T-Pain changed the world forever after introducing the techniques of using auto-tune in music through his debut album, which was released back in 2004. While it was a tool for many artists who didn’t have a singing voice to experiment, it wasn’t for everyone.
In Netflix series This Is Pop, T-Pain reveals that when he received serious criticism of auto-tune from artists and old friends, he felt a bit depressed. In fact, he thought it was a joke in the beginning.
Usher was my friend. I really respect Usher. And he said, ‘I’m gonna tell you something, man. You kinda fucked up music.’
As T-Pain suggested that it was a joke, Usher proceeded to say it once again that it was his fault for inviting auto-tune.
And then he was like, ‘Yeah man you really fucked up music for real singers. I was like, ‘What did I do? I came out and I used Auto-Tune.’ He was like, ‘Yeah, you fucked it up.’ I’m like, ‘But I used it, I didn’t tell everybody else to start using it.’
T-Pain then revealed that because of Usher, whom he considered a great friend in past, he fell into a long period of depression, which lasted for whole 4 years, which is too much.
That is the very moment, and I don’t even think I realized this for a long time, but that’s the very moment that started a four-year depression for me.
Usher was not the only one who tried to attack auto-tune. Even Jay-Z stood against the use of auto-tune, and even released an anti auto-tune song on the album The Blueprint 3 titled “D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune).”