Matt Yglesias spends entirely too much time worrying about the threat from robots, pirates and (presumably) robot pirate zombies. The real threat, as everyone knows, is me.
Before anyone complains, all I have to ask is whether any of you can sing eight octaves. Can you even find three people who collectively cover eight octaves? No? Then pipe down and enjoy.
***Update***
Stupid Snopes. Still, “possibly close to six octaves” is better than your average Hannukah cantor.
srv
5, maybe 6 octaves.
Pb
Amateur. Bow to the master.
Martin
8 octaves? Nobody can sing 8. 3 is pushing it for really talented singers, maybe 4 for the freaks. My wife can almost cover 3 singing and she’s got one of the broadest ranges in her choirs.
Lots of people will claim 4+ octaves, but they can’t actually sing and hold those notes. My wife can hit quite a few notes above high C but can’t hold them. High C is the best she can carry.
TenguPhule
One is all you need.
People will pay you not to use it.
bend
why is Johnny depp in that video? I just, well, i just don’t understand.
bob
Mariah Carey sucks. Regardless of her range.
Pb
Wait. How do we know that she can’t sound like Barry White? Now that might be a Mariah Carey album worth having.
The Pirate
Captain Beefheart could cover 4.5 octaves. True story.
TheFountainHead
I gotchyer eight octaves right ‘ere!!!
(Sorry, I was in the Bronx tonight)
bobnoxious
Range? After a regrettable Indonesian encounter, paid a visit to the domestic STD clinic. Nurse Ratched shoved a dry cue tip up my willie without any warning. Never been able to hit that note again. Can’t quite reach the low notes anymore. Haven’t been back to Indo either…
Keith
Closest I can think of is Ronnie James Dio with I think 5
Xenos
Too many notes.
D-Chance.
Don’t forget to ‘save the planet’ tonight. Earth Hour. Google is already doing its share (I guess they never heard of Blackle, which has been doing the exact same thing for over a year now).
P.S. Heh. Talk about empty gestures. Google itself admits,
IOW, they’re all hat; no cattle. And people still buy into this crap when even the messengers themselves admit it’s crap.
John S.
Even Yma Sumac could only cover about 4 octaves, and though Mariah allegedly can cover about 5 octaves, I think Sumac has a better set of pipes – especially in the baritone range.
jake
Sure, if I’m allowed to kick them in the nads.
volney
Carey squeals the top two octaves. Any pig has better range.
mikesdak
Julie Andrews has been credited with a 4 octave range, and I think she could actually use it, as opposed to just holding a note like a fire siren.
Ellison, Ellensburg, Ellers, and Lambchop
Barack Obama can carry nine octaves.
Svensker
Yma was awesome. Mariah? She’s kinda cute (I like the retro set-up) but she ain’t got no soul, baby. Put her up against a young Aretha and whaddya got? No contest, that’s what.
AemJeff
What good is a five or six octave range, if you have absolutely no taste in selecting material? I’ll take Lou Reed over Mariah anytime.
jake
Fixed, because talent and no talent should never appear in close proximity.
Ole
Back in the days Nina Hagen could cover a lot of ground with her voice too. Don’t know how many octaves though – anyone who has the number stuck in the back if his mind somewhere?
Regards.
dbrown
All I can think of is Glitter (Luckily, only saw the reviews!)… now that was the height of her true talent range
Soylent Green
Usually I think Mariah sounds like a fire alarm but that was good singing, dawg.
PeterJ
Georgia Brown, a singer from Brazil has a vocal range spanning 8 octaves. There’s a couple of clips with her on YouTube.
I prefer Mariah Carey though.
PeterJ
Octaves aren’t everything ;)
Whammer
I was hoping that Yma Sumac would get referenced on this thread, so I wouldn’t need to be the only old guy who remembered her.
And bobnoxious, that q-tip up the willie thing is no good, you got that right. The worst thing was that when it got done to me it turned out I was clean, just had some kind of psychosomatic guilty thing, made much worse by the q-tip (twice).
Dave_Violence
Unless Mariah Carey takes off all of her clothes, I do not care to see or hear her no matter what. Her music is pop crap and if a million people like it, fine with me.
mclaren
Plus, Yma Sumac was an Inca sun goddess from the depths of the jungles of Peru, as opposed to being plain old Amy Camus from Camden, Ohio.
Speaking of more important issues: I think we need to change the Threat Level indicators. Threat level RED should now have a zombie symbol, threat level ORANGE, should be a robot threat alert, requiring intermittant civi defense broadcasts warning of “radioactive creatures roaming the streets in terrifying metal skin” and threat level YELLOW should be a pirate warning.
Threat level GREEN is, of course, a warning of imminent Greenpeace activity.
Dayv
No matter how wide her range, it’s still boring, assembly-line-made pop music. Thanks, but I’ll pass.