Recording vocals with SM58 and a 500 sq. foot basement...sound treatment options?

[Hot_Mess]

Hello, I really hope someone here can help me!

Here is what I do:
I arrange and "record" in Logic Pro 9 (ALL software instruments using a midi keyboard). So the only live audio recording I need to do is my voice. My voice is just adequate-sounding...I am planning to do a lot of double tracking, harmonizing, etc. to try to make it palatable.

What do I need to do to make a respectable recording, with regard to treating the room? (Up to this point I've been using a Blue Snowball USB mic which has worked OK but I want to do things right and I don't think that's it! If you are curious, listen to Theremin Dreams on Soundcloud here: https://soundcloud.com/jessicazin)

Today I hooked up my SM58 and preamp and tried it out and it sounded pretty echoey with lots of background noise. I've been researching vocal recording booths and stuff but there is a lot of conflicting advice about what to do.

I could potentially spend a few hundred dollars. Currently the basement is half-carpeted, has some weird angles and a low ceiling.

What are my options? Thanks for any help.--Jessica

 

[bouldersoundguy]

Weird angles are potentially good. The low ceiling is bad. Small rooms tend not to sound too good but are more likely to add their character to your recordings.

The first thing I'd do is try to sing with your lips right on the mic's grill. It can be challenging because the mic will be more sensitive to small movements by the singer and there's a buildup of bass frequencies, but there are many, many examples of famous singers sounding great through an SM58 using that technique. You'll need to turn the preamp gain down a bit compared to singing a foot or so off the mic, and some eq to compensate for proximity effect (the bass buildup) will probably be needed. I generally do a low shelf cut with a shallow slope rolloff around 300-800Hz.

Treating the room is trickier. It's relatively easy to tame higher frequencies but hard to deal with lower ones. If you don't treat the room properly you can end up with results that aren't much better than what you started with. They do make small diffusers/absorbers that sort of wrap around the mic. That might be worth a try. Search "mic reflection absorber".

 

[ecc83]

"500 sq ft" is not much of a picture.
What are the actual floor dimensions? Hope they are not 22.36X 22.36! And how low is "low"?

Dave.

 

[miroslav]

I could potentially spend a few hundred dollars. Currently the basement is half-carpeted, has some weird angles and a low ceiling.

What are my options? Thanks for any help.--Jessica

1. Get out of the basement....at least while you record your vocals.
2. Take the few hundered and build some broadband traps, which you could do for a few hundered.

Some form of "vocal booth"....will only help make your vocals dead/dry, which may be OK...but you are still going to have to edit/mix all the music in that basement, which is going to still be a problem without any kind of treatment.
You need some trapping to tame the room sound.

 

[Hot_Mess]

Here are some photos of the basement. This is the biggest room of the house, although the ceilings in the family room are somewhat higher. I know I've got some severe limitations here, I just want to do the best I can. Also, I can spend a few hundred a couple times a year probably, without my husband going nuts.

 

[Hot_Mess]

Also, don't freak out but I'm mixing with headphones.

 

[miroslav]

Some "basement"....I'm thinking cement walls and ceiling with a furnace and washing machine in the corner.

Put your husband to work building your a bunch of traps...and that few hundered will go a long way, and you can even dress up the traps with some color coordinated fabric so that they'll fit in your "basement" really nice.
Also, since part of that is the family, and you probably have a nice TV/Stereo in there....the traps will imporve that sound too.

Then spend the next few hundred on some monitors and lose the headphones for mixing.

 

[Hot_Mess]

Thank you bouldersoundguy and miroslav for the suggestions. I will try singing close to the mic and see how that sounds. I will research the bass traps idea. I read that you should tape blankets to the walls. Is that a good idea?

I kind of like the idea of making it as dead as possible and adding reverb in Logic. I like it fake, fake, fake.

 

[fritsthegirl]

Thank you bouldersoundguy and miroslav for the suggestions. I will try singing close to the mic and see how that sounds. I will research the bass traps idea. I read that you should tape blankets to the walls. Is that a good idea?

I kind of like the idea of making it as dead as possible and adding reverb in Logic. I like it fake, fake, fake.

I don't know much about acoustics but I know blankets on the walls don't do much for the acoustics of the room.

As to you wanting your voice/recordings to sound fake, fake, fake. My question is, are you serious? And then, why?

