What’s funny to me is yesterday I went out and watched a cover band play music from back in the 70s 80s and 90s. They did music from the Eagles,Journey, AC/DC, Pat Benatar, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Prince, etc. They didn’t use backing tracks and they didn’t mime or lip sync. They just played instruments and sang the songs. And you know what? It was great! I enjoyed the music thoroughly even though it wasn’t perfect every single second of every single song. it was just plain old music being played and sung, it sounded great and a good time was had by all. Why can’t the original artists realize we aren’t there to hear perfection, we are there to hear them play and sing the songs we love so we can sing along and have a good time? it boggles my mind.
@alexanderSydneyOz the guys in these classic bands are all in their 70s; some of them are in their 80s. They can't sing like that anymore. They should retire!
Considering what a snit Don Henley has been throwing about people reacting to his/the Eagles’ music online, being called out for this chicanery is fully justified. Keep telling the truth, Fil!! 💯👏👍
As a live musician and studio owner I recently posted on a Billie Ellis live video & of course between songs her vocal was out of breath & "live" & as soon as the track started her vocal was super smooth processed studio quality and in stereo etc - live concerts today are a money making sham....keep highlighting this charade!
@@djsguitars01 That’s sad and disappointing. I thought Billie Eilish was one of the singers who was always singing live. Pink is live and I think Lady Gaga is too, but I’m not sure about LG.
But was that an official "live" video or a fan video from a phone? If an official release she probably was singing live at the event, but post production has been added afterwards by the producers. It's best to check an actual fan phone recording.
72 year old here. I've played in bands and recorded artistes using reel-to-reel, and latterly DAWs, throughout my life, and I have to say your logic is flawless! Keep it up.
62 years old here still playing, gigging and recording, and I look forward keep going past 72, 82, and my last breath; if the Stones are doing it… I don’t get how anyone can be surprised about it ❤
I saw Led Zeppelin in the 70s. Robert Plant's voice was shot from touring, but he made the most of it and so did we. Loved the show! That's real, that's what makes it "live".
For sure ! Zeppelin is a great example of a band that used the studio as an instrument and there is often lots of overdubs and production going on, so when they played things live they couldn't really do that, but it was somehow even better. Their live performances are very powerful, the benchmark for a rock performance IMHO.
Personally, that situation is the one where I don't mind if they use backing tracks for lead vocals... if the artist's voice is shot, maybe towards the end of the tour, and they just can't sing... but the show must go on. But Fil's example even has backing tracks for the background vox, which is like... really?! And then, with ticket prices having gone thru the roof, someone might be lucky to see 1 show per summer, and spend hundreds of dollars just on the ticket, plus parking, fees, food & bev, merch... and after all that, you find out you paid for them to stream some prerecorded songs thru their PA.
@@bloozedaddyThey were toast because Plant had to have nodules removed from his vocal cords in 1972, which was a dangerous procedure back then. He's lucky he could sing at all after that.
Interviewed in 2015, Henley said, "My voice isn't going to last that much longer. I have good days and bad days. But I'm OK with that. I realise how fortunate we are to have had such long careers. It rarely happens in this business. And I don't want to retire." So 1.) His voice was going. 2.) He had no intention of quitting. 3.) The solution he came up with is obvious.
@@vestibulate I’m not defending Henley or lip syncing at concerts, but so many are doing it (who are decades younger even) and selling tickets as though they were performing live, it’s not really fair to single out any one artist. No one is preventing any of them from perpetuating this fraud. Some class action lawsuits on artists such as The Eagles, Taylor Swift, Janet Jackson, Madonna and others, plus Live Nation when it’s the promoter, would likely change this lip syncing fraud for the better. At the very least, anyone using prerecorded vocals should be required by law to say on the concert announcements and ticket buying sites, plus the actual tickets “some vocals will have been prerecorded” or “some previously recorded tracks will be used” so people will be informed and have a choice. Suing them all for billions is probably the only way to end the deception.
@@justintime42000 This business about not singling out any one individual is just another means to silence criticism. People who commit fraud are going to be named. You've named a number of them yourself. It could be said that you're singling them out unfairly when others not mentioned are equally guilty. Where does that leave us?
@@vestibulate Seems like you didn’t bother to read everything I said and that you singled out one thing to be argumentative about. I said I wasn’t defending Henley. They ALL need to be sued. I wasn’t trying to silence YOU or anyone else. Just getting Vince Gill and Deacon Frey to sing was one way to extend the longevity of the band. Henley has been trying to figure out how to get The Eagles to run on empty for at least as long as Glenn Frey has been gone! I can’t understand why anyone would pay big money to see them live to hear Deacon Frey try to be his dad. They lost too much when Glenn died. The problem is industry wide. I want to see them all, including the promoters, venues, ticket sellers, sound people and everyone else who enables and profits from this fraud to be called out publicly, and not just here on UA-cam, and make them pay. The question is, who is going to sue them and how? It probably has to be a class action lawsuit (at least in the US) because nobody who buys concert tickets has the money to pay attorneys for something this huge. Perhaps we could all write to our state and local consumer affairs offices and complain about ALL the artists, including The Eagles and Henley, who are defrauding the public. Maybe the local governments can do something. All ticket vendors (including the resellers) have to put total ticket prices online now including fees, for all New York shows, so they can’t surprise people with huge fees after they’ve started the buying process anymore. A small victory against the Ticketmaster/Live Nation monopoly, but it’s something. I think by your spelling you probably live in the UK, so consider complaining to whoever your consumer authorities are, about whichever artists you want. Contact BBC and Sky News. The more the merrier. Email them proof. The mainstream press and music press getting ahold of this story will help give it more of the publicity it needs. Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair or NME, you name it, could all get on board, if they dare to care! I noticed while watching Glastonbury that people weren’t lip syncing, and I wondered if the people who put on the festival insist on all live performances. If so, good for them! The Eagles are on their way out. At least they did give live performances for years. Some of these younger artists have likely never done a single concert without lip syncing. They should all pay regardless of age but perhaps it’s younger artists who should take the lead by saying “I promise I won’t lip sync live or use auto tune, like so many others are doing” without getting sued by anyone themselves, to help spread the word that live singing matters, if they have the guts to do it. Pink did it! It’s the future that matters more than what the old dinosaurs are doing. People will say they’re old, who cares? (I don’t feel this way myself but I do care about the present and future of music even though I am not young anymore myself. I want younger people to know and experience what real music is. I had that real experience for my youth.) Younger artists like Taylor Swift can’t be thought of as being too old to sing live. This whole ridiculous physical performance emphasis on singers is a lot of what’s to blame on why all the younger folks are dancing and lip syncing their way through live shows instead of really singing. Bringing back live singing on TV shows too, so the standards are changed from physical displays to actual talent displays, would be a good start too. Since we don’t pay big money for TV, it can’t be enforced or sued into submission, but they could take a stand, if the public demanded it. Hope I have made my position clearer! Sorry this was so long.
All I can do is laugh, and then retch, knowing Don Henley could not care less about his fan base. Let the money roll in, must be his mantra. Sickening. Great job as usual, Fil!
You're 100% correct Fil. As someone who's done audio prod/post-prod, there's absolutely zero chance you could get two waveforms (with pitch or amplitude represented on the y-axis) to match like that in an overlay. Anyone who suggests this could be due to inefficient software (as you've observed) either doesn't understand audio or is lying :-). Have to be honest -- I knew this happened with some acts, but your revelations in this channel have left my jaw on the floor. Astonishing.
The Eagles are charging $1100+ per seat with a hotel package so people can essentially listen to a faux live "hits" album while they pretend to sing. I wonder if the instruments are pre-recorded too? Fraud.
It is very hard to get a man to understand something that his livelihood depends on him not understanding. I also think its a symptom of doing more shows more closely together than the vocalists are actually capable of and their voice recovering between them. Age probably contributing even bigger recovery times.
