[Eddies]

Ok, I've had enough

Autotune, you're in.

Fuck you T-Pain. It's bad enough that a load of singers use it surreptitiously to pretend that they can really sing, but this recent trend of using it as an effect is now so rife I can barely listen to daytime radio without going into a a rage.

[GCW]

Just 'cos you're too weak to work them, doesn't make them a bad idea  

[butters]

The new fucking cunting tops of the squeezy bottles of tomato/HP sauce. The development of the squeezy bottle was a leap forward into a new age of sauce deployment. But now they've gone and fucked it with some pointless little plastic hygiene wodgit. This satans spawn of an idea means that unless you can close a captains of crush 3 you have no chance of getting anything out of the bottle at all. However if you have the misfortune of being blessed with the crush strength of a bear (or a handy vice lying about) then you will only succeed in exploding untold quantities of sauce all over everywhere apart from where you want it. Leading to a half hour cleaning session by which time my fish-finger sandwich is all cold and a bit soggy.
Twattery.

You are aware that you have to unscrew the lid and remove the silver foil seal when you open a new bottle aren't you?

Please please please by all the things that are good in the world tell me no!!

[nik at work]

Yes I know about the foil. And OK perhaps I am slightly exagerating the effort involved in getting the sauce out, I was upset about the fish-finger sandwich. But I still think the little sealing piece they've put in means that the sauce comes out in a sudden rush, not so bad if your squeezing out a pile of sauce on the side of the plate for dipping purposes but when trying to get an even distribution on a slice of bread in a sandwich situation you tend to end up with a large dollop suddenly released then a sad little trail of sauce. Very uneven spreadage which is completely unsatisfactory. In the pre-sealing grommet days it was easy to get a consistent and predictable flow whereas now it's like a game of Russian roulette, when's it going to blow???
To be clear I am in no way suggesting that the sauce should go in room 101, or the squeezy bottle, or even the new big lid so you can stand on it's head so the sauce is ready for instant deployment. These are all good things. It's just that little bit of clear plastic in set into the hole in the lid which makes the squeezing such a lottery.

[robertostallioni]

I was upset about the fish-finger sandwich

Your lass away then?

[fatdoc]

Yes I know about the foil. And OK perhaps I am slightly exagerating the effort involved in getting the sauce out, I was upset about the fish-finger sandwich. But I still think the little sealing piece they've put in means that the sauce comes out in a sudden rush, not so bad if your squeezing out a pile of sauce on the side of the plate for dipping purposes but when trying to get an even distribution on a slice of bread in a sandwich situation you tend to end up with a large dollop suddenly released then a sad little trail of sauce. Very uneven spreadage which is completely unsatisfactory. In the pre-sealing grommet days it was easy to get a consistent and predictable flow whereas now it's like a game of Russian roulette, when's it going to blow???
To be clear I am in no way suggesting that the sauce should go in room 101, or the squeezy bottle, or even the new big lid so you can stand on it's head so the sauce is ready for instant deployment. These are all good things. It's just that little bit of clear plastic in set into the hole in the lid which makes the squeezing such a lottery.

god bless this bizarre online community...

[Houdini]

The new fucking cunting tops of the squeezy bottles of tomato/HP sauce. The development of the squeezy bottle was a leap forward into a new age of sauce deployment. But now they've gone and fucked it with some pointless little plastic hygiene wodgit. This satans spawn of an idea means that unless you can close a captains of crush 3 you have no chance of getting anything out of the bottle at all. However if you have the misfortune of being blessed with the crush strength of a bear (or a handy vice lying about) then you will only succeed in exploding untold quantities of sauce all over everywhere apart from where you want it. Leading to a half hour cleaning session by which time my fish-finger sandwich is all cold and a bit soggy.
Twattery.

FAIL.

[Falling Down]

Stick a skewer down it Nik, then withdraw it, rotate 90 degrees and stick it in again. Makes a perfect cross-hair for sauce aiming and optimum flow rate.

[Falling Down]

Jay-Z has caused a bit of stir (rightly) dissing autotune (and therefore Kanye) on his new album. 

Autotune is the work of the devil. Vocoders (Cher, Buggles, Bon Jovi)  on the other hand are ace and we need to be careful we don't throw them in unawares.

[Stubbs]

Autotune, bad for hip hop, god for the news!



(oh and Kanye produced the tune D.O.A (Death of Autotune))

[Bubba]

Autotune is just a vocoder used in a certain way innit?

Cher's horrible "believe" shit was the same thing as we're seeing now.