I really like the natural sound of your voice, it's great. And I love all the sound effects and instruments you use. Kimya Dawson. Check her out, all your songs reminded me of her. I liked Theremin Dreams a lot, but all your tunes are cool. Real cool, and funny, and quirky.

Don't aim to fake yourself or voice too much please, your natural ability is more than enough. It's nice to hear a female artist not affecting her natural and real voice with a bunch of effects.

If you want to work on something, learn to bring that natural sound out better by honing your recording skills and getting the right mic. But you're doing well. Visit the MP3 mixing clinic sometime (if you haven't already) to get some feedback on how to improve the overall sound.

It's very cool to see and hear another chick on here. I like your style.

 

[Hot_Mess]

Thanks for the encouragement Frits! That Kimya Dawson song about Corey Haim et al. totally inspired my 80s song. You nailed it. I think I was kind of overcompensating with my "fake fake fake" comment, I'm defensive about doing everything with software instruments...Specifically what I meant is that I don't have any problem with recording my voice totally dry and then adding "fake" reverb from the Logic plug in. I think with my limited resources and technical skills that is often going to be my best bet. I like writing and arranging music, I see the technical side as a necessary evil. Although I am learning to love Logic Pro.

 

[ecc83]

Thanks for the encouragement Frits! That Kimya Dawson song about Corey Haim et al. totally inspired my 80s song. You nailed it. I think I was kind of overcompensating with my "fake fake fake" comment, I'm defensive about doing everything with software instruments...Specifically what I meant is that I don't have any problem with recording my voice totally dry and then adding "fake" reverb from the Logic plug in. I think with my limited resources and technical skills that is often going to be my best bet. I like writing and arranging music, I see the technical side as a necessary evil. Although I am learning to love Logic Pro.

Sorry but I find the phase "I see the technical side as a necessary evil" rather insulting. How would you like it if us guys "who keep the lights on" referred to "artists" as "beardy, floppy minded twits that can't even wire a 13amp plug"?

I was an electronics service tech' for 1/2 my working life (now 68) and The Management of most of the companies I worked for had much the same attitude. Sales and Marketing got all the smiles and junketing. "Maintenance" was just an N.E. A drain on resources that they would love to do without but knew they couldn't.

Surely now, in the 21st century we have learned that art and technology must go hand in hand? You cannot have the former without the latter. Even before man invented instruments he knew that voices sounded so much better in certain caves and then went on to build artificial ones. Fork! Even science and religion are becoming a bit more reconciled with one another!

You can of course make music without knowledge of Ohms Law or the ability to solder and be forever ignorant of the decibel but this limits you to what you can see and what you can buy (and things ALWAYS go wrong at 2am Saturday morning) and even if you are very rich there are gizzmos, special leads for instance that simply cannot be bought.

Twas not for nothing that chaps at Abbey Road were called Recording ENGINEERS!

Dave.

 

[grimtraveller]

I kind of like the idea of making it as dead as possible and adding reverb in Logic. I like it fake, fake, fake.

Other than maybe the first 20 or so years of recording, then virtually the entire history of recorded music has had, as a major part of the story, how engineers, artists, builders and developers of one shade or another pushed the boundaries of recorded sound and a large part of this was/has been what I call, 'the triumph of artifice'. Artifice is not a bad thing ~ it is normal in recording.

As to you wanting your voice/recordings to sound fake, fake, fake. My question is, are you serious? And then, why?

Pretty much everything connected with reproducing sound necessitates fakery to some extent. Artifice has become and now is as much a part of recording as music itself. It soon becomes apparent that it's simply a matter of where one chooses to draw their own particular line in the sand.
The only way you can have absolute purity is to go and hear someone sing their song and we've come a long way past that. Before sound reproduction came along, that's the only way anyone ever heard particular artists.
I'm an urbanite product of the technological age and I, for one, would not like a return to those times.......

I really like the natural sound of your voice, it's great.....your natural ability is more than enough. It's nice to hear a female artist not affecting her natural and real voice with a bunch of effects.