And to have untrained people tell me, that's because they have performed it so often they just do the exact same thing. Wtf! You have obviously NOT EVER performed! As a.musician, no way!!!
@@dawndimanno7129 Even as someone who never had a single singing class, but is musical enough to be able to sing along "pretty well" to known songs (or so I am/have been told by trained singers and friends alike), a bit more than to simply carry a tune, even I know how bad my voice sounds after a concert or a party at which I was "singing along". To be honest, if the concert is by a band/singer I really like and whose many lyrics I know by heart, it's gonna take days until I am able to speak normally again (the worst combination by far is hard rock/metal music and beer).
Firstly Fil, what a top guy you are. I am 72, started playing guitar aged 13, only stopped a couple of years ago due to arthritis, and was a sound engineer all my working life, so I can say I know a bit. The Eagles were one of my favourite bands and I have seen them 3 times, albeit a long time ago. I really would love to think that they were not miming back then, but the sad truth is that you would not really know. The venues are so large, even if you managed to get the very best seats, you are so far divorced from the artists it's impossible to tell 100%. Everyone has their own opinion. Personally, I would not pay good money to go and see McCartney croak his way through a 2 hour set, it's the same thing to me as having to put up with a distorted mobile disco system at a wedding, the perfectionist in me just cannot stand it. It's sad, but if you want to hear tunes from bands who peaked in the late 70's played accurately to the originals, it's tribute bands all the way. What the Eagles are now doing is a disgrace to the industry and would be fraud in any other sector.
Well said! I love tribute and cover bands because they work hard to keep the real music that we have loved for decades alive and well. It saddens me to see online all of the disrespect these bands can get sometimes from so-called music lovers. Do you know Classic Albums Live - the ultimate and preeminent cover band who play classic rock albums, front to back, as they were meant to be listened to ... cut for cut, note for note .... it's like being transported back in time to recording studio and listening to your favourite album as it is being recorded!
I saw Pink Floyd live back in 1987 and I remember thinking at the time that their performance was so pitch-perfect and spot on that I wondered if they were just miming to the records. Nobody I mentioned this to took me seriously or believed that it was the case ... but was it?
Ditto...going back to the early 90's ...I went to 2 Pink Floyd concerts that cost me a quarter of what going to see only 1 eagles concerts. I have never had an interest in spending hard earned money to see eagles.
Don just throwing his pennies to the lowest bidder to do his musical and PR dirty work for him🤑 What a bunch of sell outs! You can say NO, you know. There are still plenty of artists who would love an honest producer not a manufacturer. Which is what these complicit crooks should be properly named going forward
If you pull apart a studio track where the lead vocal has been doubled, even then, in the studio, they won't overlap that exactly. I've seen an analysis of a doubled Karen Carpenter track (not a for the purpose of criticism, just to look at how the recording was constructed) where it was pointed out that the timing, the pitch and even the vowel sounds were not exactly the same. If Karen Carpenter can't do it in a studio, no one can do it, and especially not live.
I did enjoy this SO MUCH! Especially the little backing harmony surprise at the end was very satisfying and amusing the way you share it. I respect how you carefully choose your words too, Fil. Very professional.
Everything about Fil’s professionalism commands respect. He conducts himself in such a mannerly way you just grow to love him and what he stands for for.
The music industry was always crooked. It was a way for organised crime to launder money for a long time. Nobody has integrity in the music business. I only bother seeing small time bands in bars. They really play, and can be more entertaining than the huge venue shows anyway.
If you think about the word performance it doesn't mean real. If you saw a con man throwing himself against a car and claiming that the car hit him you might say to yourself "what a performance".
If this doesn't piss Don Henley off, then I don't know what will. He had a hissy fit at Rick Beato, for just playing Eagles music but criticising Henley for lip syncing is on another level. Providing the Eagles tell their ticket paying fans, that they lip sync, at their concerts, then that's fair---it's not good but at least it's being honest.
"He had a hissy fit at Rick Beato, for just playing Eagles music" Yikes, I must have missed that. Sheesh! I don't understand that mentality. You're getting more exposure for your music, maybe even to younger/newer fans!
@Yesica1993 Yeah. Moved Rick to put on a suit and tie and go to court to clarify copyright laws. There is a video from Rick on his experience. He found out that Henley hired 50 people to monitor who's playing Eagles music without licence. Pretty sad old man!!
Oh the irony of The Eagles blocking live covers/performances of their songs by other artists on UA-cam. Their management cites copyright in the UA-cam channel ‘strikes’ (to prevent monetisation of Eagles songs), but they seem to have no problem duping audiences at their live shows for financial gain. Great analysis Fil 🙏
Again this is a product of private downloads, extremely low payment from platforms like Spotify, so bands have to squeeze out every penny. to give yo an idea our last album was self financed and cost 350k. We will make a loss on this offer 100k. A band can only sell so much merch.
Do you even realize what a great person you are?. So honest and fair. Handsome and an award winning smile. Wouldn't miss your videos. Thanks for what you do. I'm not very musical, but I have learned a lot watching you.
I guess Don Henley really can't come to grips with being public about his voice has changed as he's gotten older as every artist has some of them even to the point where they won't sing anymore they're just retired and make the rounds take pictures sign autographs chat with people but they don't have the voice power anymore
Pretty rare that some folks can sing nearly similar to when they were in their 30s & 40s. I can't imagine why people would pay so much money to see & hear their beloved singer(s) really just half sing, half speak their songs. The biggest and hugest difference is breath control.
@@thedeathwobblechannel6539 Jon Anderson of Yes is in top form at age 80+. Just released a project called "True" with the Band Geeks. Genes and luck play a role, but dedication to the craft is the biggest controllable factor. Henley probably lacked the dedication to get his voice in performance shape, but still had to get himself and his crew paid (if there are other factors, i plead ignorant). But it's undeniable the lack of dedication goes downstream to the fans he's ripping off.
Thank you again, Fil, for all your efforts and hard work. You’re absolutely one of THE most genuine, sincere, and uniquely talented artists on all of UA-cam. Please know, you are SO APPRECIATED! Happy New Year, looking forward to seeing what you’ll bring us, in 2025!🎉❤
Hi Fil 😊 Thank you for bringing this to us sadly once again as Don Henley thinks he can play fast and loose with the public trust so now he's going to have to change another song in his set. All they understand is money and the only way to combat this is to take away what they most want. Your analysis is like a lawyer preparing for a case... it is ironclad... they cannot run from the evidence and so they must have to decide whether to comply or quit. Thank you for all that you do. Have a great day and Rock 🤘🏾
Thank you for all your hard work, Fil. The music industry needs to be held accountable. It's wrong that people pay hundreds of pounds for tickets to a performance that isn't authentic.
Woah, copy and pasted backing vocals, I did not expect that! I kind of thought they might have backing track vocals that they were singing along to, to varying degrees for the backing harmonies, but wow! You always find the little details! Thanks for this, I didn't think the Eagles had suddenly come clean. And the other thing about your methods is, like any good scientific method, it is absolutely repeatable.
He went into the studio and prob did multiple takes and they took the best one, auto-tuned it and then copied/pasted it 5x's or whatever...it is very high even for dh in his younger days...why cant these guys just retire with their royalty millions and maybe do limited appearances that are authentic? Instead they are ruining whatever legacy the band had...
@@billdouglass-ty6blAnd it's very probable that he sang them in a much lower in the studio for the track you're describing (to keep it sounding smooth) and they dragged his vocal up to pitch. No matter, it's pure fakery.
3:46 and THAT'S how you do it, folks! Just grab a vocal from a previous performance that didn't suck and use it for all your next performances and hope no one compares the two with pitch analyzing software!
@@Whateva67 But the thing is, it's not that easy. I don't know why an experienced live performer would ever choose to do that. Perfect lip synching is tricky (especially that Mariah Carey one the other week, where she had all these different "live" versions - how would you remember which one you were meant to be miming to?) but also it's easier for a band to lock in together than to lock in to a backing track (if they've played together a lot).
