MICS AND THE MECHANICS (OF KARAOKE)

Karaoke is an enormously fashionable pastime in North America. Since the introduction of the professional karaoke machine in Japan in the early 1970s, the faddish recreation has developed into a mainstay of spirited nights out around the world – and many are the amateur chanteuses who have belted along to a smash pop hit, replete with its own colourful lyric video and streamlined synth instrumentals.

Private karaoke rooms, in particular, have lately made the leap from niche to mainstream, and in major urban centres, have mostly supplanted the communal karaoke nights at bars and restaurants that for many years afforded Canadians their only opportunity to sing and drink in public among friends. (The private-room experience is an import from Seoul and Berlin, among other more enterprising cities, where it’s prevailed as the norm for decades.)

And yet despite how widespread karaoke has become as a commercial entertainment, how karaoke is actually made remains for most a mystery.

How are songs recorded? How are lyrics programmed? How are playlists curated and maintained? Who decides which chart-toppers ought to be honoured with a karaoke interpretation? Who provides the imitation backing track? Who transcribes the lyrics as they appear in block-caps on the screen, and how do they manage to synchronize each word’s guiding highlight to the very millisecond it’s meant to be sung? Who gets paid for what, exactly – and how do a lot of vocalless covers of major-label hits pass muster with the law? Who orchestrates this whole complicated operation? And how on earth do they get their work so fast to the world’s innumerable lounges and bars?

The questions posed above don’t burn in many minds because we don’t tend to give the people who make karaoke possible much thought. Nonetheless, getting a song ready to sing along to is often a labour-intensive, time-consuming process – and in the era of instant streaming and overnight viral hits, any karaoke lounge worth its salt is expected to keep up to date with the charts, doubling the challenge. It’s difficult to imagine the effort this demands.

Out of their offices in London, England, Sunfly Karaoke’s crack team of producers, curators, programmers and more work diligently to furnish pubs, nightclubs,