ARTICLE - Getting a vintage sound picture.
------------------------------------------------------
I hope this will help a lot of newbies out once again.
i'm continually asked by newbies and friends how to get the old - some say - "vintage " sound picture. here are some techniques ive used over the years
on such songs of mine as "The siamese cat" ( the comedy last vocal line always makes people laugh !) , "The Smooch song"(heavy guitar usage),
the bluesy "The working mans song", and the song i wrote for the harley crowd because i like harleys called "pretty girls
and fancy cars" a country song.
I'm also posting this because many folks have told me they buy vintage gear and still cant get a vintage sound.
so heres how i do it.
1. ive found getting "the sound" is often not related to using
particular equipment. sometimes its being carefull how you use
mic positioning. and how you eq the track. firstly watch your
hi end eq. a lot of todays consumer like sound cards and recording equipment have shrill hi ends. try selective cuts of eq in the region 2 to 6k.
you can use frequency analysis software to identify dominant shrill peaks.
watch particularly the 2k region ive found and see if cutting here
cleans things up. if you carefully analyse old vintage records ,
the hi end was not too pronounced because the machines they used then did not have as pronounced hi end electronics.
also watch your low mids. search for the warm areas to boost,
and the boomy areas to cut. particularly on miced bass cabinets.
sometimes adding some hi's on bass and cutting lows can make it cut through better.
2. on vocals for vintage. try doubling your vocals ie : singing your
vocals twice, and heres a twist, and requires LOTS OF EXPERIMENTATION.
take a vocal track and copy it . then slide the copy a few
milliseconds forward in time. on the original vocal track now
cut the lows a bit (EXPERIMENT !) , and on the copy cut the highs
but boost the low mids by various amounts from small to a bit more.
LET ME EXPLAIN. the overall purpose here is to delay the LOWS(BASS) just a bit. THIS ILLUSION can add warmth to a vocal track if its done correctly.
i believe from what i hear some console vendors have
experimented with similar concepts in recording consoles.
the concept seems to thicken the track and affects psychoacoustically how the listeners ear hears the song.
but remember we are talking about very small millisecond amounts.
the overall concept i call "delaying the bass".
try it on your next song !
you can try similar concepts on guitar tracks as well.
3. if you want vintage guitar tracks ive tried many tricks.
facing amps into corners and micing from behind the amp can
work with a good sounding room. some of the old records used nothing more than a hallway. but it was how the hallway was miced thats important.
i see a lot of advice given on this bbs to ALWAYS mic a guitar amp the same way,
ie: quite close to the cone just off centre. well i'm sorry , i dont
always agree. ive had interesting sounds from lots of different positions. for example the mic over the guitar amp, just peeking round one corner etc. on some of the old records they would put the guitar amp on a chair and put the mic in various positions around the chair.
4. probably the best vintage trick ive learnt is if i want some
warmth in my track to send the track out to a tape machine
from the daw pc and record it on a tape multitrack then bring it
back into the daw , noise reduce it, and mix it in with the regular track.
old tascam half inch 8 tracks are usefull for this but ive also used old 4 tracks or even old reel to reel machines. an old sony reel to reel i once had was good for this. of course if you have speed variances on tape a bit of cut and paste back in the daw might be in order.
just some ideas to try. because a lot of newbie folks sometimes tell me their tracks sound sterile and clinical sometimes with todays low noise recording equipment. Some of these tricks are a lot of work to get right, but occassionally i get a bit of magic happening if i use the techniques properly.
If it doesnt work for you thefirst time as everyone wants "instant siolutions" these days, PERSEVERE - try different eq settings ,
and/or different pan techniques and/or different millisecond slide
techniques etc
happy new year to all.
------------------------------------------------------
I hope this will help a lot of newbies out once again.
i'm continually asked by newbies and friends how to get the old - some say - "vintage " sound picture. here are some techniques ive used over the years
on such songs of mine as "The siamese cat" ( the comedy last vocal line always makes people laugh !) , "The Smooch song"(heavy guitar usage),
the bluesy "The working mans song", and the song i wrote for the harley crowd because i like harleys called "pretty girls
and fancy cars" a country song.
I'm also posting this because many folks have told me they buy vintage gear and still cant get a vintage sound.
so heres how i do it.
1. ive found getting "the sound" is often not related to using
particular equipment. sometimes its being carefull how you use
mic positioning. and how you eq the track. firstly watch your
hi end eq. a lot of todays consumer like sound cards and recording equipment have shrill hi ends. try selective cuts of eq in the region 2 to 6k.
you can use frequency analysis software to identify dominant shrill peaks.
watch particularly the 2k region ive found and see if cutting here
cleans things up. if you carefully analyse old vintage records ,
the hi end was not too pronounced because the machines they used then did not have as pronounced hi end electronics.
also watch your low mids. search for the warm areas to boost,
and the boomy areas to cut. particularly on miced bass cabinets.
sometimes adding some hi's on bass and cutting lows can make it cut through better.
2. on vocals for vintage. try doubling your vocals ie : singing your
vocals twice, and heres a twist, and requires LOTS OF EXPERIMENTATION.
take a vocal track and copy it . then slide the copy a few
milliseconds forward in time. on the original vocal track now
cut the lows a bit (EXPERIMENT !) , and on the copy cut the highs
but boost the low mids by various amounts from small to a bit more.
LET ME EXPLAIN. the overall purpose here is to delay the LOWS(BASS) just a bit. THIS ILLUSION can add warmth to a vocal track if its done correctly.
i believe from what i hear some console vendors have
experimented with similar concepts in recording consoles.
the concept seems to thicken the track and affects psychoacoustically how the listeners ear hears the song.
but remember we are talking about very small millisecond amounts.
the overall concept i call "delaying the bass".
try it on your next song !
you can try similar concepts on guitar tracks as well.
3. if you want vintage guitar tracks ive tried many tricks.
facing amps into corners and micing from behind the amp can
work with a good sounding room. some of the old records used nothing more than a hallway. but it was how the hallway was miced thats important.
i see a lot of advice given on this bbs to ALWAYS mic a guitar amp the same way,
ie: quite close to the cone just off centre. well i'm sorry , i dont
always agree. ive had interesting sounds from lots of different positions. for example the mic over the guitar amp, just peeking round one corner etc. on some of the old records they would put the guitar amp on a chair and put the mic in various positions around the chair.
4. probably the best vintage trick ive learnt is if i want some
warmth in my track to send the track out to a tape machine
from the daw pc and record it on a tape multitrack then bring it
back into the daw , noise reduce it, and mix it in with the regular track.
old tascam half inch 8 tracks are usefull for this but ive also used old 4 tracks or even old reel to reel machines. an old sony reel to reel i once had was good for this. of course if you have speed variances on tape a bit of cut and paste back in the daw might be in order.
just some ideas to try. because a lot of newbie folks sometimes tell me their tracks sound sterile and clinical sometimes with todays low noise recording equipment. Some of these tricks are a lot of work to get right, but occassionally i get a bit of magic happening if i use the techniques properly.
If it doesnt work for you thefirst time as everyone wants "instant siolutions" these days, PERSEVERE - try different eq settings ,
and/or different pan techniques and/or different millisecond slide
techniques etc
happy new year to all.