Thanks Fil for doing this, it was obvious this was not a live vocal when I saw them in Manchester. I would also be dubious about the backing vocals through most of the songs... but appreciate that would be harder to prove.....also as much as I love Joe Walsh, it sounded like he was only singing half of 'in the city'. As for the vocals on 'I can't tell you why' 🧐🧐🧐......Could you review a Paul McCartney concert, I wasnt a huge fan beforehand, but after seeing him live (in the same venue as the Eagles) was blown away and in no doubt that everything was live......vocals weren't perfect but they didn't need to be and in all honesty added to the experience to see an 82 your old man not sounding like his younger self but still sounding incredible, adapted the vocals accordingly and the concert was all the better for it.....Would love to hear your thoughts.
Here's something ironic: 10 years ago in a Rolling Stone article Don Henley was quoted as saying that perhaps the reason that Led Zeppelin never re-united is because Robert Plant can't hit "those notes" anymore. Integrity: Plant-1, Henley-0.
Fil, so logical & data driven, all wrapped up in a calm objective demonstration. Thank you for the TRUTH we all long for, even though painful at times.
You say let you know what we think. I think performers who have aged to the point they can no longer sing live at a 'live' performance should retire, and young ones who just don't want to sing live should quit. I think you are genius for explaining miming - lip-synching - in a way even a layman, or laywoman, can understand is pretty amazing. Thanks for all the hard work and effort. Hope you have a great New Year.
Accuracy is not created by accident or poor processing. The fact that thew plots overlay and complete each other is in fact testament to the integrity of this comparison methodology. Busted
Thank you for another great analysis Fil. I am not a music person and your explanations are very understandable to me. Thank you for the clarity always. Great work.
New-comer to your channel. Keep up the good work. This year there was one concert my wife and I walked out on( black berry smoke) because it sounded and looked like( to us) that it was mimed. We don't know, factually, if it was mimed, what we do know is we won't buy tickets for that band again. My point being is we pay for live performances and if we aren't getting a live performance we won''t support those artists.
Great video Fil. Thanks. It's going to be harder to spot this when someone invents a box using AI to adjust the pre-recorded vocal slightly. Great to uncover this while we can.
Daryl Hall’s live performances were always better than what came out of the studio. Even now, when his voice isn’t the same as it was (age 78), he still does a great job. He’s ’real and his touch is true.’
I saw the Eagles at Earl's Court, 2001. £28 for ticket & travel...amazing show and sound. Henley has an amazing and recognizable vocal but he's been singing for 50+ years so its bound to change. Nobody can dispute what Fil is saying: DON HENLEY IS MIMING! All our heroes grow old but we still love them. Neil Young, Springsteen, James Taylor, Chris Rea, Knopfler, Maiden, Elton John, Dylan and so many more inclding Steve Tyler. We don't need perfection Don, Let The Music Do The Talking. Please don't fake it.
Even McCartney sings live, and he's one I would expect to take advantage of this trend. As recently as 10 years ago he was bragging that he's still in the same key. Now he has let that go and we still love him.
What is the music industry gonna do when Artificial Intelligence record albums start to come out with fake band members who do not sing or play instruments, but mime all their performances, like todays performers?
My old butt and the rest of the old guys in the band go out and play every weekend, with no backing tracks or electronic crutches. The dance floor is always hopping, even with the mistakes all of us make. Lol…we’re all in our late 60’s and early 70’s. We wouldn’t know how to use that stuff anyway!
As a retired Digital & RF Engineer, Fil's explanation is technically & scientifically correct. You could argue that a very precise vocalist after singing their song perhaps 1,000's of times, could usually reasonably replicate the pitch of a song they know in their sleep, especially 6 or 8 weeks apart. I sm a shower or driving singer, and can spontaneously match notes in a song in my range that I know well. IDENTICAL ? Nobody. Further, there's the timing. A human ear may not be able to discern minor variances as indistinguishable. BUT, the human voice cannot replicate IDENTICAL pitch bends in a song for a whole verse let alone a whole song IDENTICALLY. Nor with the precision TIMING of a computer. Start, Stop, Sustain, Vary, bend, Slide Pitch, Vibrato, Every Single Time. It's not like a piano piece where each string is tuned to resonate at the same frequency each time, but the human still has to control the timing, to 100ms or less. As the vocal cords adjust to create the nuanced sounds, continuously varying Frequencies, it simply cannot be done IDENTICALLY every time. And to claim that "imprecise software" would make 2 different performances graph IDENTICALLY is just disingenuous & ludicrous. It is scientifically obvious and inarguable, that the vocal recording, the isolated vocal, from both concert dates, is a playback of the exact same vocal recording, made elsewhere at a different date, and that the musical performance is sync'd to a replay at the concert, with timing cues for the other musicians, played on a monitor only the musicians hear (in ear ?) BUT the audience can not. Concerts are an experience, but they are far too expensive now to get what they used to do on Shows like Top of the Pops, Old Grey Whistle Stop, Midnight Special, Bandstand, etc and get a lip sync sing along. I'd rather hear an aging artist do their best, live, authentically, than fake it. Some do, perhaps some have Egos that are too big to be honest.
Very well said! My hope is that there are enough of us - music lovers and makers - who prefer real and raw over fake and "perfect", every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Because, if there are too few of us - of all ages and generations - then I don't think Fil's side project will have much of a chance for success.
The simple fact that Fil’s not been sued yet proves he’s right AND that his approach is beyond reproach. It’d be so easy for him to call for fans tof this channel to go ‘spy’ in concerts with phone recordings and then bash them with proof of cheating. That would probably be suable, and yet a lawsuit would bring such a huge spotlight on this issue in mainstream media that I don’t see who would dare to bring it.
Glad you did the analysis of this song! Of the songs I'd suspect him of miming on, this one surprises me the least as the times I've heard him sing it, the high falsetto part is nailed strongly and evenly every time which would be very hard to do even without taking into consideration that he's not far from 80 years old.
Even in a studio, back to back, not a single human on earth can make IDENTICAL takes. Not even a matter of odds, it is plain and simple, impossible. That fact is why 'doubling' a vocal fattens the sound. It is the tiny timing differences that make it work. Simply duplicating a track only makes it louder. They should be ashamed, charging what they do. - Cheers
Many years ago the Eagles were booed off the stage in Des Moines Iowa. A few years ago my daughter got us tickets to see them. It seemed live but now I doubt it was. They are stealing fans money . Fraud. Fil you do a good job. Really appreciate your work and music !
I saw Poco open for them many moons ago (before Tim joined the Eagles) and Poco blew them off stage and got sacked from the tour. Poco were great live and , on that night, far better than than Henley and crew.
This is so sad. I saw the Eagles in the mid-70s in Australia. They were brilliant. One of the staples of their live shows was that they sounded almost exactly like their records. They didn't ring in changes, or improvise, or anything like that. They knew we were there to hear the songs exactly the way they were familiar to us, and they delivered. There was no question about them being genuine; they were just that tight, it was a mark of quality. And they were my favourite country-rock band. Now, I have trouble listening to them without thinking about how Frey and Henley bullied their bandmates to the point of shedding them altogether, and how since then Henley has behaved like some kind of mean-spirited mogul, blocking creative artists from doing things with his music. And now this. FFS, what a pitiful descent into fraudulent pseudo-performance. I see that the lowest price for tickets to see them live in Las Vegas in March 2025 is $242. That's not trivial money. If I was paying that sort of money for a live show, I'd bloody well want it to be a LIVE show.
You are correct. If the program is unreliable, you would never be able to match line to line in 0.01 sec increments over several seconds or over an entire song. Unreliable implies that the uncertainty (variance or standard deviation) associated with mean value is very large. In other words, if one were to reproduce the mean value (say via simulation 100 or 1000 times), the mean value would be all over the place.
