Winterlong and Pixies Vocals

I worked on the vocal harmonies for Winterlong a long ass time last night. I think I've got it, but I know that the minute RS opens his mouth and I don't have Kim Deal's voice to line up to...I'm gonna be lost. It's frustrating because I am actually working quite hard on it. I think that I should make a recording of just Kim's vocal part and listen to it over and over maybe.

I think something that makes the Pixies harmonies particularly hard is Charles and Kim's ranges. As a young man, at least, Charles had kind of a high range. A sort of "my testicals haven't fallen yet" range. Conversely, Kim has a bit of a lower range for a woman. And then they do this thing where half the time she goes high and he goes low...and the other half the time they reverse it. So there's no hard and fast rule about what they are going to do. People always talk about Charles screaming violently and Kim having this sweet voice...but that's not always the case.

Take Subbacultcha for instance...she's doing this gravelly low thing. That happens on Caribou too...and on the last section of I Bleed. I Bleed is actually a really interesting study. The song starts with him singing low and calm and her singing really high and sweet in a head voice, almost falcetto. Then it shifts and she goes ultra low and he starts screaming higer.

Winterlong is pretty challenging to dissect actually...because they are both kind of in a mid-range. Neither of them is at the extremes like usual. I think that's what gives me such a hard time with Oh My Golly in the Rosa part too...they are closer together.

Last night I sat down to play some Nields tunes. I thought maybe I'd whip one out at a party in April where there's going to be an open mic. These are songs that I sang every day for years...but haven't touched much in the last couple. I was really surprised to notice that the vocals were higher than I remembered...and that the way I'd been singing them all those years was totally out my throat...with no breath support at all.

I'm not an expert on singing and breathing...but when I started singing Pixies I changed the way I sang. I tried to push air from my belly and sing more in my chest...rather than using my throat and head voice. It's weird concepts to grasp and I'm still not sure I use the terms right or do it right...but I call tell the difference. I changed with the Pixies for two reasons...one to get more power and be heard (even with a mic I was having trouble competing with RS's strong vocals and the rest of the band) and the other was that Kim Deal does have this range that is lower than my natural range. So I just needed more air to push the lower notes out. I kind of knew that I did this and that I really struggled with it at the start (my throat hurt all the time those first few months and I was constantly slipping back and forth from head to chest voice...Monkey Gone to Heaven being a great example of a song that can be done either way and it took me a long time to figure out which way to go...I still struggle with that song a little bit even today) but I had kind of forgotten about all that...or maybe thought I hadn't done as much of that as I thought.

But trying to sing the Nields last night was a real eye opener. It THRASHED my throat. It just felt WRONG. Even when I sing in my head voice with Pixies songs...it still feels supported. It doesn't feel like a strain. But the Nields were almost impossible to sing.

So I guess I'm making progress even though it feels slow. Progress towards being able to sing like Kim Deal anyway...and maybe away from being able to sing like the Nields. It makes me wonder if the Nields just have higher ranges, but do all the breath support stuff...or if they just don't use chest voice at all.