more on EQ - the next step = carving room for vocals

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shackrock

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alrigiht so all my instruments sound A TON better thanks to all this spectrum and EQ business...haha.

but now i'm sticking in the vocals...and wondering where i should start with these...i know i should "jig saw" them into the rest of the instruments...but then again its a lot harder then it sounds i found.

Since the vocals basically take up the entire spectral analyzer window...where SHOULD the cuts/raises be made? and would i then need to cut/raise EVERYTHING else (besides vocals) to get them to "fit in" right?

just wondering - and yes i have read articles, but nothing seems as good as getting the stuff straight from this place - questions are answered exactly! haha
thanks everyone
 
I read about cutting at 3K to help a vocal sit in the mix, and boosting at 7K to compensate for a dull singer (me). I've been doing both for a while now and it seems to work.
 
usually, you don't have to do anything to the drums, because of the shortness of the individual sounds. The only thing that could give you problems here is the snare, so pull that fader down just a notch. Bass instruments shouldn't be of concern either. What is of concern is stuff like guitars and keyboards and everything else in the same frequency range. Take these instruments, subgroup 'em and apply a slight EQ cut @1-3kHz. If that doesn't do the trick, try to add some 5k to the vocal track for more intelligibility (sp?).

Hope that helps,

David.
 
If my spectrum analyzer shows a hump between 400-500 on the vocals, would you reccomend cutting some of the midrange instruments there? IE guitars/ keys. It just kind of seems to make sense following the same school of thought or am I just being too analitical?
 
you think that just doing 1 octave cuts around the mid section in my guitars, and a boots of the same freaq. and octave (and db, except a positive boost not a negative cut of course)....would do the trick? It sounds like its not bad.


how much of a cut is everyone saying? because anymore then 2-3 for my guitars makes them loose thier uniquness i think.
 
2-5db cuts are usually enough.

Dont forget to cut some of the low mids out of your vocals too. That will give you a little more ability to push up their volume. Y

You can also play with adding a touch of distortion, chorus or flanger to the vocals if you need a little edge. Just a slight touch will do.
 
I just make sure the vocals have some decent low-cutting to them, and I'll boost the high mids slightly.

But it should be pretty easy to figure out where the bulk of the energy of the vox is coming from. Sure, they can be pretty much all over the place, but look for what general range they're falling in. Usually the high-mids, competing with the guitar. Luckily, the two sound different enough sonically so they won't compete much, so you don't need to do a lot of cutting. overall, though, if you can just cut a wide trench in the mids from 250 hz to 3500 hz, that should usually cover it. And you don't have to cut a whole lot -- just a good 2-3 db.

Here's a good trick: Try listening to the vocals in the mix. If there's something "missing" from it that you normally hear when soloed, and you want to hear it, then here's what you do:

*Listen to it again really close in the mix and memorize how it sounds.

* Now pull out the eq plugin or whatever eq you're working with, and eq the voice, in solo mode, so it sounds like it does in the mix . . . taking away whatever frequencies you need to make it sound the way it sounded with the rest of the mix.

* Now, DON'T apply this eq setting to the vocals. Apply it instead to the rest of the mix.

Following me? :) Think about it now.
 
also, if you've got instruments competing with your vocal... re-arrange your song.

either change the frequency you are playing on the offending instruments, or change the timing of the instruments so that they don't collide with, but rather complement the vocal.

listen to some blues, that guitar does not play when the singer is telling the story unless the guitar is complementing the singer.

most rock and r&b are blues derivatives... learn from the classics.
 
crosstudio said:
also, if you've got instruments competing with your vocal... re-arrange your song.
....
listen to some blues, that guitar does not play when the singer is telling the story unless the guitar is complementing the singer.

most rock and r&b are blues derivatives... learn from the classics.
Click to expand...

So, you're saying that all types of rock music have to use the blues as their basis. WRONG! The blues has no influence whatsoever on the type of music I make. In addition, it seems kind of narrow-minded to say that someone should re-arrange their song if, in your words "instruments [are] competing with your vocal." Sometimes a very busy arrangement is what is right for a song.

I know it probably seems as if I am over-reacting to this comment, but it really bothers me when people want to apply a "one-size-fits-all" solution to a problem. Some of the best music in the world happened when people ignore rules, conventions, and even what seems to make sense. If noone ever went beyond "learn[ing] from the classics" music would go nowhere.

Don't get me wrong, crosstudio's advice is good for 75% of the situations out there, but it bothers me for him to suggest that this is always the best thing to do.
 
If there is any rock, hip-hop, or r & b influence in your music, then there is blues.
 
Rock's genesis may be in the blues, but if you can't hear any remnant of the blues in someone's music, how can you say that it's influenced by the blues? You may be able to say that it's influenced by music that was influenced by music that was influenced by the blues, but that's definitely not the same as saying that all rock is blues influenced. It's just not true. You could just as easily say that all rock is influenced by slave folk songs, because they influenced a type of music that influenced another type of music that influenced the blues. There should be a way to determine a music's influences independent of its genesis, and that way is to open up your ears and listen. If you don't hear the blues in a type of music, then it's not influenced by the blues, and it can still be rock. Can someone tell me how, for example, most of Radiohead's output is blues-influenced? Would you then say that, since no reasonable person could hear a remnant of the blues in their music, that Radiohead is not a rock band?

(BTW, I'll admit up front that I severely dislike blues music, and any rock song that sounds overtly bluesy.)
 
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