Welcome back to the Charismatic Voice! I was recently told that I couldn't really get grunge music without listening to Bush and specifically to Glycerin. So here I am, this is my first time digging into Bush and I plan to dig deep. Let's get to it! Must be a skin, I'm sinking in, must be for real, cause now I can feel, I didn't mind, it's not my kind, it's not my time, to wonder Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Bye. Bye.
Bye. Don't forget where you're at. Don't let the days go by.
Kiss the rain. Kiss the rain. This is beautiful.
This is beautiful. I really, really, really like it. I, uh... I'm at this stage where I'm like, come on, I just really want to listen to the whole thing right now.
I want to know where this goes. But we are going to go back to the beginning and I'm going to nerd out about so many elements. How about that time when the strings came in and had this beautiful emotional spell?
Wasn't that pretty? Okay, yeah, it was really pretty. This has more softness to it than I would have expected from grunge, I think. Must be your skin, I'm so killing, must be for real, cause now I can feel, I didn't mind, it's not my kind. Right there, an I didn't mind, that's the moment where I hear his voice and I say, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, this is definitely grunge.
He has some very specific stylization there, specific mouth shaping that says, grunge! to me. So that was cool.
Also he's just got a he's got a really nice voice. It's uh it's so like it's full and deep but it has a bite to it and uh like yeah there's an edge. I'm gonna go back.
Let's go back. There's also like a softness in the guitar there that's a bit unexpected. All right. So just from that very first bit, the moment we hear Gavin here start to sing, right?
Gavin, Gavin. I'm checking my notes. I have to be sure.
Gavin Rossdale. Gavin Rossdale. So very first time for me hearing him sing, Gavin Rossdale. The moment he starts singing, you can hear this intensity that is just seething underneath. This is one of those things that I think about as being very typical and a grunge sound.
And I think important to capture if you're trying to do a cover and sound like you're doing grunge, I think you need to have that inner seethe. I think a person that takes that inner seethe to the next level is Maynard. in tool, just FYI, if you're like, oh, I've got too much intercede, go sing some tool, try. In this case, right, it just, it happens in the breath.
There's, I think, some extra pressure that happens in here as well. Let's go back, listen for that intensity. Play? And when he did mind, I didn't mind, the specific thing there that says grunge to me, or one of them, it's a combination.
One of them is the way that it sounds like he's using a locked jaw to really emphasize the teeth and not open the mouth too much. In grunge, a lot of times until we go much higher, it tends to be fairly closed right here. That's part of what makes it feel a little bit dirty.
If you were to open up more, you'd get a clearer vowel. And in this case, there's going to be a little bit of soft palate drop to get a little more nasality into the sound. Again, a little grungy. It's not my time to wonder why Everything I want It's a little Eddie Vedder in there Now you're here, now you're Don't want this Don't want I'll never forget where you're at Oh, I'm a sucker.
Also, glycerine? I thought it was glycerin. I think that I just always pronounce that the wrong way in my head.
Thank you for correcting me, Gavin. I gotta stop one more time. We're gonna rewind just a little bit here.
I think that the moment those strings entered the song, that was when I knew I was sunk. He started singing and I was like, oh, yeah, good. But when the strings entered, oh, my gosh.
Like, I felt all of my defenses against falling hopelessly in love with a song just crumbled. Yes, strings! I love string instruments, especially when they're brought into contemporary music like this.
It's so beautiful. Okay. I'll never forget Right? Don't ever forget It's like my heart just is like, yeah!
Don't ever forget Glittering I like that little bit of rhythmic addition in the guitars there. We didn't have bass until now. And we still don't have drums. For a taste of change, though I want it to Shut up and easy on us It's a really beautiful song.
I feel like I could get lost in it. One of the things that makes it so beautiful is it just has a grittiness to the feeling with the beauty. It's making this comment, I think, on a sort of bittersweet existence. And maybe it's all about sweetness with glycerine being the topic here. Man, it feels like when I read through the lyrics too, it has longing and the sweetness and the bitterness that can come from that.
Super beautiful. I think that the bitterness we get in his voice is partly coming from the gravel that we hear. There's this kind of sound that's often present.
Only he's making it a different way than how I just made it. And I think that that is a sound that is present in a lot of grunge music. So I'm glad that this has been confirmed for me, that this is, yes, indeed part of the grunge vocal technique.
And that gravel, I believe, is being made in a very healthy way. When you see people like Eddie Vedder still singing great. I wish that more people from Grunge had continued so we'd be able to hear more of their voices today. But I hear that gravel to me. It sounds like it's not being made with the two vocal folds.
It sounds like it's being made with a different structure in the voice that maybe is more designed to create that kind of rattling sound. And it definitely sounds like it's something that, in this case at least, he's able to... add more gravel or take it away kind of depending on how much pain he's feeling in the moment right it's almost like a knife like he's able to say like oh this knife is really serrated or not oh that's a horrible image y'all sorry right this is sweet it's not a serrated edge it's very sweet I love the power he develops there with the grits.
And while this is a music video, I think a lot of times music videos... the singers are actually singing the song even though it's not the actual sound that we're hearing with a studio album. And in this case you can really look at his mouth shapes and see that he is indeed locking that jaw and often using a lot of lip movements like But never ah No Pez dispenser. I'm gonna go back one more time. Oh yeah, two.
Shut up and easy on the three. I won't friend them, but you and me. Glycerine.
