Latest / Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond / From Inside Voice: Lake Bell and the Mechanics of Singing

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From Inside Voice: Lake Bell and the Mechanics of Singing · Broken Record with Rick Rubin, Malcolm Gladwell, Bruce Headlam and Justin Richmond

• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Pushkin. Hey, it's Justin Richmond here with the preview of
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: a new audio book I had the pleasure of working
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: on at Pushkin Industries, called Inside Voice. Inside Voice is
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: by the actor Lake Bell, who's long bit obsessed with
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: our voices? Why did they matter in such deeply personal ways?
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Why do we hate our voice? In writing the book,
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  Speaker 1: Lake went down some really fascinating rabbit holes, exploring the psychology,
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  Speaker 1: social science, and cultural constructs of our voice. She started
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: with the mechanics. In this excerpt, you'll hear Lake in
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: conversation with ear nose and Throat doc to the Stars,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: doctor Randolph Schnipman. His office is filled with gifts of
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  Speaker 1: albums and instruments and other memorabilia from a who's who
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  Speaker 1: of grateful artists whose voices were strengthened or even saved
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  Speaker 1: by doctor Schnipman. An Inside Voice, you'll also hear the
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  Speaker 1: iconic voices of Drew Barrymore, Susie Esman of Curb Your Enthusiasm,
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: comedian Tracy Allman, Broken Record alum Jeff Goldbloom, and one
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: of my personal heroes. You'll know her from Jackie Brown
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: Coffee or Foxy Brown. Pam Greer if you're interested at
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  Speaker 1: all in how our voices make beautiful music or why
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  Speaker 1: we hate her own voices, I think you'll like this audiobook.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Inside Voice is available at inside Voice audiobook dot Com, Audible, Spotify,
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: and wherever audiobooks are sold. To fully respect anything, we
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: need to know what it's made of. So let's find
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  Speaker 1: out what the voice is made of, shall we. I
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: think we need to consult an ear nose and throat
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  Speaker 1: specialist aka a doctor to get an unboring scientific education
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: on the architecture of our vocal tools. God, if we
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: can only talk to the E n T doc to
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  Speaker 1: the stars, someone like doctor Randolph Schnipman. Doctor Schnipman's entire
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  Speaker 1: office in Los Angeles is lined floor to ceiling with records,
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  Speaker 1: musical instruments, and other memorabilia from generations of grateful musicians
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: and performers whose iconic voices he has nurtured and even saved.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: Schnipman himself is kind of an icon. The man could
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: rock a yamica and skinny jeans concurrently and make it
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  Speaker 1: sing to boot. His own voice is pretty terrific. Long Island,
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  Speaker 1: New York accent the best I'm an ear nose and
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: throat doctor. It's also known as an oto rhino laryngologist
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: otto for the ear, rhino for the nose, and laryngology
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: for the larynx of the throat. It is my mission
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  Speaker 1: to help people get the best out of their voice,
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  Speaker 1: and especially if it's going to help the function better
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  Speaker 1: in society. Great. And if you had to kind of
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: break it down to the layman, everyday galler guy, what
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: are the main architectural structural infrastructure items inside our throats
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: and necks and noses that we need to pay attention to.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: The vocal cords are a muscular structure that is has
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  Speaker 1: a membrane lining on the surface and there's a little
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  Speaker 1: lubricant in between the actual surface and the muscle that
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  Speaker 1: allows it to vibrate. And when we phonate, we bring
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  Speaker 1: those two structures together and align them. Similar to when
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: you're a kid and you pull two blades of grass
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: and put them between your thumbs and you then gently
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: blow through it. Those two blades of grass will vibrate
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  Speaker 1: and make a noise. And depending on your aperture and
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: the force of your air that you blow and the
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: way you press your lips, and you can affect the sound.
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: That's really helpful because I do remember, you know, even
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: with my children. Now, if we get a blade of
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: grass that's a little thinner, it's kind of like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: that's not going to do a great sound. If you
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  Speaker 1: get a thicker one, you know, how fat is it?
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  Speaker 1: How long is it? So you're saying, our vocal chords
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  Speaker 1: and our vocal mechanics are all different shapes and sizes
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  Speaker 1: and levels of strength and the breath that we've pushed through,
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  Speaker 1: So that's going to all affect the variance and sound. Right.
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  Speaker 1: But also it's not just the way you present the
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: air through those two blades of grass, but it's also
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  Speaker 1: the actual blades of grass and how they are coordinated. Okay,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: and here's a really interesting question, which is you know,
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  Speaker 1: when you're like, oh, I sound just like my mother,
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  Speaker 1: is that actually because mechanics of your vocal chords and
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  Speaker 1: all the fun fixings in there are the same as
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  Speaker 1: your mother's. Is it genetic to sound a certain way?
