Spice Girls need computer power to boost their weak voices
When The Spice Girls announce their reunion tour, there is a intriguing secret they will no doubt be keen to keep from fans.
They won't be belting out their songs just by Girl Power. . . but with the help of Computer Power.
For while the showbusiness world eagerly awaits their return, aides closer to them have been less enthusiastic about their vocal abilities.
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The Spice Girls in 1997: Ten years on, they are concerned about their voices
So Ginger, Scary, Sporty, Baby and Posh are going into the studio to pre-record the songs for their tour - in order to mask the failings of their own live voices.
On stage, they will employ a new hi-tech system which will present those digitally-enhanced recordings as their own voices.
It works by taking the singer's live voice on stage and electronically comparing it to the perfect vocal sounds that have already been recorded in the studio.
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Geri and Posh as they are now
When the girls sing out of tune on stage, the mistakes in their voices are instantaneously corrected - in less than a tenth of a second - by computer to perfect the pitch and tone. And it is this remastered "virtual voice" which belts out across the arena. The girls' vocals are altered so quickly that it will appear the resulting perfect voices are live and their own.
The system is not miming as such, because they are not just mouthing music to a backing track.
But the voices of Ginger (Geri Halliwell), Scary (Melanie Brown), Sporty (Melanie Chisholm), Baby (Emma Bunton) and Posh (Victoria Beckham) are actually changed to make them better.
"As they sing, the computer program corrects the mistakes so that the sound comes out as the desired sound - so they appear to be able to sing really well live," said an industry source. The system is being seen as a godsend for Posh - who is known for her particularly weak singing voice.
There have even been suggestions that while they are short or rehearsal time, the girls will use the computer enhancement to make sure they can perform as soon as next Sunday at the Concert for Diana at Wembley.
A Spice Girls spokesman was adamant that detailed touring logistics which would cover the use of live vocal enhancement had not yet been discussed, adding: "They all have great singing voices."
