Recording Vocals

[SirPsychoSexy]

Man, I'm having problems, problems, problems.

My band and I are in the studio, and we're a metal outfit. Our vocals can go from clean to gruff to rap to all-out gutteral screaming in one song, and our engineer is having a hard time making it sound convincing.

The clean vocals are pretty easy to fix with a pitch bender and some verb, so that's not really an issue, and neither are the rap-type vocals.

The problems we're having are with depth on the gruffer and more gutteral vocals. They just don't sound convincing. There is no bottom end. We want the sound to be Pantera-ish, but we can't seem to do it.

The mic we're using is this $7000 mic from the late 60's, with a gold windscreen (I couldn't tell you the brand or model), but it picks up nose-hairs rubbing together. I have no doubt this is a superior mic, but for the rougher vocals, we're having to use an SM58 to make it sound better, and even that much isn't helping.

Does anyone know how to get a good "metal" vocal sound? There's nothing wrong with our singer, he's great, it's just that he sounds lot better through a PA than an actual clear recording, apparently.

Thanks,

Chris

[Harvey Gerst]

Run the signal thru a distortion pedal or box and put a little rough edge on the sound. You don't need much.

Sounds like you're using an AKG C12; definitely the wrong mic for the job. See if the studio has a Shure SM7 laying around.

[SirPsychoSexy]

Harvey!
Thank God!

Thanks for the info! We'll try that!!

Thx!

Chris

[SirPsychoSexy]

In case they don't have an SM7, what else would be okay?
If they don't have one we'll try to rent, but what is the likelihood of the local music store having an sm7?

I am assuming this is a vintage mic?

[Harvey Gerst]

Nope, the SM7 is still a very current mic, but you're right in assuming most music stores won't carry it. It's a pretty standard mic in most decent studios.

You might also try an EV RE-20, if one's available, but I think the SM7 is gonna do a better job. If you can find an old Beyer Soundstar MkII, that's another great mic for metal vocals.

The main point with those vocals is that you don't want them too clean or pristine sounding. We use a SansAmp TRI-O.D. on some of our metal vocals (and we do a LOT of metal recording here), and it works great for adding the bottom and grit you need.

[DJL]

I want to try that idea, where are you patching in the distrortion in at, on the board? Thanks for the tip.

[Harvey Gerst]

I usually patch it into the channel insert during mixdown. You could also send the distorted output to another channel strip and blend them later.

[DJL]

Thank you again.

[analogelectric]

All of the things already mentioned are great but I have another option:

Have the vocalist really close to the mic until it saturates the capsule. It works best with a condenser mic.

I'd even compress the hell out of the vocal then post compressor mix in a little 4K-8K.

Split the signal with a slight doubling delay (could be too much of an 'effect' though)

Pantera does add a bit of distortion on the vocal tracks (although Phil does have the guttural thing down naturally and knows how to work a mic--much like Mike Patton does). I'd try not using outboard gear but maybe running it back through a mic pre (during mix) so it clips a bit (better control with a dry signal). I find using pedals or effect distortion presets to be a bit too cheesy.

Also mixing in a double track that is performed through some cheap kids walkie-talkie sounds pretty cool.

Hope that helps, sorry if I repeated some earlier advice but if it works for most it must work in general.

--Adam Lazlo

[baniak]

HEy,

I know that time is money in a recording environment, but if you like the singer's sound through a PA, or at least better than a clear recording, why don't you experiment with mic-ing the PA as the singer is singing through it?

You could also have a mic going straight into the board and use the PA sound to double the vocal. That way you can use whatever sound you come up with from the much better suggestions that preceded mine and mix it in with the PA sound???

Just an idea.