Dutch band The Nits did it well on one of their tours. They had a huge (mock-up) reel-to-reel tape-deck standing on stage all through their performance. On a couple of their songs, when all 4 musicians sat together and did close harmony, they obviously weren't playing their instruments and instead the reel-to-reel tape-deck was "playing" to make it clear to the audiences that yes, for this song they used a playback track for the instruments.
Now let’s find the concert that was the backing track for October 18. And then the one before that….lol. I just wonder when the last time was than Henley actually sang live…how many years ago???
Undoubtedly, a lot of folks are happy to spend several hundred dollars per head to sit with others who enjoy watching Don Henley move his lips like he used to when he was a singer. Thank you Fil for providing proof that Don Henley can still convincingly move his lips.
I don't know why anyone tries to dispute this stuff. It is what it is and there's no disputing it. It's possible that they are putting the vocal over top of the actual live one for the video. Which is totally stupid, IMHO.
I absolutely loved the Eagles literally half a century ago. They can probably still play, but I'd be really surprised if they could still sing. Only a very few singers (Ann, Juice) can last that long, but they definitely lose a lot of range and articulation. Look at Stevie Nicks performance on Saturday Night Live. It was problematic, but it was still great. Even though she really only ever sings one or two notes, you could see she was singing for real, and that is appreciated.
Happy Christmas, Phil! Glad you are shining a light on these copy-paste jobs. I am looking forward to 2025 and more enlightening videos. Cheers from Cheshire. 🎉
Well, that's a thought. Audience members playing back sounds they each had made at some previous concert. Wonder how that would be received by the "band"?
I had to think of a scene in a comedy, in where the chef let fall a steak on the dirty ground, picks it up and throws it in the frying pan, saying "what the custumer doesn't see the chef gets away with '. It seems to be be the same here. Keep on showing us, Phil. Thnx
Con Henley is at it again. Please keep these videos coming. Together, we can shame these cheats into retirement and hopefully celebrate some new genuine live artists in 2025. Happy New Year and good health for 2025.
@@SuziQ. I recall the analysis of another performance - Desperado, I think, which was the second one I referred to. Not suprised it's not a standalone!
@@SimonJM , Yes, those were different cities, but they were all Desperado (late 2023, early 2024, and another date I don’t remember). I want to find that Vince Gill interview that Vera mentioned.
Cut and paste baby, cut and paste! I will say their 70s records would have been done proper. You could easily punch in a fix, but cutting and pasting was too much of a chore. A good sing could just nail it. I would bet, recent albums by many are full of cut and paste. I dabble in music but prefer to play it all the way through, and maybe do a few touch ups.
Once they have the tech to make adjusts to a track to make it sound different every time, then that's the end for me as I won't be able to trust any band or singer. I'll end up sticking to live theatre as the only live performance I do. I don't mind backing tracks, and singers singing along to recorded bacijng vocals, that's a sound choice and there's no secret about that. But all vocals tracks mimed? What's the point.
Perfection was defined differently back when Glenn said that. Indeed, different music lovers today will define 'perfection' differently. How would YOU define a perfect album or concert?
What’s funny to me is yesterday I went out and watched a cover band play music from back in the 70s 80s and 90s. They did music from the Eagles,Journey, AC/DC, Pat Benatar, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Prince, etc. They didn’t use backing tracks and they didn’t mime or lip sync. They just played instruments and sang the songs. And you know what? It was great! I enjoyed the music thoroughly even though it wasn’t perfect every single second of every single song. it was just plain old music being played and sung, it sounded great and a good time was had by all. Why can’t the original artists realize we aren’t there to hear perfection, we are there to hear them play and sing the songs we love so we can sing along and have a good time? it boggles my mind.
I know a local cover band and they use backing tracks for "some" backing vocals but if the band is doing that who knows what they are really playing.
The times have got so weird, right? When I hear a singer go slightly out of tune, I get happy because I know they’re singing live. 😂
If the likes of Don Henley and other original artists from decades ago did actually try to sing uncorrected, you might wish they had
Ethanol
@alexanderSydneyOz the guys in these classic bands are all in their 70s; some of them are in their 80s. They can't sing like that anymore. They should retire!
Don is so protective of eagles legacy, he doesn't want anyone to sing the songs anymore... even himself!!
The only thing he wants to protect is his wealth.
@@MrOuazo 🤣😂
Clever!😁
He still wants the big $ from the "shows" though!
💯
Considering what a snit Don Henley has been throwing about people reacting to his/the Eagles’ music online, being called out for this chicanery is fully justified. Keep telling the truth, Fil!! 💯👏👍
He's a greedy bastard, no doubt about that.
Amen!
If the best he can do is fake it maybe its time to quit and stop lying to paying customers.
Chicanery - you don’t hear that one very often
@@zaphodrahja AMEN!!!
As a live musician and studio owner I recently posted on a Billie Ellis live video & of course between songs her vocal was out of breath & "live" & as soon as the track started her vocal was super smooth processed studio quality and in stereo etc - live concerts today are a money making sham....keep highlighting this charade!
Yes, we must point this out, so actual musicians AND fans understand.
@@djsguitars01 That’s sad and disappointing. I thought Billie Eilish was one of the singers who was always singing live.
Pink is live and I think Lady Gaga is too, but I’m not sure about LG.
Welcome to the future, Right ?
But was that an official "live" video or a fan video from a phone? If an official release she probably was singing live at the event, but post production has been added afterwards by the producers. It's best to check an actual fan phone recording.
72 year old here. I've played in bands and recorded artistes using reel-to-reel, and latterly DAWs, throughout my life, and I have to say your logic is flawless! Keep it up.
72.. sure, sure
62 years old here still playing, gigging and recording, and I look forward keep going past 72, 82, and my last breath; if the Stones are doing it… I don’t get how anyone can be surprised about it ❤
I saw Led Zeppelin in the 70s. Robert Plant's voice was shot from touring, but he made the most of it and so did we. Loved the show! That's real, that's what makes it "live".
For sure ! Zeppelin is a great example of a band that used the studio as an instrument and there is often lots of overdubs and production going on, so when they played things live they couldn't really do that, but it was somehow even better. Their live performances are very powerful, the benchmark for a rock performance IMHO.
Personally, that situation is the one where I don't mind if they use backing tracks for lead vocals... if the artist's voice is shot, maybe towards the end of the tour, and they just can't sing... but the show must go on.
But Fil's example even has backing tracks for the background vox, which is like... really?!
And then, with ticket prices having gone thru the roof, someone might be lucky to see 1 show per summer, and spend hundreds of dollars just on the ticket, plus parking, fees, food & bev, merch... and after all that, you find out you paid for them to stream some prerecorded songs thru their PA.
I would expect no less from Robert Plant. Legend, (and musician) that he is.
Plant's range was toast by 1972 . That was the last time he ever sang "Rock And Roll" like the record.
@@bloozedaddyThey were toast because Plant had to have nodules removed from his vocal cords in 1972, which was a dangerous procedure back then. He's lucky he could sing at all after that.
Interviewed in 2015, Henley said, "My voice isn't going to last that much longer. I have good days and bad days. But I'm OK with that. I realise how fortunate we are to have had such long careers. It rarely happens in this business. And I don't want to retire." So 1.) His voice was going. 2.) He had no intention of quitting. 3.) The solution he came up with is obvious.
@@vestibulate I’m not defending Henley or lip syncing at concerts, but so many are doing it (who are decades younger even) and selling tickets as though they were performing live, it’s not really fair to single out any one artist. No one is preventing any of them from perpetuating this fraud. Some class action lawsuits on artists such as The Eagles, Taylor Swift, Janet Jackson, Madonna and others, plus Live Nation when it’s the promoter, would likely change this lip syncing fraud for the better. At the very least, anyone using prerecorded vocals should be required by law to say on the concert announcements and ticket buying sites, plus the actual tickets “some vocals will have been prerecorded” or “some previously recorded tracks will be used” so people will be informed and have a choice. Suing them all for billions is probably the only way to end the deception.
