The new single, “33 ‘GOD,” from Bon Iver’s upcoming album, “22, A Million,” is a surreally fantastic song, exploring religion through strange sounds and Justin Vernon’s now-classic falsetto. It’s hard to understand — the lyrics hint, but don’t say. The rhythms wind in and out, building up to a crescendo that never really crests. It’s an odd song, beautiful and reverent, relying heavily on Vernon’s voice to create its holy effect.

It’s also heavily auto-tuned.

Layered in the background a high-pitch trill wails, “I know so well, that this is all there is.” It acts directly against Vernon’s original voice, while simultaneously complementing it. It’s there to create that dichotomy, a song about God questioning whether or not there is religion. It’s intimate, it’s haunting. It’s beautiful and exactly what the song needs.

Unfortunately for musical artistry and integrity, not everyone uses Auto-Tune in the same way. Instead of improving a song, it’s often used as crutch for lack of talent instead, giving it a generally negative connotation. Pop stars like Selena Gomez, Katy Perry and Lana Del Rey have been called out and denounced for unfortunate performances where vocals seemed pitchy, out-of-tune, and not anything like the album they were selling.

Auto-Tune, after all, is essentially a musical tool. It is used for a specific purpose: to create a certain sound on album that cannot be achieved through human voice alone. Used at its very best, it should enhance an album, adding something to it that wasn’t there before. When used by pop stars to supplement a lack of singing ability, it makes live shows seem worthless and creates the idea that Auto-Tune is a fix-all instead of just an enhancer.

Music is made to be consumed live. Recorded albums are great, but there’s a certain element of the music that cannot be captured unless the music is live. When an artist is better live than pre-recorded, it makes going to shows worth it. Without that, music becomes just about buying an album, not about experiencing it together, as a group.

“33 ‘GOD” is a great song for many reasons. Because it’s melodic, because it’s haunting, and yes, because it uses Auto-Tune. It’s not used because Vernon can’t sing. It’s not used as a crutch. And there is no trickery — it’s pretty apparent that the portion of the song was not created with a human mouth. Vernon can sing, and “33 ‘GOD” with its Auto-Tune actually showcases this.

Pop stars please take note — Auto-Tune can be used to create something beautiful, instead of just something false.

Emera Riley is a junior magazine journalism major. Her column appears weekly in Pulp. You can email her at elril100@syr.edu

Published on September 6, 2016 at 9:59 pm