hey chris liepe here with the isolated vocals for julian casablancas the strokes reptilia lots of
you have been asking for this and commenting very diligently and politely it's about time i did this
i'm excited to get into his voice he's got a lot of texture to his voice his distortion is unique
yet approachable so i'm excited to get into these isolated tracks specifically because you
don't hear the depth of the texture simply by uh listening to the full track you really don't i've
heard this song in its entirety in full mix many many many many times but never noticed some of the
nice textures of his voice before and the way he goes in and out of his distortion he modifies his
tone really really cool so we're going to dive into all of that if you'd like more help with
your own voice getting distortion in your voice you'd like to work with me on a more close level
click the link below and join my free voice course or if you've already done that and
you'd like to go even deeper go to my website chrisleypay.com and request an invitation
to my full 12 week journey this way we'll be able to work face to face if you want i even
offer private lessons there so let's get into this he seemed impressed by the way you came in tell us
a story i know you're not boring i was afraid that you would not insist you sound so sleepy just
take this now leave me i said please don't slow me okay we're transitioning let's talk about
julian character one here before we get into the grit really really cool stuff
he seemed impressed by the way you came in by the way you came in notice he does not close his
his words at all at least in this type of phrasing it came in it came in it's not in
which is how most people when they're singing in this lazy way they tend to close their
words sooner and just kind of hum a little bit he's not doing that yet he has this very lazy
yet pent-up sound now julian has a way of being lazy and pent up in a way that's very different
from other lazy pent-up aggressive singers like kurt cobain it's very subtly different
there's less angst behind what he does in this way that he sings if we're comparing contrasting to
kurt in particular listen again here though tell us a story i know you're not boring tell us
a story the pitch is sharp his pitch is kind of not all over the place but certainly not precise
and it's almost like this sort of story he's sort of speaking it there's definitely pitch there but
story his voice thins out a little bit so that's a story you have to get that sort of flippant it's
a story yeah he's using there's there's a bit of clean compression going on here but it's not
brought out by me saying i need to use compression here it's this like tell us a story tell us a
i'm story fall asleep like that's kind of the way that this this vibe works and when we use
tools at our disposal to to get these sounds we have to remember that it's more about character
and less about technique all right listening on yes you sound so sleepy just take this
now leave me i said please don't slow me down only if i'm going too fast okay
now there's some strangeness to these isolated tracks my apologies but uh we've got i said please
let's listen to this a couple times and let's dissect this type of grit it's so
cool sounding i said please i said i said okay that's placed in one area it's a little bit
lower in the throat and you've heard me talk about this a lot but we're gonna lift something heavy
i i i i i i i i i and then we're gonna play with the placement of that lower
that can get uncomfortable higher
the raspier it gets the higher it's placed in the throat and if you hear this i said please i said
i said there's less rasp there but then here please please i said please i said please you hear
the difference in what i'm doing i'm practicing with this very short phrase i'm practicing
placing my grit in two different places two different points of engagement i cover this a lot
more in my courses and help you really workshop this but start by by taking very small bits
and experimenting with a different placement that's how he gets this very deep grit he's not
thinking about this stuff he's just singing but we can use these tools and these perspectives to
put some of the same things in our voices please don't slow me down only if i'm going too fast
you're in a strange
now that is a third sort of thing that's happening the please
is a very controlled pitch is is central here this is more of like a
strange it's much more fallen apart listen again strange there's like almost two tones going on
this isn't the same thing as strange which is please it's not that it doesn't sound the same
starts with the fry the fry gives us gives things away here
you're in a strange
i'm exaggerating that a little bit yeah they are in a strange
hear how it's more broken up here i'm approaching my vocal break and i'm letting it fall apart i've
talked about this kind of thing a lot on the channel before but it's neat to hear
all of these different approaches within a few phrases right please please strange
strange now my mind's more inconsistent than his but not by much strange strange
strange strange stray
experiment with your voice if as long as you're letting your
voice fall apart or on your vocal break you're not going to be hurting anything
but lean into that break and experiment with the different sounds that come out
because this sort of like folly a party sound is going to come back in his singing
and it's a great way to get more abrasive while not getting more aggressive listening
you can really hear sorry to stop it so soon again you can really
hear the the breakup right the falling apart into the more controlled compressed-based
again really exaggerated but part of our town there it is a bit more dialed in
here the two different flavors super cool
oh so cool right there again right round me ran me off the road ran me off the road
there's also a lot of nasality going on here this is not road this is hard ran me off the road
there's a lot of nasality going on unapologetically ran me off the road
the way it is over i'm now taking over you're no longer laughing i'm not drowning fast enough
now every time that i look at back to lazy now but i'd also like to point out that
how lazy his diction is in the upper parts or in the more aggressive uh
abrasive parts we can't really use aggressive for julian now every time
i thought i told you this world is not for you oh
yeah you sound so angry just calm down that's not how lazy but ah angsty at this
i mean
the room is on fire oh
not the room is on fire that would be the butt rock way of doing it right
we have to let go we have to become completely ambivalent and desperate the room is on fire
the room is on fire
that's so different than the other way right the room is on fire there is absolutely not one
way to distort your voice there's absolutely not one way to be anx-filled there's so many
other emotions that are communicated here and he does this better than most
you sound so angry just calm down you found me i said please don't slow me down if i'm going too
fast there again he's back to that more i said please that more controlled version so he knows
when to fall apart and when to it controls the wrong word focused honed in is better
you're in a
you stranger even hear his voice crack there a little bit but
part of our sound yeah the nice night over you're not trying hard
listen to that one big clue there
i i cracked too early ran me off the road ran me off the road road so cool
now taking over you're no longer laughing i'm not drowning fast enough oh now you might be
thinking that it just sounds like he's trashing his voice there towards the end i don't think
that's the case it's this it's this sense that he's abandoning into that cracky uh yodely thing
but doing it in a very familiar to the way his voice feels way i can kind of talk like this for
quite a while and i'm living in that break and now my voice is cracking here and there but it
really doesn't take much out of my voice and so i can just go back to and talk just like normal
you have to get that coordination before you can really do that because if you just try to get
that amount of breakup by just pushing harder and harder you're going to fry your voice in a matter
of seconds not minutes you'll know i hope you've enjoyed this breakdown of the isolated vocals of
the strokes this was a lot of fun great vibe lots to unpack in this simple arrangement if you'd like
more videos like this be sure to request make your requests in the comments below let me know what
you thought of this one again if you'd like more help more personalized help with your voice and me
as your vocal coach or teacher click that link below and join my free course talk to you soon