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Is it genetic? Certainly? Bob Dylan and Jacob Dylan sound
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  Speaker 1: very much alike. I'm getting people your own got my
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  Speaker 1: window open, and yet I've heard Danny Harrison performing concert,
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  Speaker 1: and he can sound like an exact duplicate of his father,
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  Speaker 1: George Harrison noise. So there certainly are going to be
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  Speaker 1: some genetic phenomena based on the way you're that instrument
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  Speaker 1: is designed, and I think probably part of that will
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: also be affected by when you're raised by somebody who
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  Speaker 1: uses their instrument that way you we will learn to
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  Speaker 1: use it in a similar fashion. So I think there's
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  Speaker 1: a combination. I think it's both. Just to pop in
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  Speaker 1: here this concept hearkens back to the whole oh I
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  Speaker 1: sound like my mother phenomenon, And I mean it's not
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  Speaker 1: just like that for the ladies in the house. Let
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  Speaker 1: the Dylan men remind us that, gentlemen, you probably do
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  Speaker 1: sound like your pop. I mean, here's my dad. You
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  Speaker 1: really don't want any advice for me, believe me. And
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: then my brother Houston is another exit there, and I
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  Speaker 1: don't get off there. I get off fifteenth Street. No
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  Speaker 1: one gets outsafe from this paradigm. Fellas. People have asked
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  Speaker 1: me some of the albums that are records that are
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  Speaker 1: hanging on my wall, They'll ask me, does that person's
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  Speaker 1: vocal chords look different? And then the follow up question
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  Speaker 1: is if you look at somebody's vocal chords, can you
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  Speaker 1: predict that they're going to have a certain voice or
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  Speaker 1: that they're even going to have a good or a
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  Speaker 1: bad voice? And I'd say absolutely not. The structure itself
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: comes from a standard assembly line in terms of just
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  Speaker 1: looking at it macroscopically, and it really comes down to
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  Speaker 1: the way one uses it. You work in the great
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: Los Angeles, California aka Hollywood, and you treat so many
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  Speaker 1: incredible voices and they come to you when in duress
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  Speaker 1: or crisis, and so I'm curious if you could tell
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  Speaker 1: me why someone like a Hollywood actor or a sort
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  Speaker 1: of esteemed singer would even need an E n T.
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  Speaker 1: What are the plagues and foibles that they go through. Well,
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  Speaker 1: there's the entire range. I mean, they are people who
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: live in this real world and they have obligations to perform.
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  Speaker 1: So I take care of all the uranos and throat
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  Speaker 1: problems for performers specific to the performances. Performers can develop
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  Speaker 1: problems from a cold causing temporary laryngitis, or they can
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  Speaker 1: develop problems from excess of wear and tear, and that
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  Speaker 1: can cause more long lasting problems that may or may
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  Speaker 1: not be reversible. If you could kind of give us
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: an example of something that, anecdotally speaking, happened where you're
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: called in. You're the big guns and you're called in
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  Speaker 1: to help. I guess one story that the sticks in
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  Speaker 1: my mind was there was somebody performing at the Greek
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  Speaker 1: Theater and I got called at about five o'clock before
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  Speaker 1: her evening show, and there was an intro band, so
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  Speaker 1: she had an extra hour and her vocal chords to
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  Speaker 1: look swollen and inflamed, and she was very anxious to
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  Speaker 1: not cancel. There's certain little treatments, little tricks that we
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  Speaker 1: can do on site to try to help resolve those issues,
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: little techniques, topical treatments that we can try. Remember she
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  Speaker 1: even they went out and they told the intro band
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  Speaker 1: to play an extra couple of songs, so she could
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  Speaker 1: even say that she could give it even more time
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  Speaker 1: to work. And then I remember her going out and
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  Speaker 1: performing and apologizing at the outset, saying that she had
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: been struggling. She apologized, and I think subsequent to that
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  Speaker 1: she even offered them to come back and see her
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  Speaker 1: perform at another time. Are there any voices that just
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: you hear it and you go, oh my god, that's
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: the most unsupported. They're killing their internal structures right now.
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  Speaker 1: Is there a voice quality that almost offends you at
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  Speaker 1: from a medical standpoint? Well, I mean there's certainly be
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  Speaker 1: a lot of Harvey Fierstein voice. I mean, the way
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: he talks like this, it's probably a combination. I've never
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  Speaker 1: looked at his vocal chords, but I'm sure they don't
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  Speaker 1: look great, and mixing that up with his approach, which
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: is a real fry type of voice. I would say
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  Speaker 1: that I hear Harvey Fierstein, and I say to myself,
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  Speaker 1: that's a voice. I'd be curious to see what it
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  Speaker 1: looks like, to figure out what combination of things is
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  Speaker 1: he engaging and listening in order to get that voice.
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: I don't believe in God or gods or goddesses, but
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: I pray every day, sometimes more than once a day,
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  Speaker 1: and I operate under a complicated belief system pretty much
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  Speaker 1: of my own device, which I based on scientific laws
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  Speaker 1: and humanistic principles, and in a while it works for me.