I remember, when I was 16, reading the Beatles authorized biography and a comment the author, Hunter Davies, made that, for some reason, really stood out to me. He was at the recording session for, I think, "Getting better" and Lennon, McCartney and Harrison were doing the vocals. He said that those 3 could hear the music in their headphones but no one else in the studio could and as they listened to them singing with just the Beatles' voices but no music they sounded flat and unnatural.
Of course, when you hear them with the music and the vocal processing, they don't sound flat or unnatural.
I think natural ability isn't always enough. For starters, one has to hone that natural ability and that takes work. Then there's the versatility of voice that different songs demand. Someone singing in a hall won't necessarilly translate to a recording and that's partly why all kinds of jiggery pokery gets applied and sometimes why singers don't come over live as well as they do on a record.

Don't aim to fake yourself or voice too much

Have you ever heard Barry Gibb of the BeeGees speak ? When I first heard him speak, I had to laugh. He's the high pitched falsetto voice that was the defining vocal sound in the band's disco hey day. But when he talks, he has this deep voice and Mancunian accent as he was from Manchester before him and his brothers went out to Oz. He certainly did not sound on those late 70s records like he talked.
In fact, it's quite an eye opener hearing British singers talk. Some sing like they speak, for example, George Harrison sounded like a scouser, on Black Sabbath's debut, Ozzy Osbourne sounded like a Brummie. But most do not. Artifice occurs long before the technical cats hit town.

I'm defensive about doing everything with software instruments...

Well, to be honest, that's not surprising unless you are among people whose chosen genres call specifically for software instruments. Rap, house, various electronica, drum & bass, jungle ~ these and others don't really need non sampled instruments.
Here at HR, there are still many regulars that play real instruments {and by that I mean not sampled} so there is still something of a slant towards them. I hope there always will be, not because I'm against VSTis {heck, I use them myself, I dig them}, but because I suspect that if there isn't, they'll one day disappear altogether.
It is an illogical bias, but one I hold.
That said, I think software instruments were a Godsend because they enable so many of us to put into concrete reality, the musical visions that we had but which necessitated knowing the players of various instruments. I don't know any uillean pipe or bansuri wood flute players, much less philharmonic orchestras {that can fit in the kids' bedroom}!
I use VSTis to supplent what already is happening with guitars, basses, drums, double basses, percussion, voices etc.

What I meant is that I don't have any problem with recording my voice totally dry and then adding "fake" reverb from the Logic plug in.

That's what seems to have been happening in studios since the early 60s . Some do, some don't. Both approaches are valid and I can rarely tell.

I think with my limited resources and technical skills that is often going to be my best bet. I like writing and arranging music, I see the technical side as a necessary evil. Although I am learning to love Logic Pro.

I think that's cool. Everyone needs to find their level and place in which they're most effective.
I wouldn't describe the technical side as a necessary evil though. It's the side without which, the artistic side remains but a dream or let's say, a song you can play but never listen to.

Even science and religion are becoming a bit more reconciled with one another !

I think the supposed clash between science and religion has been way oversimplified by both sides and blown out of proportion to produce differences that in reality were never there.

Recording ENGINEERS!

It's no oversimplification to say that without them, our lives would have been a whole lot less enriched.

Surely now, in the 21st century we have learned that art and technology must go hand in hand? You cannot have the former without the latter.

Well, they go hand in hand if you want an audience and if you want to go beyond the simplicity of say, drawing a picture or speaking a poem or strumming a guitar or plinking a piano.
I see the technological driving of the music biz as being inevitable because we're human.
As soon as it became possible to capture and reproduce sound, there was just no way that as humans, we would just sit back and be content with sticking a mic in a room and capturing everything that took place with no change or progression, in the same way, as soon as gunpowder and the gun came into being, a weapon that had the capability to destroy whole cities, then countries would soon follow.

 

[mixsit]

Back to acoustics and ..stuff,

Some "basement"....I'm thinking cement walls and ceiling with a furnace and washing machine in the corner. ..

My thoughts too.
Wow. I think you're going to be just fine.
With a room like that -Lets see, lots of variations going on on the walls and offsets and such, even long enough for some potentially interesting (read useful) room tone- A combo fairly bright varied structure and surfaces and (if I'm not mistaken .. hanging ceiling tiles.. possibly helping out in the low end some..

