Raye’s hit single Where Is My Husband! might have a killer vocal hook, but chorus aside, it’s not a song that you can easily sing along to.
This is due not only to Raye’s rapid-fire delivery but also the intricacies of the vocal production, which the star has been breaking down in a series of bite-sized videos.
In the first of these, we see Raye (AKA Rachel Keen) in front of the Where Is My Husband! Pro Tools project, taking us through the finer details of the song’s complex outro section.
“Originally the outro was just me singing ‘ooooh…’ but after singing it on stage it felt a bit boring to me,” she says in a caption. “We gotta add the lyrics,” she decided.
Eight layers of lyrics, in fact, each of which has Raye singing the “I would like a ring,” line that’s become one of the most quoted from the song. These are panned left and right, to create what Raye calls “this kind of surround sound feeling in your headphones, or in your speakers, or in your car.”
In fact, says Raye, there is no specific ‘lead vocal’ in the chorus or the majority of the rest of the song. “The vocals are either only in your left ear or only in your right ear,” she explains. “No vocals are straight down the middle - I’m calling this my retro pop vocal production hahahaha.”
Raye also says that many of the vocal “flourishes” were last-minute additions, which delayed the song’s completion. Where Is My Husband! Is unusual in the sense that it was performed live before it was completed - it was introduced to the world at the Glastonbury Festival in June, but wasn’t released as a single until 19 September - so was able to evolve over time.
In fact, in a second breakdown video, Raye says that she may well make more edits to the song before it appears on her as-yet-untitled new album.
“We did some new brass parts at the NFL performance [at halftime during a recent game in London] and I’m really upset that they’re not in the record,” she says.
Describing herself as “a maximalist when it comes to music production and vocals,” Raye says that she likes to throw “every bit of paint” she can at her mixes and then rein it back.
We also get to hear some isolated vocal harmonies, and more of the tiny details that went into the painstakingly constructed arrangement.
“I made a pad out of my voice,” she says, before pointing out that, even if you barely notice it, it definitely makes a difference.
“One of you will care as much as I care about these things,” she says with a laugh, which is surely all that any music producer can hope for when they’re looking to add that extra 1% of quality.
With a release date for Raye’s new album still not confirmed, though, it seems like the moment when Where Is My Husband! is finally declared ‘finished’ could still be some way off...
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