The Three Necessary Ingredients For Distortion - Compression, Constriction and Acoustics

I like to sing melodically with grit, so I've never actively tried to learn false fold screams.

Then I came across a guy who said that the more you work on your false fold screams, the false folds adapt in a way so that they can vibrate faster than the false folds of the typical non-vocalist!!!

That's amazing. No wonder these guys who have been doing them for years and years get so much more distortion. It's not as if the flase fold scream is some ultra-technical technique. It's about as basic as they come and maybe that's why screaming is more in vogue than singing with grit: It's harder to sing with grit and manage both the clean note and the grit you place over the top than to just create distortion.

I thought: If I learn to do false fold screams, my false folds could adapt in a way that they vibrate faster, which could give me better quality, more badass grit when I sing with grit. So, maybe there is some benefit in learning to scream even though I'm not a screamer.

I have looked at numerous tutorials for false fold screams including Gabriel Bonhila's channel (he does a tremendous Alex Terrible type scream) and David Benites Extreme Vocal.

Not one of them uses a hyoid pull. They don't even use a similar sounding term.

It's amazing how much distortion they can generate without using any constriction. They create far more distortion than I 'd ever even need to!

Not only do they not ever mention a hypoid pull, they don't even say to use constriction! I thought: "How can they be creating so much distortion without one of the three essential in gredients?

My curiosity was piqued.

I'm wondering if maybe hyoid pulls are only necessary for singing with grit but not for screaming.

One said specifically: "Do not squeeze or narrow your vocal tract."

I tried letting the tract remain open and I got a much better false fold scream than I did when I was trying to make my vocal tract narrower to get that "thumb over the water hose" on my airflow!

I couldn't belive I'd never thought to try that.

Think of the most common cue for doing a false fold scream: "Do an angry sigh."

Why would that work? Sighs, even angry ones, don't require a hyoid pull.

They just require breath support and some compression to that the air gets "pent up" so that when it's released, it comes out harder (which I think is the purpose of constriction).

Now, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe they're doing a hyoid pull but they don't know the terminology so they call it compression."

If you wanted to ask another vocal coach or another vocalist if they use a hyoid pull, what other term might they use in place of "hyoid pull" to mean essentially the same thing?

I ask because besides vocal coaches I've talked to other people and they say constriction will hurt you. I the angry sigh is the most popular cue for false fold screams, but it includes no constriction.

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