@@justintime42000 This business about not singling out any one individual is just another means to silence criticism. People who commit fraud are going to be named. You've named a number of them yourself. It could be said that you're singling them out unfairly when others not mentioned are equally guilty. Where does that leave us?
@@vestibulate Seems like you didn’t bother to read everything I said and that you singled out one thing to be argumentative about. I said I wasn’t defending Henley. They ALL need to be sued. I wasn’t trying to silence YOU or anyone else.
Just getting Vince Gill and Deacon Frey to sing was one way to extend the longevity of the band. Henley has been trying to figure out how to get The Eagles to run on empty for at least as long as Glenn Frey has been gone! I can’t understand why anyone would pay big money to see them live to hear Deacon Frey try to be his dad. They lost too much when Glenn died.
The problem is industry wide. I want to see them all, including the promoters, venues, ticket sellers, sound people and everyone else who enables and profits from this fraud to be called out publicly, and not just here on UA-cam, and make them pay. The question is, who is going to sue them and how? It probably has to be a class action lawsuit (at least in the US) because nobody who buys concert tickets has the money to pay attorneys for something this huge. Perhaps we could all write to our state and local consumer affairs offices and complain about ALL the artists, including The Eagles and Henley, who are defrauding the public. Maybe the local governments can do something.
All ticket vendors (including the resellers) have to put total ticket prices online now including fees, for all New York shows, so they can’t surprise people with huge fees after they’ve started the buying process anymore. A small victory against the Ticketmaster/Live Nation monopoly, but it’s something.
I think by your spelling you probably live in the UK, so consider complaining to whoever your consumer authorities are, about whichever artists you want. Contact BBC and Sky News. The more the merrier. Email them proof. The mainstream press and music press getting ahold of this story will help give it more of the publicity it needs. Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair or NME, you name it, could all get on board, if they dare to care! I noticed while watching Glastonbury that people weren’t lip syncing, and I wondered if the people who put on the festival insist on all live performances. If so, good for them!
The Eagles are on their way out. At least they did give live performances for years. Some of these younger artists have likely never done a single concert without lip syncing. They should all pay regardless of age but perhaps it’s younger artists who should take the lead by saying “I promise I won’t lip sync live or use auto tune, like so many others are doing” without getting sued by anyone themselves, to help spread the word that live singing matters, if they have the guts to do it. Pink did it!
It’s the future that matters more than what the old dinosaurs are doing. People will say they’re old, who cares? (I don’t feel this way myself but I do care about the present and future of music even though I am not young anymore myself. I want younger people to know and experience what real music is. I had that real experience for my youth.) Younger artists like Taylor Swift can’t be thought of as being too old to sing live. This whole ridiculous physical performance emphasis on singers is a lot of what’s to blame on why all the younger folks are dancing and lip syncing their way through live shows instead of really singing.
Bringing back live singing on TV shows too, so the standards are changed from physical displays to actual talent displays, would be a good start too. Since we don’t pay big money for TV, it can’t be enforced or sued into submission, but they could take a stand, if the public demanded it.
Hope I have made my position clearer! Sorry this was so long.
@@justintime42000 Jesus Christ. Relax, will you?
All I can do is laugh, and then retch, knowing Don Henley could not care less about his fan base. Let the money roll in, must be his mantra. Sickening. Great job as usual, Fil!
yep, just let the fools pay me to stand on stage and move about a bit. 🤦♂next it will be a video screen
Didn't anyone ever tell him you can't take it with you? At his age he better get right with Jesus pronto.
Jesus lip synced all his sermons. I knew his sound tech 😊
@@JTPiano2011 🤣🤣🤣
Smells like chump
You're 100% correct Fil. As someone who's done audio prod/post-prod, there's absolutely zero chance you could get two waveforms (with pitch or amplitude represented on the y-axis) to match like that in an overlay. Anyone who suggests this could be due to inefficient software (as you've observed) either doesn't understand audio or is lying :-).
Have to be honest -- I knew this happened with some acts, but your revelations in this channel have left my jaw on the floor. Astonishing.
The Eagles are charging $1100+ per seat with a hotel package so people can essentially listen to a faux live "hits" album while they pretend to sing. I wonder if the instruments are pre-recorded too? Fraud.
It is very hard to get a man to understand something that his livelihood depends on him not understanding.
I also think its a symptom of doing more shows more closely together than the vocalists are actually capable of and their voice recovering between them. Age probably contributing even bigger recovery times.
And to have untrained people tell me, that's because they have performed it so often they just do the exact same thing. Wtf! You have obviously NOT EVER performed! As a.musician, no way!!!
@@dawndimanno7129 Even as someone who never had a single singing class, but is musical enough to be able to sing along "pretty well" to known songs (or so I am/have been told by trained singers and friends alike), a bit more than to simply carry a tune, even I know how bad my voice sounds after a concert or a party at which I was "singing along". To be honest, if the concert is by a band/singer I really like and whose many lyrics I know by heart, it's gonna take days until I am able to speak normally again (the worst combination by far is hard rock/metal music and beer).
Firstly Fil, what a top guy you are. I am 72, started playing guitar aged 13, only stopped a couple of years ago due to arthritis, and was a sound engineer all my working life, so I can say I know a bit. The Eagles were one of my favourite bands and I have seen them 3 times, albeit a long time ago. I really would love to think that they were not miming back then, but the sad truth is that you would not really know. The venues are so large, even if you managed to get the very best seats, you are so far divorced from the artists it's impossible to tell 100%. Everyone has their own opinion. Personally, I would not pay good money to go and see McCartney croak his way through a 2 hour set, it's the same thing to me as having to put up with a distorted mobile disco system at a wedding, the perfectionist in me just cannot stand it. It's sad, but if you want to hear tunes from bands who peaked in the late 70's played accurately to the originals, it's tribute bands all the way. What the Eagles are now doing is a disgrace to the industry and would be fraud in any other sector.
Well said! I love tribute and cover bands because they work hard to keep the real music that we have loved for decades alive and well. It saddens me to see online all of the disrespect these bands can get sometimes from so-called music lovers. Do you know Classic Albums Live - the ultimate and preeminent cover band who play classic rock albums, front to back, as they were meant to be listened to ... cut for cut, note for note .... it's like being transported back in time to recording studio and listening to your favourite album as it is being recorded!
I saw Pink Floyd live back in 1987 and I remember thinking at the time that their performance was so pitch-perfect and spot on that I wondered if they were just miming to the records. Nobody I mentioned this to took me seriously or believed that it was the case ... but was it?
They weren't miming back then. Henley has just gotten lazy .
@@rutabega2039 A recent analysis Fil showed that Roger Waters did mime. I don't know if he's done Pink Floyd with or without Waters.
@@cheshacat The funny part of that is that Waters can't sing anyway.
My god! What a con! Unforgivable. I'm so pleased I haven't wasted my hard earned cash buying tickets to see them! Great work Fil as always
Ditto...going back to the early 90's ...I went to 2 Pink Floyd concerts that cost me a quarter of what going to see only 1 eagles concerts. I have never had an interest in spending hard earned money to see eagles.
@@kmt3614Look at Fil"s calling out members of Pink Floyd too!
😢
Don just throwing his pennies to the lowest bidder to do his musical and PR dirty work for him🤑
What a bunch of sell outs! You can say NO, you know. There are still plenty of artists who would love an honest producer not a manufacturer. Which is what these complicit crooks should be properly named going forward
Con Henley
@@kmt3614he just busted Roger Waters a while back.
If you pull apart a studio track where the lead vocal has been doubled, even then, in the studio, they won't overlap that exactly. I've seen an analysis of a doubled Karen Carpenter track (not a for the purpose of criticism, just to look at how the recording was constructed) where it was pointed out that the timing, the pitch and even the vowel sounds were not exactly the same. If Karen Carpenter can't do it in a studio, no one can do it, and especially not live.