Get some slabs of 2-3" med density stuff , wrap in cloth. Hang a few over your mic area (first and closest thus strongest destructive reflection). Perhaps in an open inverted 'V. I hung mine in a way that lets me just lift and shift them to change the angles; 'Flat over head/max clearance, or make a little roof hut' effect that even gets an edge down some to catch from the upper sides..?
Then you do some to put up around your mic'd off area. Really, just giving that amount of control' option, plus applying some appropriate mic distances, may surprise you.
https://homerecording.com/bbs/attachment.php?attachmentid=83558&d=1385697861
https://homerecording.com/bbs/attachment.php?attachmentid=83559&d=1385697919

 

[mjbphotos]

Get closer to the mic, as already suggested, and move it to the far back of the room in the first picture, facing towards your keyboard, maybe 3-4 ft out from the wall, so that when you stand at the mic, your head is basically blocking the reflections from the wall behind you. Get a pop filter, as when you're closer to the mic, the pops and esses will be more noticable. It's also good for keeping your distance to the mic uniform.

 

[souliscrap]

Hello Jessica,

My suggestion is that you look into a vocal booth as your vocals are the only thing that you are recording in that room. The room specifications for listening and recording are quite different, it all depends if you want to utilise the reverb of the room for your recordings. If youre using sorftare instruments then you want the vocal recording quite dry (no reverb from the room) so that you can add whatever reverb you think that sounds best later when mixing, make sure you use only one type as adding different kinds of reverb to other instruments will make your track sound weird and not fit together

If you are mixing down on headphones then you dont need to treat the room at all, but it would be best to invest in some monitor speakers with a nice flat frequency response. When acoustically treating a room you want to minimalise early reflections from flat surfaces and from the walls. This can cause discrepancy in the in the frequency band attenuating certain frequencies, which later could show in the mix because you might counteract by unnecessary EQing. To do this you need to adsorb and diffuse the sound. All the clutter in the room helps to diffuse, i would push it all to the back of the room. That couch acts as a decent absorber too. Like others suggested look into bass traps try placing them behind your monitors.
When recording the vocals it wont matter where your head is because lower frequencies will bend round and you will still get reflections from the front...

Hope this helps

Sam

 

[gcolbert]

I think that getting close to your SM58 will get you a lot better sound than you are expecting. As to room treatments ... Try recording your vocals in a couple of the other rooms in your place. It might just be that the front room or bedroom has a response that you like. I like your tunes by the way.

Glen

 

[Hot_Mess]

Thanks for all the feedback. I did just get some Yamaha HS50M monitors from craigslist and just set them up and tried them today.

I guess it does make sense that having different tracks with different types of reverb will sound funky. Going to have to think about that, and about a vocal booth.

Sorry I offended you ecc83! I guess that's what I get for saying the "technical side is a necessary evil" on a forum for home recording. Doh!

I'll post a link to my mix after recording with the SM58 and mixing with my monitors for the first time. But it's taking forever.

I'm also reading some books on home recording and acoustics. Home Studio Setup by Ben Harris, which is a quick read and seems to provide a good general overview but not enough specifics to really act on, and Sound and Recording by Francis Rumsey and Tim McCormick. I choose these because they were in the library and therefore free. I'd appreciate any suggestions about reading material too.

This is some learning curve!

 

[Nathan1984]

Gobo in front of you, treated. Pop filter is a must. A good mic and a good preamp go along way too.

 

[ecc83]

Thanks for all the feedback. I did just get some Yamaha HS50M monitors from craigslist and just set them up and tried them today.

I guess it does make sense that having different tracks with different types of reverb will sound funky. Going to have to think about that, and about a vocal booth.

Sorry I offended you ecc83! I guess that's what I get for saying the "technical side is a necessary evil" on a forum for home recording. Doh!

I'll post a link to my mix after recording with the SM58 and mixing with my monitors for the first time. But it's taking forever.

I'm also reading some books on home recording and acoustics. Home Studio Setup by Ben Harris, which is a quick read and seems to provide a good general overview but not enough specifics to really act on, and Sound and Recording by Francis Rumsey and Tim McCormick. I choose these because they were in the library and therefore free. I'd appreciate any suggestions about reading material too.

This is some learning curve!

All is forgiven H.M! And felicitations of the season!

Further reading? Go to Sound On Sound | Recording Techniques | Audio Technology | Music Production | Computer Music | Video Media and get stuck in. There you will find vast amounts of information and articles about recording just about anything under the sun. The Aug 07 issue for instance gives what is possibly the best treatise on recording electric guitar ever done. (there is also a very good one on acoustic gits) But not just words! There is a wealth of recording clips and examples to download.

But I am STILL going to say "get some electronics education!"

Dave.