Recording vocal on two mics

M

mcmac74

Active member
I've often double tracked my vocal to add depth but never tried using the same take recorded on different mics to add depth. I assume others have and was wondering how you've found it? I have a couple of budget condenser mics as well as an SM58 to experiment with.

My 2nd mic stand is in storage due to house move...otherwise I'd just experiment without posting. If it's a successful technique I may just go to the trouble of digging it out!

Cheers
Mark
 
I've never found that a way to remotely mimic a double track. You normally end up with either a very similar sound, but more often a phase and strange one due to partial phase cancellation. People might sometimes use multiple mics on one sound source where different parts of it sound different - so the two mics capture different components which you then blend. One mouth doesn't work that way.
 
The tracks have to be different to get extra depth. Different mikes won't do it. The difference comes from you singing it again and the variations that arise from that.
 
rob aylestone said:
I've never found that a way to remotely mimic a double track. You normally end up with either a very similar sound, but more often a phase and strange one due to partial phase cancellation. People might sometimes use multiple mics on one sound source where different parts of it sound different - so the two mics capture different components which you then blend. One mouth doesn't work that way.
Click to expand...

gecko zzed said:
The tracks have to be different to get extra depth. Different mikes won't do it. The difference comes from you singing it again and the variations that arise from that.
Click to expand...

That's cleared that up then! ?
 
Never file it away till you try it - sometimes you create a new 'effect' you can pull out of the hat a few projects down the line. I'd suggest you always try these things rather than rely on us, but for us, we've just learned a few things that never seem to work, so don't do them.
 
gecko zzed said:
The tracks have to be different to get extra depth. Different mikes won't do it. The difference comes from you singing it again and the variations that arise from that.
Click to expand...

^^^Exactly^^^

I have tried it with a condensor and SM58, 2 different condensors, the difference in sound was so miniscule it was not worth using both tracks.
 
some vocalists exhibit differeent tonalities physically with some nasal resonance and some chest resonance. If it's really pronounced I will "stack" two mics with different response characteristics to capture this.
 
didn't the Doubler invented by that EMI engineer for the Beatles basically come down to a 20ms delay or something?
the Flanger…

I know ElectroHarmonix used to make a vocal pedal called the Doubler or something similar to that name.

Singing a second time seems to be the best method as used on Nirvana's Nevermind and a million other recordings. Ive always found it to sound strange when I tried it, maybe it was comb-filtering I was hearing?
 
CoolCat said:
didn't the Doubler invented by that EMI engineer for the Beatles basically come down to a 20ms delay or something?
the Flanger…

I know ElectroHarmonix used to make a vocal pedal called the Doubler or something similar to that name.

Singing a second time seems to be the best method as used on Nirvana's Nevermind and a million other recordings. Ive always found it to sound strange when I tried it, maybe it was comb-filtering I was hearing?
Click to expand...

Both Paul McCartney and John Lennon were exceptionally good double-trackers (as you can hear from early Beatles tracks). However John wasn't keen on the work involved in double tracking (he thought it was tedious), and the result was Ken Townsend developing a synthetic double tracking system using a second tape player to add a variable delay.
 
Ken Townsend....

That got me going through the internet to find the pedal I thought I'd owned back 30yrs ago...
there it is...lol ElectroHarmonix!

Electro Harmonix pedals were all over the place back then. This was probably made for guitars? we used it on vocals.
 

Attachments

  • Double Track.jpg
    Double Track.jpg
    702 KB · Views: 14
gecko zzed said:
Both Paul McCartney and John Lennon were exceptionally good double-trackers (as you can hear from early Beatles tracks). However John wasn't keen on the work involved in double tracking (he thought it was tedious), and the result was Ken Townsend developing a synthetic double tracking system using a second tape player to add a variable delay.
Click to expand...

Waves has a plug in called ADT. They even give you a way to make it vary as if it were a real tape machine. I was thinking of using my reel to reel and trying it like they did "back in the day".

But what you explained about the Beatles is what I have read as well. Lennon didn't like to do it and, back then, getting it right was much harder than today.
 
Yeah, you won't get a "doubling" effect, but you can capture as has been stated a singers upper and lower tones using a combination of 2 different mics... lots of "metal" singers do this using an SM7B for the lower & proximity effect sound with a condenser mic for the "air" or upper, crisp sound that it can capture. You can then treat both sources differently and blend to taste. As with all multiple mic recordings, you'll need to be aware of possible phase issues... and not every singer will benefit from this method... but experimenting is half the fun.
 
Ujn Hunter said:
Yeah, you won't get a "doubling" effect, but you can capture as has been stated a singers upper and lower tones using a combination of 2 different mics... lots of "metal" singers do this using an SM7B for the lower & proximity effect sound with a condenser mic for the "air" or upper, crisp sound that it can capture. You can then treat both sources differently and blend to taste. As with all multiple mic recordings, you'll need to be aware of possible phase issues... and not every singer will benefit from this method... but experimenting is half the fun.
Click to expand...

I can understand people doing this. But if they need to do so,maybe it's time for a better mike?
 
rob aylestone said:
Never file it away till you try it - sometimes you create a new 'effect' you can pull out of the hat a few projects down the line. I'd suggest you always try these things rather than rely on us, but for us, we've just learned a few things that never seem to work, so don't do them.
Click to expand...

^^^^^^^^^^C'est ça.
Some of us have tried it and any change was negligible or so microscopic as to have made no difference at all.
However, I know Tony Visconti tried it with David Bowie {on "Heroes"} and he seemed to think quite highly of it. He felt that some of the unique sound of Bowie's vocals on the song was due to the technique. Basically, he had one mic 9 feet away, another one 20 feet away and a third one 50 feet away. As the track got more dense Bowie had to shout louder and the blend is what is heard on the track. So, like most things in recording that have been outmoded, abandoned or are frowned upon, there is an application for it but like those things, it has to be the right time to try it and quite often isn't standard practice for a reason.
My attempts at the 'two mics on a vocal' have never been impressive as I recall. Works on guitars, bass and pianos nicely at times, though.
 
Watching "Classic Albums" on AXSTV, they recently looked at Night at the Opera. In it, Brian May said that Freddie Mercury was so good at double tracking vocals that tracks would often phase each other. That's good pitch control!
 
grimtraveller said:
Tony Visconti tried it with David Bowie
Click to expand...
I was watching this programme on the making of "Bridge over troubled waters" yesterday and I noticed that when Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon were going through the song, they both had a double mic set up.

TalismanRich said:
Brian May said that Freddie Mercury was so good at double tracking vocals that tracks would often phase each other
Click to expand...
I recall one of the Pink Floyd production crew or engineers saying that also about David Gilmour. Most of my female friends that record vocals for me are superb double trackers and their voices kind of phase when they DT. I actually dislike the sound ! I want the vocals exact but I'd rather there were some differences and sometimes find myself having to EQ each vocal in rather different ways to make it sound like just one vocal, which sometimes seems to defeat the whole object !
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top