Unprocessed Vocal Tracks

  • Thread starter Thread starter schismatic
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TheChikenMaster said:
I think its worthless to hear one of those dry tracks. Besides you might be pleasantly surprised if you hear one of those tracks.
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You've completely contradicted yourself there. I think you're being a bit cynical, it may not help you but it could help him, plus bozmillar's gone out of his way to post these - I've had a listen just out of curiosity
 
Do I need to explain what I mean by pleasantly surprised? gosh!
I think you are being cynical. The whole idea is simple, following the "this sounds good and this is crap" theory. Its not that hard to know what crap is when you hear it. Same goes with smelling it, obviously.
 
Setup was very basic. MXL990 -> mackie preamp -> Delta 66. I placed it in the middle of my living room with a TV on one wall (to deflect bouncying reverb) and an open closet on the other wall. It is basically the spot in the room with the least amount of boingy reverb.

She was singing really close to the mic, probably 3 inches. If I had to do it again, I'd have her back up a couple inches to avoid some of the plosives and cut out some of the heavy siblance, but i think it sounded good enough in the end.

I didn't worry about background noise much. There is a fridge and a computer running in the background and my kids playing in the room next to us. Walls are paper thin with neighbors below and to the side.
 
TheChikenMaster said:
Do I need to explain what I mean by pleasantly surprised? gosh!
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Um...yes? if you get a pleasant surprise out of something then how is it not worthwhile? I don't particularly wanna see Tommy Lee's cock, but if I did, and it was smaller than mine, then I'd be pleasantly surprised and be glad I saw it :p

Anyway thats a pointless argument, and the whole notion of "good" and "crap" is subjective so I think it can sometimes be useful to hear what other people think are "good" and "crap", I mean your not just making music for yourself to hear are you?
 
TheChikenMaster said:
Do I need to explain what I mean by pleasantly surprised? gosh!
I think you are being cynical. The whole idea is simple, following the "this sounds good and this is crap" theory. Its not that hard to know what crap is when you hear it. Same goes with smelling it, obviously.
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I don't agree with this at all actually. It is really hard to tell what sounds good when you are tracking. A lot of times something sounds good when you are tracking, but just doesn't work when you are mixing Sometimes it sounds kind of crappy when tracking, but it all falls into place in the mix.

And I don't agree with the "if it sounds good it is good" idea because what sounds good one day can sound like garbage the next. If the "if it sounds good it is good" theory were true, there'd be a lot fewer crappy recordings out there.
 
bozmillar said:
And I don't agree with the "if it sounds good it is good" idea because what sounds good one day can sound like garbage the next. If the "if it sounds good it is good" theory were true, there'd be a lot fewer crappy recordings out there.
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That statement answers itself. The theory is true hence all the crappy recordings.
 
I'm betting that if you took a dry vocal track from the John Lennon, Freddy Mercury, Ian Gillan, or any good singer, you'd be disappointed to find out that it's not that far from the final product. The point being (again) that you have to get it to sound as good as possible during tracking or else all the EQ, compression, reverb or flanging in the world won't give you a good final product. All those effects should be used (or not used) to enhance an already good sounding track, not to save it.
 
Bloody hell Chiken Master, eight posts in this thread and not one of them helpful or informative. The guy is just looking for a yardstick for pity's sake.
 
schismatic said:
Can anbody point me in the direction of some unprocessed vocal tracks that are on professional recordings?

I basically want to have a look at the quality of the initally recorded vocal track, with a view to possibly being able to use it as a reference track of sorts for my vocal recordings.

It would be very handy if there was an A/B type thing between a raw unprocessed vocal, and then the processed vocal within the track.

Thanks,

Tom
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Are you recording your own vocals? Any chance you could stop by a good local studio and record a vocal take there to keep as a reference? Shouldn't cost much to just do a couple of dry vocal tracks. That way you could compare it to what you do and see if you are on the right track.

