In her article “Seduced by ‘Perfect’ Pitch” Lessley Anderson covers a controversial and ever-present issue in the music industry; that issue is none other than the use of Auto-Tune. As members of today’s society, where access to music is only a click away, we are familiar with the use, or in some cases abuse, of Auto-Tune. The overly edited songs are obvious but at times they can be catchy. Take Kesha’s song Animal for instance, her voice sounds flawless and soft; there isn’t a sharp stop, an off pitch note, or an awkward gasp for air. The entire song flows pretty smoothly and that’s what we like to hear. As wrong as it may seem, you can’t blame music companies for using Auto-Tune to polish a song. After all the companies only seek profit and if edited music is what the people demand, then that’s what the companies are going to sell. If you take a closer look at the issue, you’ll see that the heart of the problem is not in the decision of the music producers but rather in the notion behind a societal demand for perfection.

Take a look around you, the pictures you see in magazines, the actors you see in movies, and the songs you hear on the radio are all manipulated to look and sound perfect. This distortion of both visual and audio content finds its way into our everyday lives and inevitably distorts our perception of the world. Like Anderson hints at towards the end of her article, we, as a society, are starting to aim for a perfection that isn’t naturally attainable. Little girls have eating disorders and women are piling on makeup because they are trying to achieve this superficial idea of perfection. (Keep in mind though that I am not implying all women wear makeup for this sole purpose.) The younger generation is repeating edited songs that sound catchy but are full of nothing but lyrics about love, sex, and drugs. This is harming society as a whole, it’s hard to appreciate natural talent when all you hear is edited music. Anderson leaves us with a few thought provoking questions about the music industry, “What happens when an entire industry decides it’s safer to bet on the robot? Will we start to hate the sound of our own voices?”

Link to Kesha’s song Animal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDPNGX6UMl8