Mixing loud vocals in a soft song

[justwantyou2kno]

I play in a band with 2 guitars, bass, and drums. The guitar style is very slow and spacey, and to really push that fact I've panned the guitars hard left and right to their own side. We have 3 vocalists all doing their own thing, and it can be very abrasive at times (think earlier fugazi).

The problem I am having is that when vocals come in, the song sounds really huge and loud and noisy (which is the sound we're going for). But in the other parts without vocals, the song sounds very weak. If I play the song with vocals muted it's alright, but when I add them it seems like they kill the slower quiet parts of our songs. Is heavy compression the only thing that'll fix this? Any help would be appreciated.

Nick

 

[imalion]

Hey there.

Here is my 2 cents.

Heavy compression might even out some levels for you. But my first thought is to add something to the parts of the song you feel sound weak. Like maybe an extra guitar or two to fill things up when/where the big vocals are missing.

Steven

 

[btr31]

on the quieter parts of the songs? is there a melody? or a main part that you continue to focus on? if so, maybe double it up on those parts, or bring it out. if there is no melody at that part, it might get kind of boring. just a thought

 

[shackrock]

a - compress vocals a decent amount in those sections.
b - turn down the volume of the vox in those sections?! haha. there's notthing wrong with a killer loud performance - and then turning the volume lower on the mix.

 

[mixsit]

From what you've described, that would be the natural result. Do you need to reconsider the arrangement?
In addition to the ideas already mentioned, how about pulling the side instruments farther in and spread out (diffused/effected if they're not already), and/or ride their gain a bit to fill in when the vocals are out.
Wayne