BOOKS: What the heck is a Vocoder?
Monday, 3 May 2010
That’s what I said.
“…the vocoder (invented in the late 1920s) took human speech and broke it up into its constituent frequencies, thus allowing that voice to be transmitted electronically, and reassembled and synthesized at the other end, reproducing the words, if not the sound, of the original speech. The vocoder was developed as a means of encrypting speech, of protecting transmissions from prying ears. But, over time, it found other uses, in movies, television, and music (if you want to imagine what it sounds like, recall the Cylons from the original Battlestar Galactica). Eventually, what began its life as a tool for cryptology became a pop-culture icon…” – David Pitt
Preview a selection of songs using a vocoder. I recognized some classics. Flavorwire
How to Weck a Nice Day at the Beach: The Vocoder from World War II to Hip Hop, The Machine Speaks by Dave Tompkins
