What is your default vocal effect chain? EQ/Compressor/Reverb.. ?

arcadeko

arcadeko

Illuminatius Overlordious
I freaking hate my vocals and hate them even more after I listen to them played back.

But alas this is the only one I have so im stuck with it, I am not trying to sing like american idol just make something that doesn't cause visible lacerations to the ear drums.

So - if you have a standard processing method for vocals (not the exact settings as I know those have to be tweaked in relation to the specific voice) can you please share it?

Like is there something that you always, definitely start with for a vocal track?

I use a compressor/eq/reverb or stereo splitter whatever but I just have such a damn thin, nasally, off-key, shitastic voice that I must find a magic bullet of processing effects to make it sound better.
 
I have tried double tracking with some success. Should I stick with full pan L/R for each track? That seems to sound the best.
 
Have you actually tried training your voice in any way? Yeah to a certain extent it's what your born with, but improving your tone would be a better solution than trying to cover it up with effects, if its nasaly and thin maybe your placing it too high and forward and need to mix in some chest voice?
 
Good suggestions above. I also do not care for my voice and have tracked it as many as 4 times to get a sound I could stand. I usually pan the extra tracks L,R,and C at a lower volume level.
 
Regarding 'printing' effects while tracking: I think that is usually dictated by the style of music and the wishes of the artist. For most vocal tracks I just insert a little medium- to hard- knee compression, 1.3:1 ratio, setting the threshold to achieve -1 to -2 db of gain reduction. I usually don't add anything else until mixing.
 
benage said:
Have you actually tried training your voice in any way? Yeah to a certain extent it's what your born with, but improving your tone would be a better solution than trying to cover it up with effects, if its nasaly and thin maybe your placing it too high and forward and need to mix in some chest voice?
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Yeah I have been doing vocal exercises and practicing more and more -I think a lot of it is finding a comfortable range for myself
- I posted a few tracks in the clinic if you care to take a listen.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone
 
Just had a listen to some of your tracks, your voice sounds fine to me, it didn't seem nasaly or thin, but as you said you've done alot to disguise it, there does seem to be double/triple tracking and spreading going on and it's quite knocked back with plenty of ambient effects, which does leave it a bit indistinct and unfocused (I guess that was the point!) and hard to know if you really need to do all that.
 
benage said:
Just had a listen to some of your tracks, your voice sounds fine to me, it didn't seem nasaly or thin, but as you said you've done alot to disguise it, there does seem to be double/triple tracking and spreading going on and it's quite knocked back with plenty of ambient effects, which does leave it a bit indistinct and unfocused (I guess that was the point!) and hard to know if you really need to do all that.
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I have some trouble getting the double tracking right LOL - I will probably ease off on the effects more as I get a little more vocally confident - or drunker :drunk::laughings:
 
You cant really record something and make it sound "better than real life". If you have a terrible voice, eq and compression aren't going to help.

My default is EQ > Compression > something time based like verb or delay, or both. The settings of each plug-in are adjusted to help the vocal sit in the mix. If what you've recorded doesn't sound good without processing, re record untill it does. Even if it involves practise first.
 
chamelious said:
You cant really record something and make it sound "better than real life". If you have a terrible voice, eq and compression aren't going to help. If what you've recorded doesn't sound good without processing, re record untill it does. Even if it involves practise first.
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Yeah I totally agree - I seem to at least be developing a better ear for vocal pitch as I can tell how off the vocal tracks are now more than I could before. I don't know why I have such a difficult time I can tell if a guitar or keyboard note is off instantly but for some reason I have some kind of audio blind spot when it comes to my vocals.
 
I don't think anybody likes to hear their own voice at first. It takes some getting used to to hear yourself sing. It's also difficult to separate yourself from your own vocal takes. I can listen to an old song of mine and still feel my throat trying to hit the right notes. :(
 
I always track dry - a Neumann U-89 into either my API-clone (sparkly) or Neve-clone (dark body) Seventh Circle Preamp in the middle of my acoustically treated tracking room, which has high ceilings. Never a need to compress on input when recording at 24 bit, IMO.

From there, I'll add EQ to kill the low end, sometimes add a little convolution plate reverb. I usually only compress at the vocal buss. And for big hook choruses, I'll double-, triple, or giguple- track many passes. When I giguple-track vocals, I suppress the sibbilant consonants on all but the primary track.

But normally I keep it all pretty clean. I hate the idea of adding processing just because the vocals don't sound right. They should be performed and tracked to sound really good, then minimally processed to sound even better.
 
I use a Neuman U87 to an Avalon M5 pre straight to the IZ RADAR with a Symetrix noise gate and some compression depending on if I actually know how I am going to mix it. If not, no compression. This works great for my vocals. For others I have many mics to try.
 
My wife can't stand to hear herself sing either, so I kinda know what you're getting at. She thinks it sounds terrible, and everyone else thinks she's either humble or crazy... it's a mental thing, we all have one about something.

As far as tricks I use for vocals, one of the things I normally do if it sounds "thin" is to throw the lead vocal to two new tracks, so there are three. Pitch shift one up 4-7 cents, and one down 4-7 cents. Pan hard left and right, add some reverb, and bring it way down in the mix. If you lay it low enough, it seems to help make the vocal a little "fuller" without being noticeable. Make sure you compress it, though. If it's a dynamic track, the high parts will pop out and sound funny if the lead vocal track is compressed.

Normally for the lead, I just do a HPF>De ess>Compress>EQ>Reberb, and that's about it. Any other effects that may or may not pop up at certain points of the song (like delay) I bus to an FX track and automate the level of the effect there, so it's only where needed.

I really dig natural sounding vocals though, so I try to keep my use of FX to a minimum, other than what is needed to make it sound clear.
 
arcadeko said:
I freaking hate my vocals and hate them even more after I listen to them played back.

But alas this is the only one I have so im stuck with it, I am not trying to sing like american idol just make something that doesn't cause visible lacerations to the ear drums.

So - if you have a standard processing method for vocals (not the exact settings as I know those have to be tweaked in relation to the specific voice) can you please share it?

Like is there something that you always, definitely start with for a vocal track?

I use a compressor/eq/reverb or stereo splitter whatever but I just have such a damn thin, nasally, off-key, shitastic voice that I must find a magic bullet of processing effects to make it sound better.
Click to expand...

The vocal chain I like especially on days when I seem to be off pitch. Goes something like pitch corrector like melodyne etc, then volume leveling. then some eq-ing to take out overly dominant or harsh harmonic ranges that maybe whine or ring too much. Then maybe a little compression and your favorite delays and reverbs. Alot of todays music other than pop or rap seems to be light on the obviousness of your effects the idea is not so much to change your voice but to enhance it. Be careful with the pitch correction or you can get an overly robotic sound. After that it's lots of tweaking in tiny discreet increments till you have the sound you want. make sure to watch for clipping and lower the right outpputs in the previous effects t make sure the clipping is fixed. Cheers.
 
Personally it all depends on what sort of track I'm recording, but in the recent mixes I've done for clients they've wanted the upfront "pop" sound, but not so clean.

The vocal I did this weekend was recorded through a Rode K2 into my Mackie 800R - very clean sound, and used a double pop shield. Processing was EQ with a high pass filter, H-Comp to compress the vocal a little, Soundtoys Decapitator to give it a little overdrive, API 2500 compressor to tighten it up again and then I used some very tight delay to add some size overall.
 
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