Singing. Mansun - Wide Open Space

roundthebend

We cover this in our band. I'm the lead singer. I'm OK until those really high bits (bold italics below) at the end of each verse.
I can just about cope with the end of the chorus.

Now, I think the problem is simply range. But I'm not a trained singer. I just give it my best and it comes out passable. I'd love some tips to make this song more achievable.

I think part of the answer is that we'll get others in the band to augment my singing.


Mansun - Wide Open Space

I'm in a wide open space, I'm standing
I'm all alone and staring in to space
It's always quiet through my ceiling
The roof comes in and crashes in a daze

I'm in a wide open space, it's freezing
You'll never get to heaven with a smile on your face from me
I'm in a wide open space, I'm staring
There's something quite bizarre I cannot see

I'm on the top of a hill, I'm lonely
There's someone here to shout to miles away
I could be back at my house, for I care
They do not hear me, it's the same old case

CHORUS

REPEAT VERSE 1

CHORUS x2

digitalkettle

Always loved this song...wondered how he did it live (pretty faithfully as it turns out):


He jumps into falsetto range for the highlighted phrases (studio recording slightly different: phrase two doesn't go falsetto but he does push it harder).

roundthebend

@digitalkettle ;
recent live recordings are quite poor in comparison - he struggles more than I do.

Even using falsetto I struggle to get up there. It's wild.

Lebarque

Just sing it an octave down

Grangousier

Out of curiosity do you do technical stuff, warm ups, etc? I found when I did some every day for a bit it helped a lot, I was able to sing a lot higher (and notes that had previously been a bit of a strain became easier). If you need a suggestion, I've used Jeff Rolka's videos on YouTube -  https://www.youtube.com/@JeffRolka - Find your range (Tenor/Bariton/Bass) and do the exercises along with him. He's very good, no bullshit, minimal self-promotion. There is a bunch of useful technical info there as well. There are lots of singing teachers on YouTube, but I've found his videos to be useful and a lot less annoying than many of the others. 

darthed1981

Paul Draper has (had, lets face it) a brilliant voice - saw him do the whole of Six last year.

Wide Open Space is hard... but Legacy...

roundthebend

Grangousier said:

Out of curiosity do you do technical stuff, warm ups, etc? I found when I did some every day for a bit it helped a lot, I was able to sing a lot higher (and notes that had previously been a bit of a strain became easier). If you need a suggestion, I've used Jeff Rolka's videos on YouTube -  https://www.youtube.com/@JeffRolka - Find your range (Tenor/Bariton/Bass) and do the exercises along with him. He's very good, no bullshit, minimal self-promotion. There is a bunch of useful technical info there as well. There are lots of singing teachers on YouTube, but I've found his videos to be useful and a lot less annoying than many of the others. 

I don't do anything technical, I practise by singing the songs. But I'm getting more interested in improving this skill. 

roundthebend

darthed1981 said:

Paul Draper has (had, lets face it) a brilliant voice - saw him do the whole of Six last year.

Wide Open Space is hard... but Legacy...

Come and see us try that song on Saturday night, we're playing a pub in Peterborough.

DiscoStu

EDIT: accidental post.

DiscoStu

We play it too. We play everything tuned down to D# and our singer says that that subtle change helps him with a lot of our set.
Personally, I've always sung it falsetto but I'm not the singer in this band. Our guy just doesn't bother trying to go high.

AntonHunter

Grangousier said:

Out of curiosity do you do technical stuff, warm ups, etc? I found when I did some every day for a bit it helped a lot, I was able to sing a lot higher (and notes that had previously been a bit of a strain became easier). If you need a suggestion, I've used Jeff Rolka's videos on YouTube -  https://www.youtube.com/@JeffRolka - Find your range (Tenor/Bariton/Bass) and do the exercises along with him. He's very good, no bullshit, minimal self-promotion. There is a bunch of useful technical info there as well. There are lots of singing teachers on YouTube, but I've found his videos to be useful and a lot less annoying than many of the others. 

Thanks for this, I'm trying some BVs for the first time in a while and looking to improve my stamina/stability. Going to try this guy's videos.

tomajoha

I miss the 90's 

Hurling_Fruitmig

tomajoha said:

I miss the 90's 

Somehow I'm only finding out today that this was Mansun so maybe I enjoyed the 90s too much.

motnikrap

I think those bits are around high C?  So quite high.

It depends on your range, as a tenor I reckon I could get that but I'd need to set up for it.  Falsetto might sound better possibly.

Things that may potentially help which I've picked up from singing lessons:

* Do warm up!

* An exercise I've found useful for range is to take an "eee" vowel sound somewhere comfortable, slide it up and octave and back down, kind of "eeeeEEEEeeee". Then move up a semitone, repeat the octave slide.

* Learn about your diaphragm and breath support if you don't already know about this.

* Listen carefully to the vowel sounds the Mansun bloke uses in the high bits, e.g. "in a daze" isn't exactly sung as written and is kind of inferred from the consonants.

Note also he's quite close to the mic on those bits, possibly not super-loud.

darthed1981

roundthebend said:

darthed1981 said:

Paul Draper has (had, lets face it) a brilliant voice - saw him do the whole of Six last year.

Wide Open Space is hard... but Legacy...

Come and see us try that song on Saturday night, we're playing a pub in Peterborough.

Saturday night I'm seeing some Mancunian band down in London...

Good luck with the gig though!!

roundthebend

Loads of great stuff in there @motnikrap ;

bobeffect

A brilliant song

Deijavoo

We covered that back in music college, it was great fun to cover. Although our drummer was the only one who had the high notes to hit those ones so he had to sing it. 

GavRichList

Loved Mansun. Shame he turned out to be a wrong’un. 

Deijavoo

GavRichList said:

Loved Mansun. Shame he turned out to be a wrong’un. 

Oh dear. What's this?

GavRichList

Deijavoo said:

GavRichList said:

Loved Mansun. Shame he turned out to be a wrong’un. 

Oh dear. What's this?

There’s plenty online about it. He’s very problematic.