😂everybody has to cheat now
I did enjoy this SO MUCH! Especially the little backing harmony surprise at the end was very satisfying and amusing the way you share it. I respect how you carefully choose your words too, Fil. Very professional.
Everything about Fil’s professionalism commands respect. He conducts himself in such a mannerly way you just grow to love him and what he stands for for.
Gee can't wait to go spend $500 USD to go see a geezer band in Vegas at the sphere😂
We all kind of knew that the music industry was arrogant and duplicitous but you've outed these critters for once and for all. Good stuff!
100%
The music industry was always crooked. It was a way for organised crime to launder money for a long time. Nobody has integrity in the music business. I only bother seeing small time bands in bars. They really play, and can be more entertaining than the huge venue shows anyway.
Well, it's official. I trust no one in the music biz except you my friend. Thank you for your honesty.
I like Boat Rawker and Conspiracy Music Guru. They seem like legit dudes.
"Let's spend a fortune to listen to an album with a bunch of strangers while a band mimes to it."
Well ,it is a "live performance". Don, et al, are alive and they are doing something on the stage. In 2024/25 it's the best you can hope for!
@@richardpatrick2852Maybe they're holograms
@@openmodalguitar61that's the next step, 😂
If you think about the word performance it doesn't mean real.
If you saw a con man throwing himself against a car and claiming that the car hit him you might say to yourself "what a performance".
@@richardpatrick2852 Sadly, that is very true. 😞
If this doesn't piss Don Henley off, then I don't know what will. He had a hissy fit at Rick Beato, for just playing Eagles music
but criticising Henley for lip syncing is on another level.
Providing the Eagles tell their ticket paying fans, that they lip sync, at their concerts, then that's fair---it's not good but at least it's being honest.
Love Rick Beato even more.....Eagles loss after seeing the Interviews with Rick Wakeman, Police (seperately), Billy Cogan, Skunk Baxter.....
"He had a hissy fit at Rick Beato, for just playing Eagles music"
Yikes, I must have missed that. Sheesh! I don't understand that mentality. You're getting more exposure for your music, maybe even to younger/newer fans!
@Yesica1993
Yeah. Moved Rick to put on a suit and tie and go to court to clarify copyright laws. There is a video from Rick on his experience. He found out that Henley hired 50 people to monitor who's playing Eagles music without licence. Pretty sad old man!!
@@Peter-t9n, He’s a greedy old man.
I like ric beatto too
Oh the irony of The Eagles blocking live covers/performances of their songs by other artists on UA-cam. Their management cites copyright in the UA-cam channel ‘strikes’ (to prevent monetisation of Eagles songs), but they seem to have no problem duping audiences at their live shows for financial gain. Great analysis Fil 🙏
Again this is a product of private downloads, extremely low payment from platforms like Spotify, so bands have to squeeze out every penny. to give yo an idea our last album was self financed and cost 350k. We will make a loss on this offer 100k. A band can only sell so much merch.
Keep up this important work in the public interest!
Do you even realize what a great person you are?. So honest and fair. Handsome and an award winning smile. Wouldn't miss your videos. Thanks for what you do. I'm not very musical, but I have learned a lot watching you.
Get a room!
The conclusion? They just don't care...
The bottom line?
Money.
Still, it's a shame. And shouldn't be called a "live"show.
Appreciate you Fil!🌷
Thank you for sharing Fil!
@@loriematthews6418
Hi Lorie!
I agree.
They can do as they please and call it "Art"-- but not call it "live!"
@konstantia1607 👌🏼💯
Gtsy! 🙋🏻💕
@konstantia1607 🙋🏻💕
I think Dire Straits sang about this. They called the song Money for Nothing.
I totally believe that 77 year old Don Henley did two performances two months apart EXACTLY the same in every note. What a performer!
I guess Don Henley really can't come to grips with being public about his voice has changed as he's gotten older as every artist has some of them even to the point where they won't sing anymore they're just retired and make the rounds take pictures sign autographs chat with people but they don't have the voice power anymore
Yup. I am listening in headphones, and the identical performances are unreal....I mean actually unreal! LOL!
Pretty rare that some folks can sing nearly similar to when they were in their 30s & 40s. I can't imagine why people would pay so much money to see & hear their beloved singer(s) really just half sing, half speak their songs. The biggest and hugest difference is breath control.
@@thedeathwobblechannel6539 Jon Anderson of Yes is in top form at age 80+. Just released a project called "True" with the Band Geeks. Genes and luck play a role, but dedication to the craft is the biggest controllable factor. Henley probably lacked the dedication to get his voice in performance shape, but still had to get himself and his crew paid (if there are other factors, i plead ignorant). But it's undeniable the lack of dedication goes downstream to the fans he's ripping off.
@@simalakasatsimagandaJon has got a marvellous voice. I’ve always loved his singing.
live from daryl's house #60 ; joe walsh is a guy who stays in his range and cons no one.
great channel
Keep telling the truth! Music industry needs to be accountable.🎉🎉🎉
Not the music industry as a whole, just the charlatans in it.
@simonrussell77 Sad to day, it's probably most of the industry
Thank you again, Fil, for all your efforts and hard work. You’re absolutely one of THE most genuine, sincere, and uniquely talented artists on all of UA-cam. Please know, you are SO APPRECIATED! Happy New Year, looking forward to seeing what you’ll bring us, in 2025!🎉❤
He really is genuine, sincere and uniquely talented! We are very blessed to have him in this age of miming, autotune and pitch correction!
THANK YOU FIL FOR CALLING THEM OUT 💜🙏💜
"Just when I thought I was out they pull me back in"! Thanks Fil! I'm not shocked anymore.
Hi Fil 😊 Thank you for bringing this to us sadly once again as Don Henley thinks he can play fast and loose with the public trust so now he's going to have to change another song in his set. All they understand is money and the only way to combat this is to take away what they most want. Your analysis is like a lawyer preparing for a case... it is ironclad... they cannot run from the evidence and so they must have to decide whether to comply or quit. Thank you for all that you do. Have a great day and Rock 🤘🏾
Thank you for all your hard work, Fil. The music industry needs to be held accountable. It's wrong that people pay hundreds of pounds for tickets to a performance that isn't authentic.
Woah, copy and pasted backing vocals, I did not expect that! I kind of thought they might have backing track vocals that they were singing along to, to varying degrees for the backing harmonies, but wow! You always find the little details! Thanks for this, I didn't think the Eagles had suddenly come clean. And the other thing about your methods is, like any good scientific method, it is absolutely repeatable.
👍
He went into the studio and prob did multiple takes and they took the best one, auto-tuned it and then copied/pasted it 5x's or whatever...it is very high even for dh in his younger days...why cant these guys just retire with their royalty millions and maybe do limited appearances that are authentic? Instead they are ruining whatever legacy the band had...
@@billdouglass-ty6bl gonią za mamoną i nie szanują fanów. Przykre.
@@billdouglass-ty6blAnd it's very probable that he sang them in a much lower in the studio for the track you're describing (to keep it sounding smooth) and they dragged his vocal up to pitch. No matter, it's pure fakery.
What happens in Vegas eventually gets back to Fil!
Wow! Even at 77 he can recreate his performances perfectly. Every single time. That's what I call a singer.
Hahaha
Thanks for being truthful, no matter the pressure. You really cracked me up with the his vocal or her vocal. Always entertaining. Happy New Year Fil.
Rusty Young of Poco and Randy Meisner, his friend, who was also in Poco and the Eagles, are looking down from heaven, chuckling at Don Henley
3:46 and THAT'S how you do it, folks! Just grab a vocal from a previous performance that didn't suck and use it for all your next performances and hope no one compares the two with pitch analyzing software!
That’s easy
Do it with all the instrumentals too. Why the heck not?
Just mail the CD, and save on travel costs/hassles. Maybe send along life size cut outs of the band.