Cheers,

Otto
 
The key here is to start with a good source. If your dry run was through an MXL990, you can't expect to recover lost frequencies with EQ-ing.
A good vocal mic is a must. But beware. There are many out there and most have colorations included. May people LOVE the Rode NT-1. I thought the MXL990 sounded better. Don't always believe what the musicians friend catalog description says. Read a ton of reviews. Harmony central is a good place to start.
Personally, I love the BLUE "Bluebird" mic. It is a great sounding mic for a decent price. And don't forget a preamp. It makes all the difference in the world. The best ones are the tube preamps. A great cheap one is the ART Tubepac. It's a tube-based preamp AND compressor. It won't ruin your sound...just makes it come alive.
 
Paulie Jay said:
Bloody hell Chiken Master, eight posts in this thread and not one of them helpful or informative. The guy is just looking for a yardstick for pity's sake.
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Read what rami said smarty pants:)
 
On a raw vocal track I listen for a few basic things, 1 clarity, 2 pitch (on key,) 3 pops and breath noise, 4 timing. If the raw track is clear, on key, on time and with little or no noise then it will be easy to work with. If the track is off on any of the 4 things I mentioned then it's time to redo the track.

I agree it would be nice to find some tutorial sites where you could hear a raw track and the completed track, then see a step by step guide of the process involved in getting the completed track. If anyone knows of any such sites please post them, if I find any I'll be glad to share them.
 
I completely understand where the question is coming from. There are a lot of subtle differences between a raw dry track and a processed, ready to go track. it would be helpful to know how much of this ready to go-ness is already done in the tracking stage and how much is actually done to the track in the mixing stage.

I also understand where everyone else is coming from. As long as the person isn't spitting on the mic or singing into the wrong side, it will (in most cases) be just fine.
 
I'm often fascinated with the way in which arguments develop on this forum !:D
I personally don't think the OP's opening question was misplaced. It's actually damn important. How many times in the last 15 years have we heard that "such and such a singer can't really sing and it was production wizardry that got them to sound like that and they certainly suck live...." ? So it's actually kind of important to know what you or your singer sounds like 'dry' before any processing takes place. Rami's point was crucial here - any post tracking stuff enhances what is already there. If the dry vocal is actually crap, you're simply going to make it more evident.
By the way Bozmillar, your singer has a grand voice there.:cool:
Perhaps we've now reached the point where we cannot in any way contemplate unprocessed vocals which maybe should give us pause for reflection.....
 
I agree with RAMI and grimtraveller, in that the source track must be good quality. All I want to do is hear a top quality dry track by someone like Lennon or whoever, and then use that as a yardstick. How can you improve anything without a knowledge of the goal?
 
schismatic said:
I agree with RAMI and grimtraveller, in that the source track must be good quality. All I want to do is hear a top quality dry track by someone like Lennon or whoever, and then use that as a yardstick. How can you improve anything without a knowledge of the goal?
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You'll find that a vast majority of people do not take that approach. That's why people spend thousands of dollars on gear until they find one that they like. Most people just try a million different things until something falls in their lap. To me, it seems like a slow, hard and expensive process.

The link I put up earlier is actually the original tracks to bohemian rhapsody, so if you want to hear what freddy mercury sounds like raw, you can download that zip file and check it out. Sorry I didn't explain when I put it up.
 
bozmillar said:
You'll find that a vast majority of people do not take that approach. That's why people spend thousands of dollars on gear until they find one that they like. Most people just try a million different things until something falls in their lap. To me, it seems like a slow, hard and expensive process.

The link I put up earlier is actually the original tracks to bohemian rhapsody, so if you want to hear what freddy mercury sounds like raw, you can download that zip file and check it out. Sorry I didn't explain when I put it up.
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Many thanks for the link, am downloading it now. I can understand that many people do not take that approach. It's a bit like looking for a needle in a haystack when you don't know what a needle is.
 
thanks for that queen deal......thats some real good stuff.......freddy sounds good dry for sure wo effects......how did you go about getting that top secret info anyways??
 
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