Features
All The News That’s Fit To Tune
If you haven’t experienced “Auto-Tune the News,” it’s high time you did. The project, conceived by musician Michael Gregory, makes use of the abundant soundbites delivered by politicians, celebs and newscasters and the accursed pitch-correcting software to deftly satirize, well, the news.
Here’s “Sarah Palin Quits!,” the latest of the six pieces created by Gregory and his brothers Andrew and Evan and his sister-in-law Sarah. The catchy clip features Rep. Michelle Bachmann, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Rep. John Boehner, Katie Couric, a panel of pundits on “Fox News Sunday” (playing cards!), former Michael Jackson attorney Brian Oxman and, of course, ex-Alaska Governor Sarah Palin getting their groove on.
Evan Gregory told Anne Schroeder Mullins at Politico.com he and the rest of the group spend a lot of time sifting through the sea of available material for good clips.
“You have to pay attention to dig up the stuff we’re using, but you don’t have to be connected to get the joke about Boehner singing this wailing chorus of ‘Hell, no, we won’t go!,’” Evan said. “The congressional floor material has proved far more ripe than we thought it would.”
“Auto-Tune the News” was born last fall when Michael Gregory decided it would be fun to insert himself into the 2008 presidential debates. “The things people say in debates are funny, and I wanted to bring them into conversation,” Michael told Politico.
Once his siblings saw how much fun he was having, they decided they wanted to try it with the news and an Internet phenom was created.
Surprisingly, the project has been taken in stride by its unwilling stars and some, like Couric, are even big fans. “She thinks they’re very funny and wants to meet them at some point,” Couric’s producer Jennifer Yuille told Politico.
“We haven’t received as much feedback from the ‘Auto-Tune the News’ as we have for Congresswoman Bachmann’s gangster government speech, but I don’t think anyone would dispute it’s definitely more entertaining,” Debbee Keller, a spokeswoman for Rep. Bachmann told Politico.
Another big fan of “Auto-Tune” is MSNBC’s Rachael Maddow, who has giddily featured The Gregory Brothers’ clips on her show a number of times.
Besides Couric, favorite “Auto-Tune” targets include Pat Buchanan (“I was 95 percent sure that Pat Buchanan was going to have a home-run voice – and he did.”) and Vice President Joe Biden (“He always really steps up to the plate – not only with amazing melodies but outlandish lyrical content.”).
Although The Gregory Brothers already have their next piece in mind, they told Politico “Auto-Tune” isn’t likely to become their permanent gig. Says Evan, “As soon as we get bored with it, we’ll move on to the next thing.”
Here’s hoping that’s not anytime soon. (“Hell no! Hell no! Hell no-oh-oh-oh!”)
Read Anne Schroeder Mullins’ coverage of “Auto-Tune the News” on Politico.com here.
Check out all six “Auto-Tune the News” clips plus lots of other examples of Michael Gregory’s work here and order the EP Meet The Gregory Brothers at TheGregoryBrothers.com.