Songify the News
Songify the News (known as Auto-Tune the News for the first thirteen episodes) is an American musical web series popularized by Brooklyn musician Michael Gregory, and later his band The Gregory Brothers. The Gregory Brothers digitally manipulated recorded voices of politicians, news anchors and political pundits to conform to a melody, making the figures appear to sing.[1][2] The group achieved mainstream success with their "Bed Intruder Song" video which became the most watched YouTube video of 2010.[3]
Songify the News
United States
English
35+ (not including specials)
April 10, 2009 –
present
Similar videos, often non-political, thereafter appeared as part of the continuing Songify This series.[4] The Gregory Brothers continue to create films pertaining to politics and current events on their YouTube channel Schmoyoho[5] using Auto-Tune-like software, in a format much like their original Auto-Tune the News videos. After a hiatus in the series, these clips were rebranded in early 2012 under the title of Songify the News.[6]
Production[edit]
Michael, who graduated from Appalachian State University with a degree in music and a concentration in recording and production,[7] first created a "debate musical" using footage of the first presidential election debate of 2008 titled "Debate Highlights—in song and dance". This early effort did not use the Auto-Tune software to manipulate the voices of the presidential candidates in the video.[8] His brother Evan, a music major at Swarthmore College '01, encouraged Michael, who had prior experience with Auto-Tune, to attempt to use the software in his next video to make the political figures appear to sing along with the music.[9]
Michael used footage from the vice-presidential debate of 2008 as the basis for the Auto-Tune experiment, and the resulting creation, "VP Debate in Song and Dance,"[10] became the prototype which the Auto-Tune the News videos would expand upon. As the concept began to attract notice, Michael recruited the rest of the Gregory Brothers to collaboratively develop the Auto-Tune the News series.[7]
Because it draws its source material primarily from news footage, the Auto-Tune the News series has covered myriad topical issues including Arctic shrinkage, health care reform debate in the United States, texting while driving, tobacco regulation, and the alleged sexual assault of Kelly Dodson. Andrew Rose Gregory, who graduated from Swarthmore College in 2004, believes that focusing on unusual or obscure topics is a source of strength for the series, asserting that "[p]eople are frustrated with pop music because it's all the same over and over again, in terms of being love songs or a song about someone going away. These are songs that aren't about anything you've ever heard a song about."[11]
As Songify the News, the series has continued in a format indistinguishable from its predecessor. Further topics, largely United States-related, have been covered, including the 2012[12] and 2016 elections,[13] LGBT rights,[14] gun laws, and military drone usage.[15]
Reception[edit]
Auto-Tune the News has spread virally, accumulating millions of viewings.[25][26] The series' subject matter and its explosion in popularity yielded an interview on The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC on May 1, 2009,[18] and sustained media attention left the Gregory Brothers "fielding a number of inquiries" regarding turning the series into a full-time occupation for the group[7] (see commercialization below).
Representative Michele Bachmann (Republican-Minnesota 6th) was auto-tuned in "Michael Jackson. drugs. Palin.", the sixth episode of the series. In the video, she makes a speech regarding her thoughts on the American Clean Energy and Security Act. Bachmann said of the video that her children "think it's really funny to watch it...it's a riot" and that "it is really clever, really funny."[27]
The Bed Intruder Song video spread virally much faster than any previous episode, ultimately becoming the most-viewed YouTube video of 2010 (excluding major label music videos).[28] Dedicated solely to the news story of an attempted sexual assault, the episode gave a musical treatment to interview footage of the victim, Kelly Dodson, and her brother, Antoine Dodson. The episode was released on 31 July 2010 and was viewed 7.1 million times over the course of its first month online.[29] As of May 2012, Bed Intruder Song has over 100 million views. The Gregory Brothers subsequently remade the song and video as episode 12c, "iTunes Version – Bed Intruder Song", and released the accompanying song on the iTunes music store. It made an entry to the Billboard Hot 100 at #89 and debuted at #5 on Heatseekers Songs chart.[30][31] The Gregory Brothers pledged half of the song's earnings to the Dodson family.
In an interview with Barry, the Gregory Brothers reported that they had sold over 100,000 copies of The Bed Intruder Song on iTunes.[32]
Commercialization[edit]
The Gregory Brothers partnered with Sony to create a viral marketing campaign for the 2009–2010 holiday season based on their "Auto-Tune the News" series.[44] One offering in this campaign is the video entitled "Auto-Tune the Ads: Sony. Justin Timberlake. Peyton Manning."[45] When asked about a possible backlash by fans due to client integration in Auto Tune The News, Michael Gregory said "The audience gets it. It used to be where any type of sponsorship you might have fans say 'they sold out' but nowadays if you can do it on your own terms, your fans are rooting for you."[32] In an interview with Wired, the band said they are going to be working with Comedy Central to produce a TV pilot for a television series to be aired sometime in 2011.[46] The band's "Songify This" videos were parodied in The Simpsons' episode, "The Falcon and the D'ohman" and The Cleveland Show's episode, "Frapp Attack!". Aside from that, the band worked with app developer Khu.sh to create Songify, an Apple iPhone app that allows the users to autotune any speech into song. Provided with the app is an template that autotunes speech to the Double Rainbow music, with additional template packs from the band available for purchase in-app.