Getting the vocals to sit well in the mix

[LRosario]

There are two approaches to this:


The typical-

Mix your rythm section, then your lead parts, and finally your vocals. Problem is, by the time you get to your vocals, theres not much dynamic room to work with.


The Alternate-

Mix your vocals first, and go backwards. Vocals, lead, rythm, and finally drums and/or rythm percussion. If anything seems to take away from the vocal, then tweak it accordingly. Judgment comes with experience.


Also consider things like: panning gives you spatial orientation, volume gives you distance perception, and freqs give you altitude perception. Those are some extreme basics of mixing. Alot of people charge loads of money for that piece of info.

 

[NLAlston]

Put the vocals in FIRST if you can - Get the vocal track sounding exactly how you want it - SOLO.

Bring up other tracks one-by-one and listen carefully to see if they're "arguing" with the vocal track. If so, EQ out a little of the offending frequencies, turn the track back down and go on to the next.

This way, no matter what, you'll have a spaced carved out for your vocals.

And of course, heed the Bear - You can still get the mix far too cluttered, even if the vocals aren't being stomped on.

VERY GOOD info given, and it seems now that I am going to have to alter the manner in which I have been doing things. I had been tracking all of my music in my workstation's sequencer, then mixing it as best I could. The next step was to record this into my AW16G to lay down my vocals against it (it is all that I have used the 16g for). Sometimes I like to construct a lot of background vocals, and the way in which I had been handling it affroded me a greater number of tracks. But I am definitely going to have to see about setting up a little differently.

 

[Carlitov]

One of the songs I'm working on

sorry that it took so long to get back on the forum with this. here is one of the songs that i have been working on. it's not my most recent mix but it gives you a good idea where i was when i started this thread. the song contains explicit lyrics.
http://www.funender.com/music/play.php?band_id=3102&song_id=10639&mode=song_hifi

going to have to copy and paste link in address bar.

 

[xstatic]

Personally, its really important to me to get the vocals to sound right on the mix with no EQ, no compression, no fx, and no doubling. If you can't get it to sound decent like that, than all the other stuff won't make it happen. Thats usually a sign to try either a differnt arrangement, different mic, different preamp etc....

As far as getting a better mic and or pre goes, I would do the best with what you have first. When you nail the gear you do have, then get better stuff. Each persons opinion of what a "good" or "bad" preamp is is very different. I hear alot of people on this forum that rave about the M-audio DMP3. 7 or 8 years ago I might have liked something like that. Now it would be a last resort for me. In fact, I wouldn't even use a Focusrite Platinum series preamp unless I had to. The bottom line though is that even with the lowliest of gear, good talent and good engineering will always be king. However, I have no doubt in my mind that whatever engineer makes the nasty gear sound good will most likely make the good gear sound incredible

 

[cavedog101]

Xstatic said it right...all the plugs and outboard in the world aint gonna do nothing for a busy mix full unneeded parts and such....the old studio guys(like me) call it 'shit in shit out'.....you can sweeten a turd but you cant make it taste good......i could go on....really.. you've got to be definate in your choices of the backing tracks BEFORE you ever get the vocals to sit...I might record 24 tracks of background this and guitar wanker that and drum this and that, but I'm not ever gonna use it all...it makes it nice to have arrangement choices, but the fact is this...no matter what style we're talking, the vocals are gonna have to be the focus and they're gonna have to do their thing with SUPPORT not CONFLICT...whether you do it with scooping EQ to make room or you leave out someones track its up to you and is the beautiful thing about mixing...in the end its your signature....sub-bussing and different reverbs and delays can move things in and out too....

 

[Carlitov]

did anyone go listen to the song? i was sort of looking for specifics.

 

[tkingen]

I find it useful to put a frequency analyzer on the vocal track. See where the prominent frequencies are in the vocals and lightly subtract them from other tracks that also react in those frequencies. That will help carve out a space for the voice. You can do this for other tracks as well.
I've had this method described to me as giving each track it's own brick in the wall.

Terry

 

[xstatic]

That sounds like a good idea, but what if pulling those frequencies off of other instruments makes them not sound right? Or what if those prominent frequencies in the vocal actually shouldn't be so prominent? In that case carving the others would only enhance the bad parts of the vocal sound. I personally only use an analyzer for the really low and really high frequencies (that can be tough to really hear sometimes) and to keep my own ears in check on longer sessions. Other than that I really rely a lot on my ears. I have found that slight panning of things is what really helps me to pocket a vocal properly. That and making sure I am using the proper reverb for that specific situation. Also, EQ'ing your reverb return can really change the feel of things as well.

 

[tkingen]

xstatic,

Well, sir...you are right about all of that. I guess that you have just proved why mixing is a combination of art and science!

Terry

 

[crosstudio]

i think Carlitov mentioned that he's brining in the mixed instrumental into his program and adding vocals to it, so the instrumentals are pre-mixed.

that's going to make it extremely difficult to put the vocals in the mix properly. you are going to end up with a karaoke vocal sound. like when people perform to instrumental tracks in church. when the spirit is moving, the performance sounds great, but when you listen to things later, they don't sound so great.