@@Whateva67 But the thing is, it's not that easy. I don't know why an experienced live performer would ever choose to do that. Perfect lip synching is tricky (especially that Mariah Carey one the other week, where she had all these different "live" versions - how would you remember which one you were meant to be miming to?) but also it's easier for a band to lock in together than to lock in to a backing track (if they've played together a lot).
Thanks Fil for doing this, it was obvious this was not a live vocal when I saw them in Manchester. I would also be dubious about the backing vocals through most of the songs... but appreciate that would be harder to prove.....also as much as I love Joe Walsh, it sounded like he was only singing half of 'in the city'. As for the vocals on 'I can't tell you why' 🧐🧐🧐......Could you review a Paul McCartney concert, I wasnt a huge fan beforehand, but after seeing him live (in the same venue as the Eagles) was blown away and in no doubt that everything was live......vocals weren't perfect but they didn't need to be and in all honesty added to the experience to see an 82 your old man not sounding like his younger self but still sounding incredible, adapted the vocals accordingly and the concert was all the better for it.....Would love to hear your thoughts.
Great work again Fil. Haters will hate but your review proves beyond a shadow of doubt that these singers are using a recording to mime to.
Here's something ironic: 10 years ago in a Rolling Stone article Don Henley was quoted as saying that perhaps the reason that Led Zeppelin never re-united is because Robert Plant can't hit "those notes" anymore. Integrity: Plant-1, Henley-0.
Fil, so logical & data driven, all wrapped up in a calm objective demonstration. Thank you for the TRUTH we all long for, even though painful at times.
You say let you know what we think. I think performers who have aged to the point they can no longer sing live at a 'live' performance should retire, and young ones who just don't want to sing live should quit. I think you are genius for explaining miming - lip-synching - in a way even a layman, or laywoman, can understand is pretty amazing. Thanks for all the hard work and effort. Hope you have a great New Year.
The fact you have never been legally challenged, confirms the legitimacy of your analysis.
Love how you refute each of their arguments (same vocal, same show, different outfit). Love it!
The heat is on.....
Oooo, it certainly is😮
I see what you did there. 😂
Hopefully the heat is not on for Glen Frey and he went north instead of south. 😇
Oh, I forgot. Hell froze over and so The Eagles reunited.
LOL
Accuracy is not created by accident or poor processing. The fact that thew plots overlay and complete each other is in fact testament to the integrity of this comparison methodology. Busted
It's undeniable, Fil! You got this right again!
Thank you for another great analysis Fil. I am not a music person and your explanations are very understandable to me. Thank you for the clarity always. Great work.
What a mic drop video. Great stuff Fil!
New-comer to your channel. Keep up the good work. This year there was one concert my wife and I walked out on( black berry smoke) because it sounded and looked like( to us) that it was mimed. We don't know, factually, if it was mimed, what we do know is we won't buy tickets for that band again. My point being is we pay for live performances and if we aren't getting a live performance we won''t support those artists.
Yeah their act sounded canned when they toured with Skynyrd a while back.
Thank you for your hard work! Your videos are amazing & I especially love when you sing. ❤️
Great video Fil. Thanks. It's going to be harder to spot this when someone invents a box using AI to adjust the pre-recorded vocal slightly. Great to uncover this while we can.
I love how you explain the
technologies. This dance teacher knows how to get kids to point their toes. LOL, so I really find this so fascinating.
Daryl Hall’s live performances were always better than what came out of the studio. Even now, when his voice isn’t the same as it was (age 78), he still does a great job. He’s ’real and his touch is true.’
I saw the Eagles at Earl's Court, 2001. £28 for ticket & travel...amazing show and sound. Henley has an amazing and recognizable vocal but he's been singing for 50+ years so its bound to change. Nobody can dispute what Fil is saying: DON HENLEY IS MIMING! All our heroes grow old but we still love them. Neil Young, Springsteen, James Taylor, Chris Rea, Knopfler, Maiden, Elton John, Dylan and so many more inclding Steve Tyler. We don't need perfection Don, Let The Music Do The Talking. Please don't fake it.
Tyler retired. That’s a better look than what Don Henley has been doing.
Even McCartney sings live, and he's one I would expect to take advantage of this trend. As recently as 10 years ago he was bragging that he's still in the same key. Now he has let that go and we still love him.
Exactly. He knew it was time. Must be hard though!@@SuziQ.
@@mjemigh3304I love Paul. He gets a lot of hate but I've always found him to be genuine.
What is the music industry gonna do when Artificial Intelligence record albums start to come out with fake band members who do not sing or play instruments, but mime all their performances, like todays performers?
They changed the vocal part in the Vegas show that was analyzed previously. Is it a coincidence? Nope, it's the 'Fil Factor'! 🤘
Fil deserves more subscribers, not only does he sing and play instruments well, he hosts live shows and educate people in music theory. Big ups
Ha! The Eagles are a cover band of the Eagles
Eagles II.
Even if they were singing and playing live this was already basically a cover band.
If you go to an Eagles cover band performance they will actually be singing!
No, no, no. A cover band would be doing live vocals. 😊
I think you mean an "air band", or a "lip sync" band.
Great work again, Fil.
My old butt and the rest of the old guys in the band go out and play every weekend, with no backing tracks or electronic crutches. The dance floor is always hopping, even with the mistakes all of us make.
Lol…we’re all in our late 60’s and early 70’s. We wouldn’t know how to use that stuff anyway!
Keep on keeping it real! You know, for those of us who care! :)
Thank you, Fil!
Sad, I'll be going to bed with a heartache tonight.
I am literally laughing out loud. 🤣 great comment. Personally I plan to take it to the limit tonight…
As a retired Digital & RF Engineer, Fil's explanation is technically & scientifically correct. You could argue that a very precise vocalist after singing their song perhaps 1,000's of times, could usually reasonably replicate the pitch of a song they know in their sleep, especially 6 or 8 weeks apart. I sm a shower or driving singer, and can spontaneously match notes in a song in my range that I know well. IDENTICAL ? Nobody. Further, there's the timing. A human ear may not be able to discern minor variances as indistinguishable. BUT, the human voice cannot replicate IDENTICAL pitch bends in a song for a whole verse let alone a whole song IDENTICALLY. Nor with the precision TIMING of a computer. Start, Stop, Sustain, Vary, bend, Slide Pitch, Vibrato, Every Single Time. It's not like a piano piece where each string is tuned to resonate at the same frequency each time, but the human still has to control the timing, to 100ms or less. As the vocal cords adjust to create the nuanced sounds, continuously varying Frequencies, it simply cannot be done IDENTICALLY every time. And to claim that "imprecise software" would make 2 different performances graph IDENTICALLY is just disingenuous & ludicrous. It is scientifically obvious and inarguable, that the vocal recording, the isolated vocal, from both concert dates, is a playback of the exact same vocal recording, made elsewhere at a different date, and that the musical performance is sync'd to a replay at the concert, with timing cues for the other musicians, played on a monitor only the musicians hear (in ear ?) BUT the audience can not. Concerts are an experience, but they are far too expensive now to get what they used to do on Shows like Top of the Pops, Old Grey Whistle Stop, Midnight Special, Bandstand, etc and get a lip sync sing along. I'd rather hear an aging artist do their best, live, authentically, than fake it. Some do, perhaps some have Egos that are too big to be honest.
Very well said!
My hope is that there are enough of us - music lovers and makers - who prefer real and raw over fake and "perfect", every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Because, if there are too few of us - of all ages and generations - then I don't think Fil's side project will have much of a chance for success.
The simple fact that Fil’s not been sued yet proves he’s right AND that his approach is beyond reproach. It’d be so easy for him to call for fans tof this channel to go ‘spy’ in concerts with phone recordings and then bash them with proof of cheating. That would probably be suable, and yet a lawsuit would bring such a huge spotlight on this issue in mainstream media that I don’t see who would dare to bring it.