With extreme parameter values, pitch correction has also become popular as a distinctively electronic voice effect. A notable example of Auto-Tune-based pitch correction is the Cher effect, named for Cher, who originated the effect in her 1998 hit song "Believe".[2]

Stubbs - agreed; Auto-tune the news is a magnificent parody

[galpinos]

... but when trying to get an even distribution on a slice of bread in a sandwich situation you tend to end up with a large dollop suddenly released then a sad little trail of sauce. Very uneven spreadage which is completely unsatisfactory.

Could you not just spread it around with a knife?

[SA Chris]

Flavoured teas! What a load of gash 

As opposed to tea which has no flavour? 

I'm going to disagree on this one. Rooibos tea, or Raspberry & Echinacea are great if you don't want caffeine (if like me you actually get withdrawal symptoms when you don't drink it).

You could drink hot water and get no withdrawal symptoms, which is what you might as well be doing.

The thing that annoys me about these fruit flavoured teas is the taste is never as good as the smell.

[SA Chris]

pointless little plastic hygiene wodgit.
Twattery.

So for the one person who can't quite get his head around them, we should rather have them removed and risk contamination and tampering. Sorry Nik, a veto from me on that one.

[cofe]

A character in a characterless media world.

we'll disagree on that one.

[Jaspersharpe]

Fucking hell some serious controversy over the last few suggestions. 

Houdini - final say is still yours. What's in what's not?

I agree with SA Chris about the fruit tea thing. Smell great, taste of fuck all.

[tomtom]

The new fucking cunting tops of the squeezy bottles of tomato/HP sauce. The development of the squeezy bottle was a leap forward into a new age of sauce deployment. But now they've gone and fucked it with some pointless little plastic hygiene wodgit.

I think I'm swimming against the tide here, but I agree with Nik. I hate those fecking plastic sphincters they've put on squeezy sauce bottles. A right front bottom of an idea. Sure they make less mess on the bottle - BUT, according to the SCIENCE (tm)
"Plastic sauce ring-pieces make the delivery of ketchup threshold based, as opposed to the more linear application afforded by previously used open orifices in combination with the maliable (squeezy) bottle. Of course the original glass bottled 'slurp' of ketchup when first tilted was sometimes annoying but became a much loved random facet of sauce application"

Also, I always forget to store them cap side down, so when I come to use it the first blast from the  'red HP starfish' (or Brown depending on your sauce leanings) is always a watery vinegary affair rather than the full bore ketchupiness we all love on our fish finger butties.

Its over to you 101 Meister Houdini...

[SA Chris]

I just unscrew the lid, then cut the thing out completely with a sharp knife. It's not rocket science.

[dave]

the design to set on the lid is a very good idea, and those rubber things would be ok but they set the force threshold too high - i remember nearly knocking a sausage off the plate with a lateral blast from one of those badboys. fuck knows how the elderly or enfeebled get on with them, it must be carnage.

[jern]

another vote from me for the ketchup ringpiece to go in room 101. Another useless piece of marketing crap designed to prey on our innermost fears of contracting e-coli, beri-beri and god knows what the fuck else from 'contaminated' ketchup.

My missus has a mate who won't eat yogurt on their sell-by date and furthermore won't even give them to the dog! Result: massive waste of food.


re: Fruit tea  try a spoon of sugar / honey - draws the flavour out atreat

[Falling Down]

Autotune is just a vocoder used in a certain way innit?

Sort of..

A Vocoder analyses and transfers the sonic character (tuning, pitch, volume, envelope) of an audio signal (usually vocals) arriving at its analysis input to the audio signal (usually a synthesizer) arriving at its synthesis input. 'O Superman', 'Autobahn', 'Computer world' etc.  Think Bakelite dials and old reverb plates.. I've got one in Logic and it's top fun when your having a karaoke party at home 

Autotune has all sorts of internal processing gubbins and was originally intended and still used most of the time as a real-time pitch correction tool for vocalists.  It's the work of the devil and you can hear it everywhere even when it's not turned on to the max in the way we've been discussing here.

Autotune in 101 Vocoders out 

[SA Chris]

Or you may as well put ribena in hot water.

Girlfirend's mum is obsessive about BB dates, and bins so much foot. Yoghurt is much nicer a week after the BB date, gets time to thicken.

[Bubba]

Good audio knowledge!

It's the work of the devil and you can hear it everywhere even when it's not turned on to the max in the way we've been discussing here.

Yeah, it's weird - I never really noticed it a lot before but now my ear is tuned to it (thanks to the recent abuse) I can hear it everywhere - it's horrible.

[galpinos]

re: Fruit tea  try a spoon of sugar / honey - draws the flavour out atreat

What flavour does it draw out? A sugary honey-ey flavour per chance?  

[SA Chris]

Love Lockdown by Kanye West for example, is that vocoder or autotuner?

Any current radio examples of autotune crime?