s time for another edition of Get Retro. Put down your iPhones and get funky with me for a minute. A talkbox is a music sound effects device which typically attaches to either a keyboard or guitar, allowing a musician to change the sound of the instrument by changing the shape of his/her mouth.

Check it:

Peter Frampton is probably the musician that most likely comes to mind when thinking of the talk box. Bob Heil of Heil Sound gave Frampton a talk box in 1973 and so began Frampton’s love affair with the device. He used it extensively on the album Frampton Comes Alive!

Peter Frampton Live

Now here are a few uses of the talk box that you may not have enjoyed quite yet:

Stevie Wonder’s Talk Box Cover of The Carpenters’ Close to You

And my personal favorite:

Some Dude’s Talk Box Cover of Soulja Boy’s Crank That

If you didn’t catch it from the last edition, my point with all of this retroness is to remind us of technology’s history so we can try to grapple with what technology will be. On my trip to Rhode Island this past weekend, I visited RISD Works, the Rhode Island School of Design art store.  While perusing the store, I witnessed a similar passion for a return to old school. Observe:

Cassette Tape Hand Bag

Vinyl Bowl

Vinyl Ornament

In next week’s edition of Get Retro: Combining the old with the new.

snoop dogg hasnt used a talkbox , he used auto tune , probably antares version of it as it seems t pain has made it infamous. He uses a talkbox in the video probably because of his respect for roger troutman .

Comment by aaron smith February 28, 2008 @ 5:55 AM

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Snoop Dogg holds a talkbox tube in his mouth but his voice in that song is actually played thru Autotune, which is a totally different effect and must not be confused with the talkbox, nor the vocoder.

Comment by mocheez June 25, 2008 @ 6:43 PM

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