Making my own backing vocal tracks sound like different people?

Nate74

HR4FREBR
I've been mixing some demo material lately with 2 and 3 part harmonies. It's Irish folk stuff so the backing parts are mixed almost as hot as the lead vocals are.

I'm realizing that it's very obviously me singing all 3 parts so I'm wondering are there any approaches I can take with EQ or other processing to make the vocals sound less like me?

I realize I won't be able to make it sound like a female vocalist, but I'd love to change the timbre enough to make it less obvious that I did all 3 parts. Any thoughts?

Thanks in advance!
 
Hi,
I'd look away from processing and focus more on performance.
You have the ability to make your voice sound different in a much more organic and believable way than any plugin.

Obviously I haven't heard what you're working with but if you have a bass part, for example, ham the voice up a bit.
Slightly impersonate someone or alter your inflections or accent slightly. Anything at all to make it sound less like the main voice.

I do this all the time and it helps a lot.
Well...A lot more than any plugin tweaking would have.

Try altering your position in relation to the mic, the mic choice, and the position within the room (per 'voice') too.

Hope that's useful.
 
Some good tips. Thank you. I realize I'm in the habit of setting up my standard vocal setup and then laying down all the tracks, but different mic choices makes loads of sense. I'll try experimenting with my performance as well. Thanks!
 
I find, as Steen stated, just singing them straight up harmonizing with myself or even duplicating, since they will not sound the same, little panning and volume and really, not that difficult. Just forget it is you and sing with it like you would with the radio when they sing chorus.
 
In addition to what's been suggested, one technique I tend to use is to speed up or slow down the song by 5-10% before tracking the part. When the part you just tracked is slowed or sped back to match the original, it will have a pretty different timbre.
If it's for a primary vocal part, it probably won't make enough of a difference (unless you make it really obvious by changing the speed by a lot more), but in conjunction with the other parts it could help.
e.g. if you're doing a hammy baritone, you could track that slightly fast so that it's even deeper.
 
In addition to what's been suggested, one technique I tend to use is to speed up or slow down the song by 5-10% before tracking the part. When the part you just tracked is slowed or sped back to match the original, it will have a pretty different timbre.
If it's for a primary vocal part, it probably won't make enough of a difference (unless you make it really obvious by changing the speed by a lot more), but in conjunction with the other parts it could help.
e.g. if you're doing a hammy baritone, you could track that slightly fast so that it's even deeper.

That's an interesting idea. Thank you! Used to be easy with my old Tascam 38 since there was a big old knob right on front that adjusted playback speed :) But with a song that has audio recordings as well as MIDI instruments, not even sure how to go about doing it.

Off to the Sonar manual I guess...
 
In addition to what's been suggested, one technique I tend to use is to speed up or slow down the song by 5-10% before tracking the part. When the part you just tracked is slowed or sped back to match the original, it will have a pretty different timbre.
If it's for a primary vocal part, it probably won't make enough of a difference (unless you make it really obvious by changing the speed by a lot more), but in conjunction with the other parts it could help.
e.g. if you're doing a hammy baritone, you could track that slightly fast so that it's even deeper.

That is a cool tip. Never even thought of that. Guess I sometimes stay too conventional :(
 
Yeah, it's a cool tip, but unlike my old Tascam 38, Sonar X1 (my DAW) doesn't seem to have an easy way to just speed up the playback of the whole multi-track song...
 
Yeah, it's a cool tip, but unlike my old Tascam 38, Sonar X1 (my DAW) doesn't seem to have an easy way to just speed up the playback of the whole multi-track song...
Bummer. Reaper has a slider in the middle of the transport bar for it.
 
Yeah, it's a cool tip, but unlike my old Tascam 38, Sonar X1 (my DAW) doesn't seem to have an easy way to just speed up the playback of the whole multi-track song...

Why can't you increase the record, say 120, then speed up the tempo to 130. record, then drop the recording back to 130? Your may have to check synchronization, but I bet there is a way to do it.
 
Hey Nate, your version of Sonar is more recent than my Sonar 6 PE, right? In my software, there's a program called V-Vocal, and you can alter the timbre of vocals literally with a click of the mouse, it's that easy. (There are tutorials on YouTube) If memory serves, I think it was Shift under Formant Control. I never did much with it, I always just sang different sounding parts, but this tool definitely can radically alter timbre, and it doesn't sound half bad. It's especially effective if a backing voice is mixed in the background - it would be tough for a listener to discern it being fake sounding if it's in the background. I also agree with the idea of changing the tempo (and the key by extension) and re-recording, and then move the whole thing back to the original key. This was more common in the analog days - the Beatles did this a lot in their psychedelic period. Speeding up a voice was by far the most common approach. (McCartney's voice in "When I'm 64" was recorded in a lower key and sped up, for example.) You also could stand further away from the mic, and get a distant off-mic sound. A singer sounds much different (thinner) 18 inches from the mic than someone 6 inches from the mic.
 
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