Removing Profanity From Mixes (when needed)?

Hey guys,

What are some techniques you use to remove profanity from mixes?
I write nice, pleasant, clean, meaningful lyrics that mummy could smile to and only have nice, earnest lads and lasses singing along.
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Hey guys,

What are some techniques you use to remove profanity from mixes?

Beeping seems to be out of fashion and I don't like the reverse/vinyl scratch approach, so I just duck the volume on the vocal track where needed.
Sometimes I've just asked the singer if he wants to sing an alternative word or phrase to save the hassle.
 
Funny question. If you didn't want it there, why is it. If it was meant to be there, why pull it out? I suppose having the vocalist sing "cussword" to replace the profanity would make it cute and endearing, but probably if there's profanity, it's probably not cute and endearing to begin with...
 
Beeping seems to be out of fashion and I don't like the reverse/vinyl scratch approach, so I just duck the volume on the vocal track where needed.
Sometimes I've just asked the singer if he wants to sing an alternative word or phrase to save the hassle.

How do you even create a "reverse/vinyl scratch" variation?

I've heard DJs with cleaned up versions of our songs (we never provided them with) doing the reverse/vinyl scratchy like thing, but I was curious how you'd even do that to begin with. I've tried to duck the vocals, but I find that to sound more odd.
 
Honestly, I'm not sure.
I can reverse words and phrases in ProTools quite easily but I never got it to sound the way it does on commercial records.

I just stick to either replacing the word with something more pleasant, or ducking the volume.
The latter does sound kinda strange but it's so common now that I don't think people notice or care.
 
Why do it in the 1st place? There is so much in songs today that when you hear a song with none you go "HAY WHAT WAS THAT?"

So take that all you Fother Muckers!

Alan.
 
What tools do you have?

In Protools, and I guess other DAWs, you can select the subject word, break/cut that into a separate region, then go to audiosuite-reverse-process.
That'll do it. Whether you like it or not is another thing.
 
I have Cubase and have tried some of those methods and always thought they sounded bad. As I've said, the volume "dropout" always sounded too empty, and then I've had issues where I tried reversing a section and it was off because you can end up with wrong notes as the notes might have flipped.

Anyway...just wondering if there were some common practices.

I'm still curious how the last DJ that played one of our songs did it as he simply has the mastered file and was able to easily tweak the words without is sounding odd. I tried to contact them, but never heard back.
 
Be different about it. Forget the bleeps, reverse, record scratches, etc. They work well, but it's passe. Keep the bad word in place, but sample in that bad word done in another language. How about a tugboat horn? Dog bark? Rooster crow? Fart sound? An infant's laughter? Wilhelm scream?
 
If you have something like Melodyne, or if the vocal is on a separate track, you can just work on different parts of the word to remove the majority of the offending word (either in the DAW or maybe something like Audacity). If it is a single mix, then Greg's suggestion would be a clever way of dealing with it.
 
Be different about it. Forget the bleeps, reverse, record scratches, etc. They work well, but it's passe. Keep the bad word in place, but sample in that bad word done in another language. How about a tugboat horn? Dog bark? Rooster crow? Fart sound? An infant's laughter? Wilhelm scream?

Wilhelm scream?
I sincerely hope that catches on!
 
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