Recording Background Vox

D

Dexter411

New member
Hi Guys,

I work at a semi-medium sized studio in Chicago and we have an issue that's very interesting. Today, a band came in to lay down vocal tracks on some songs they've recorded and these involve heavy harmonies. They have only one singer so, as always, I fiddled with EQ to make it so that people hear it and don't immediately go "What!? THAT'S ONE GUY SINGING!" However, this guy has a VERY unique vocal tone.

Any suggestions of how to make his background singing sound less like him (but in tune).
 
Howdy, "neighbor"

Well, for the most part, no.

You could chorus, flange, etc. Drastic verb (small room) or phone-like eq...

This will help (don't laugh, you'll thank me later) - During the harmonies, record him whispering - Kind of a heavy, monotonous, labored whisper - along with the lyrics. Do this either twice, or put a wide chorus and some light verb on it and blend it in.

This has two advantages...

1) It truly isn't his voice - It's just air moving through a shaped mouth mimicing the sound of a voice. That will give you an additional "presence" in the tracks.

2) Well, it's magic. One of the oldest tricks in the book. Right along with the "barely-audible cowbell just ahead of the beat" trick.
 
Thanks for the tips, Massive. I've never run into a recording challenge like this because, for the bands we usually record (mostly punk/metal), the singers usually are more known for (hopefully) keeping in tune than the tone of their voice. This guy is unique in that he really does have a good voice but when he sings harmonies, you can totally tell it's him based on his type of vibrato and the tone of his words.

I put some flange through it, compressed it, added reverb, and THEN EQ'd and am getting better results. I'll be sure to try out your whisper idea -- I know I've heard that method on the Maroon 5 album and it does help hide Adam Levine's obvious double/triple tracking.
 
Yo Dex:}

Here is something you might want to try -- do the background vox using a vocoder FX patch -- can do amazing things -- kind of the same thing as using a voice box that does harmony -- of course, the better the box, the better the results.

Also, split the backing vox l/r when you mix -- will tend to soften the attack.

Green Hornet :D :p :D :cool:
 
Here is a trick that I used once very effectively. Plug a microphone into a guitar amp (high impedence needed here.) Place the recording amp in front of the guitar amp and have him sing through the amp.

You can play with the bass, treble, overdrive, etc. and come up with some variations. Also, the natural compression of the guitar amp speakers adds some variation.

If you play around with it, you will be able to sound like a totally different singer. I believe the mic I used was an old Shure Unisphere A through a Marshall JCM 800.
 
That did it! Great suggestions, guys. I ran the singer through a tube preamp at first but even then he sounded the same so I put a 4x12 cab in front of it, did some off-axis miking and it sounds amazing. The amp's compression completely hides his trailing vibrato.

Thanks!
 
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