Glycerine. The days go by. Glycerine.
Please go home Ooh! Ooh, this is going somewhere. I'm gonna go back just a little bit and then let's play through this part because it feels like there's a big build coming. But did you notice how he was able to really control the grit on the edge of his sound there? As he was expanding it, it had times where it sounded like there was a little bit more definitive collision with more space between it.
This distortion and the variation of that distortion particularly makes me think, oh, this is made with an upper. This almost feels like there's already a string arrangement underneath that would go perfectly in Bridgerton. Yes, I have watched Bridgerton.
I know it feels like maybe it doesn't go with an Elizabeth personality. Like, what do we know about me that I publicly put out there? I've been singing opera for a long time, really into voice science, been really getting into all kinds of contemporary music, including rock and metal and harsh vocals, doing research on that. Huge D&D fan.
I love fantasy novels as well. I'm really into Brandon Sanderson, if you haven't guessed it by all the books that are back there. Oh, by the way, there's my really awesome model of a larynx that doesn't include the structures made. I use for harsh vocals.
It just drives me crazy, but it's a really good model still. So all of these things put it together. It doesn't seem like I'm the really a girly girl But Bridgerton is awesome. They have great, they have great music.
I love the string quartet covers essentially of so much popular music and maybe because I'm such a string quartet sucker, just honestly any sort of boat instrument sucker, you probably would have guessed I actually really enjoy Bridgerton and this, the more we get that the strings entering in there I love it more and more. It's so beautiful. I love the swells that can happen on string instruments like this.
It's possible to get that with guitar as well, but I think that when you have the bow that's constantly running across, there's a different sort of intensity that's brought to the sound. It is so, so beautiful. That's one of the reasons I fell in love with symphonic metal too.
I love having classical instruments combined like this. Sometimes people... we'll say like, oh, that really struck my heartstrings. Maybe it's just classical people that say that.
I don't know. But heartstrings, when we talk about having heartstrings, I think sometimes I think about music just going straight into my heart and it's sort of like a bow across my heartstrings that moves me. This is definitely playing my heartstrings.
I'm going to go back. There's a beautiful arc. of the phrasing here. It's just this continued to build. We still, I don't think we're ever going to get any sort of drums in this song.
The percussion or I would say any rhythmic drive seems to come from guitars instead of from a drum kit. And this gorgeous swell, it reminded me a little bit of Ghost Love Score actually from Nightwish. The way that it just doesn't want to be stopped. It feels like you almost miss parts. of the feeling of the song if you stop it too much.
So I'm going to let it play for a while longer again and then talk about a few details. Days go by Oh In that section in particular, I love how the distortion that derived really in the guitar. it starts to feel like it has the crackles in it almost like the voice when it has that extra distortion.
I think that the vocal technique and guitar technique even bass like they've all developed together and there's this sort of consistency in it that has made this miraculous sound. I need anymore Who wanted us less Could not kiss Just regress Am I just a me Could assemble a brain Well that's just fine That's just one of my names Oh gosh. That is such a beautiful section and it is like it feels so intimate. I needed you more. Right after that, I think he did this extra push of air.
I think it was there. That felt like... So intimate, especially in these headphones.
It was like somebody was breathing right beside my ear. Is he here? Yup.
That's right there. More. There's a little extra air that comes out and it just feels so personal.
Not to even mention how personal these lyrics are. I mean, who hasn't at some point felt, if not themselves, at least seen somebody else feel unrequited love? It definitely, I needed you more, you wanted us less. That hurts.
I think that seething, that longing that just, that is boiling inside of him is so clear and so intimate to share with us at the same time. I'm not one of them, and she falls around me I needed you more, you wanted us less Could not kiss, just regress You're not just me, could have said but I'm plain Well that's just fine, that's just one of my names Don't let the Check out that jaw clenching that's happening. Normally we don't want you to clench your jaw when you're singing.
This is definitely a rule-breaking thing but it does seem like it's very central to a lot of the vocal technique, vocal stylization. in grunge music. I keep pausing on the woman with the eyes and I know that I think he and Gwen Stefani had a thing like a marriage at one point. I'm wondering, I don't think that's that one particular pause looked like her some. So let me know, is that her?
I'm questioning it. Such good control over that grit. Wait.
I missed when that harmony first came in. I'm going back. Feels pinched on the top there. It's like yeah pressed.
I love okay sorry lots of little pauses here. Uh let's see if I can get to the right spot right there. I love I've seen just beautiful tattoos of the back of a woman often just outlining the shape of stringed instruments.
You've already heard me talk about how much I love stringed instruments. I love, I think it's just so beautiful when you see this like shape of a string instrument contained in a human body. And it's I think one of those more beautiful expressions of art that I've seen people put permanently.
on their bodies. It's like I am a cello. Whoa, what is this? That's like the ending of ELO, of Mr. Blue Sky that just kind of does something completely different for a bit.
But we still love. We still. This is so new. I'm not sure if I love it yet, so I'm going to go play it again.
Wait. It's very sad and dark. It makes me want to hug someone. This song is so beautiful.
And y'all have been right to recommend Bush for a long time. I am in love with so many aspects of it. And I'm just going to go watch it again right after I hit pause on this recording. Because I want to hear it all the way through. I encourage you to do the same.
And if you want to see some more analysis of grunge music, check... this out over here and maybe you fall more in love with music every day.