Glad you did the analysis of this song! Of the songs I'd suspect him of miming on, this one surprises me the least as the times I've heard him sing it, the high falsetto part is nailed strongly and evenly every time which would be very hard to do even without taking into consideration that he's not far from 80 years old.
I've been following your channel for quite some time. Thank you for exposing all these frauds!
Thanks!
Thank you!
8:30 - The TIMING is what does it! The odds of all those events occurring at the same relative times to each other is NONE!
Even in a studio, back to back, not a single human on earth can make IDENTICAL takes. Not even a matter of odds, it is plain and simple, impossible. That fact is why 'doubling' a vocal fattens the sound. It is the tiny timing differences that make it work. Simply duplicating a track only makes it louder. They should be ashamed, charging what they do. - Cheers
Your surgical analysis is unrivalled. As are your explanations.
Many years ago the Eagles were booed off the stage in Des Moines Iowa. A few years ago my daughter got us tickets to see them. It seemed live but now I doubt it was. They are stealing fans money . Fraud. Fil you do a good job. Really appreciate your work and music !
I saw Poco open for them many moons ago (before Tim joined the Eagles) and Poco blew them off stage and got sacked from the tour. Poco were great live and , on that night, far better than than Henley and crew.
Appreciate your work and insights Fil, for making audio fact-finding fun again!
Desper-a-dough 🙄
Oh very good!! 😂
Clever $
This is so sad. I saw the Eagles in the mid-70s in Australia. They were brilliant. One of the staples of their live shows was that they sounded almost exactly like their records. They didn't ring in changes, or improvise, or anything like that. They knew we were there to hear the songs exactly the way they were familiar to us, and they delivered. There was no question about them being genuine; they were just that tight, it was a mark of quality. And they were my favourite country-rock band.
Now, I have trouble listening to them without thinking about how Frey and Henley bullied their bandmates to the point of shedding them altogether, and how since then Henley has behaved like some kind of mean-spirited mogul, blocking creative artists from doing things with his music. And now this. FFS, what a pitiful descent into fraudulent pseudo-performance. I see that the lowest price for tickets to see them live in Las Vegas in March 2025 is $242. That's not trivial money. If I was paying that sort of money for a live show, I'd bloody well want it to be a LIVE show.
Great update as always Fil and all the best
Bought the pitch monitoring app. Love playing with it and seeing how close "to the lines" I can get.
What is it called please?
@@RcMcNutt"Vocal Pitch Monitor" I bought the "pro" version to support the creator.
@@RcMcNutt Vocal pitch monitor
@@RcMcNutt Just type "pitch monitoring app" into google. Its incredibly easy to do.
@@RcMcNutt Vocal Pitch Monitor app
You are correct. If the program is unreliable, you would never be able to match line to line in 0.01 sec increments over several seconds or over an entire song. Unreliable implies that the uncertainty (variance or standard deviation) associated with mean value is very large. In other words, if one were to reproduce the mean value (say via simulation 100 or 1000 times), the mean value would be all over the place.
Dutch band The Nits did it well on one of their tours. They had a huge (mock-up) reel-to-reel tape-deck standing on stage all through their performance. On a couple of their songs, when all 4 musicians sat together and did close harmony, they obviously weren't playing their instruments and instead the reel-to-reel tape-deck was "playing" to make it clear to the audiences that yes, for this song they used a playback track for the instruments.
Now let’s find the concert that was the backing track for October 18. And then the one before that….lol. I just wonder when the last time was than Henley actually sang live…how many years ago???
That's what I would like to know.
Undoubtedly, a lot of folks are happy to spend several hundred dollars per head to sit with others who enjoy watching Don Henley move his lips like he used to when he was a singer. Thank you Fil for providing proof that Don Henley can still convincingly move his lips.
😂😂😂
😂😂😂
I don't know why anyone tries to dispute this stuff. It is what it is and there's no disputing it. It's possible that they are putting the vocal over top of the actual live one for the video. Which is totally stupid, IMHO.
I absolutely loved the Eagles literally half a century ago. They can probably still play, but I'd be really surprised if they could still sing. Only a very few singers (Ann, Juice) can last that long, but they definitely lose a lot of range and articulation. Look at Stevie Nicks performance on Saturday Night Live. It was problematic, but it was still great. Even though she really only ever sings one or two notes, you could see she was singing for real, and that is appreciated.
Bro, you have great hair. It was exactly what I was rockin' in my highschool grad year photo in 1984! 👍😁
You ROCK - Fil!!! 💗💗💗
Thank you, Fil, keep on doing...you are doing the right thing!!!
Happy Christmas, Phil! Glad you are shining a light on these copy-paste jobs. I am looking forward to 2025 and more enlightening videos. Cheers from Cheshire. 🎉
"Fil"😊
I've said it before and i'll say it again... these oldies are singing better in their latter years....according to the music industry
Great explanation !
"Obviously, people were making different noises on different nights."😁
Love following your reasoning, Fil.
It's brilliant and entertaining, too!
Well, that's a thought. Audience members playing back sounds they each had made at some previous concert. Wonder how that would be received by the "band"?
I had to think of a scene in a comedy, in where the chef let fall a steak on the dirty ground, picks it up and throws it in the frying pan, saying "what the custumer doesn't see the chef gets away with '. It seems to be be the same here.
Keep on showing us, Phil. Thnx
In Argentina we have a saying, probably of spanish origin, that says "Eyes that do not see, heart that does not feel".
That was Fawlty Towers 😂
Con Henley is at it again.
Please keep these videos coming. Together, we can shame these cheats into retirement and hopefully celebrate some new genuine live artists in 2025.
Happy New Year and good health for 2025.
MERCI BEAUCOUP FIL !!! CONTINUEZ SVP !!! Trop de FAKE !
Trop d'arnaques !!! 😢😢😢
Respect ,admiration, NELLY , BELGIQUE .😊❤
Two performances examined, two performances mimed. That's a nasty precedent.
It’s more than these two. Fil analyzed two different concerts in March, and did a follow up with at least one more concert- all mimed by Don Henley.
@@SuziQ. I recall the analysis of another performance - Desperado, I think, which was the second one I referred to. Not suprised it's not a standalone!
@@SimonJM , Yes, those were different cities, but they were all Desperado (late 2023, early 2024, and another date I don’t remember). I want to find that Vince Gill interview that Vera mentioned.
I've always wondered how the Eagles had such perfect backing harmonies! Now I know why! Thanks Fil!
Cut and paste baby, cut and paste! I will say their 70s records would have been done proper. You could easily punch in a fix, but cutting and pasting was too much of a chore. A good sing could just nail it. I would bet, recent albums by many are full of cut and paste. I dabble in music but prefer to play it all the way through, and maybe do a few touch ups.
Thanks, Fil, for showing us what's going on. They really have no shame.
I used to be a big fan of Don Henley.
Of course, this was back in the day before I knew anything about Don Henley except for his music.
You are such a strong person. I couldn’t take all the backlash you get. You just let it roll off your back.
When the truth is on your side, the wind is at your back ...
Magnificent work Fil
I don't mind a band using backing tracks, but miming to their own pre-recorded vocals is the end of live shows for me.
Once they have the tech to make adjusts to a track to make it sound different every time, then that's the end for me as I won't be able to trust any band or singer. I'll end up sticking to live theatre as the only live performance I do. I don't mind backing tracks, and singers singing along to recorded bacijng vocals, that's a sound choice and there's no secret about that. But all vocals tracks mimed? What's the point.
Another great video Fil!!!!!!
Thanks for continuing to expose this kind of thing.
Quote from "History Of The Eagles" : "Perfection is not an accident" Glenn Frey.
Neither are two identical waveforms in 2024 it would seem....
Perfection was defined differently back when Glenn said that. Indeed, different music lovers today will define 'perfection' differently. How would YOU define a perfect album or concert?
The next obvious question is whether they are actually playing any of their instruments live......