what's wrong with these lead vox?

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dalley

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I'm trying to get an Eagles vibe out of this tune I am recording with my friend but something about the lead vox does not seem right to me. They sound a little "pitchy" but what i am concerned with is a "harshness".

Interesting because I've used the same mic on other tunes and they sound great. It might be the register he is singing in that introduces a harshness. EQ maybe? I dont know ...please listen if you want to help a brother out. Thanks in advance

any other suggestions are greatly appreciated

 
They're not pitchy, and they don't seem harsh to me. I think the recording's really good! How'd ya do it?
 
dalley said:
It might be the register he is singing in that introduces a harshness.
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That was my thought. I think of this sound as "shouty". It's a person on the edge of their range and forcing out either parts of or sometimes the whole vocal line, because they can't hit the notes easily. I'm not sure what the solution is, I don't know enough about singing to know if a person can extend their range with practice. Maybe a little compression would help.

The challenge with eqing a thing like this is that it's only troublesome on the shouty parts, and you have to be careful your eq adjustment doesn't affect the parts where he is more in control. Or you can be real fast on the eq knobs!!

I guess the last and suckiest solution would be to retrack the song more in his range, or get another singer.
 
He seems comfortable enough...It's just his voice; he has a powerful, overly resonant, cutting voice and not many mics are good for that. I have a suggestion, if you can re-track.

Put the mic BELOW his mouth. You'll pick up more chest resonance this way. You're getting too much nasal resonance in some passages. It sounds fine to me, but I can definitely tell the guy is probably a trained singer accustomed to singing loudly.
 
Oh, and otherwise, identify the higher notes he's hitting and just notch them out a bit. That will help, I guarantee it.
 
mrhotapples said:
He seems comfortable enough...It's just his voice; he has a powerful, overly resonant, cutting voice and not many mics are good for that. I have a suggestion, if you can re-track.

Put the mic BELOW his mouth. You'll pick up more chest resonance this way. You're getting too much nasal resonance in some passages. It sounds fine to me, but I can definitely tell the guy is probably a trained singer accustomed to singing loudly.
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If he's trained he wasn't trained in darkening his vowels which is the only place I can hear the grating tone on occasion. He seems to be pretty much right on with his pitch. Does sort of give you the same feeling though when you hear it.

I agree with ducking thos parts a bit, but I would try messing around in the 1k to 2k area and pulling a bit to see if that helps.

F.S.
 
Training to me would be having solid technique that supports itself. He doesn't seem to struggle at all, so the quality of his voice is either a stylistic choice or he's a natural and he never learned to change the tone of his voice because noone ever pointed out the buzzy resonance.

But my point was that, well, the recording has been made, and the guy's voice likely won't change, so the person mixing needs to support this guy's voice by EQing or using alternative mic techniques to make it work.

Voice is much different than a crappy sounding guitar amp due to too much distortion or poor EQ; it's personal down to a neurological level, and there are so many styles, we must learn to record all of them well!
 
mrhotapples said:
Training to me would be having solid technique that supports itself. He doesn't seem to struggle at all, so the quality of his voice is either a stylistic choice or he's a natural and he never learned to change the tone of his voice because noone ever pointed out the buzzy resonance.

But my point was that, well, the recording has been made, and the guy's voice likely won't change, so the person mixing needs to support this guy's voice by EQing or using alternative mic techniques to make it work.

Voice is much different than a crappy sounding guitar amp due to too much distortion or poor EQ; it's personal down to a neurological level, and there are so many styles, we must learn to record all of them well!
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Thanks for all of your help first of all guys.

Interestingly enough, this song was originally done @ 440 tuning, but we moved the entire CD a half step down. He had no problems hitting notes @ 440 but we were just going for a "darker" sound overall. BTW, I've known him awhile and he's been singing for many years.

I'm using a GT66 mic and I've been happy with the results with the vox for the most part ... until he goes into the upper registers. A few songs we did are a bit lower on the scale and they sounded great.

I guess what I am trying to say is that this guy has a "sweet spot" vocally and it can be challenging for an engineer ... I've been spoiled up until now with vocalists that pretty much stay in the same range.

Ideally, I would like to get him to retrack the lead with perhaps the suggestion of aiming the capsule slightly downward. If not I will try to EQ out some upper mids during the high parts.

Actually, I was happy to hear that all of you did not think it was out of tune because that was one of my concerns as well.
 
Nope, it's fine. Good pitch, just, and you pretty much pointed it out, he has a sweet spot and his upper register just isn't as smooth.

Make sure you try pointing the capsule slightly down AND having the mic slightly lower. In any event, however, most people try and get the mic at mouth level and sometimes, a singer with cutting head resonance just sounds grating.

Alternatively, if you ever run into someone with a really dull or quiet voice, having the mic pointed at their nose will brighten them up. Follow according to range...Bass notes resonate in the body, higher notes tend to resonate in the skull, thus low notes can be made more present with a mic set up towards the nose and high notes mellowed out by going lower with the mic.

As for EQ, really, try finding the note he's singing that gets you the most, and drop it rather than affecting harmonic content in the 3-4khz range. This is the best way to get certain tones to mellow out without affecting the overall voice.

Good luck!

BTW, I apologize for so much input on the subject, but I've been struggling recently with the same phenomenon with all sorts of mics, dynamic and condenser, cheapies to standards, and these suggestions have alleviated it.
 
Well, I may be completely stupid here. But I think the arrangement could be the problem. He sings a line, then the very precise and harmonious backups repeat it (almost 'correcting' the lead), and they seem to overshadow his lead.

If it were my tune, I'd have the lead by itself the first few bars with no repeating backups. Just let it stand out there alone and rough, with a guitar, and then have the other parts come in later to support it rather than "correcting" each phrase.

I'd try re-tracking the lead also. Have him drink lots of water, and make another attempt with less force.

But it isn't bad at all as it is.
 
mrhotapples said:
Training to me would be having solid technique that supports itself. He doesn't seem to struggle at all, so the quality of his voice is either a stylistic choice or he's a natural and he never learned to change the tone of his voice because noone ever pointed out the buzzy resonance.
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I was not trying to offend. Only pointing it out. I'm sure there are types of vocal training that don't touch on darkening the vowels.

I think you hit it when saying he's a natural and a very good one;)

A little level correcting in the problem areas and some eq should do it.

Compression could be making it more up front to. Maybe backing it down some and automating more could help..?

F.S.
 
I just posted a new version where I notched out ~2db of 2-3k which seemed to help and fixed a couple of other things. If you are interested:



Thanks again for the feedback
 
Sounds the same to me. :confused:

I don't know shit about singing so I can't help. But it does sound "nasal". Maybe thats what it is. I think the idea of moving the mic down and re-tracking is a good one. The backups sound awesome though.
 
http://www.sonicaudio.com/eqs.jpg

Greg_L said:
Sounds the same to me. :confused:

I don't know shit about singing so I can't help. But it does sound "nasal". Maybe thats what it is. I think the idea of moving the mic down and re-tracking is a good one. The backups sound awesome though.
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aw crap! :D

maybe it's the placebo effect but heres what I did: I looped a section with the upper register vox and swept through the EQ and found about 2.5k that was giving me a headache. Notched it down a few db and it seemed to smooth it out. I'd rather be more conservative with the EQ right now at least, unless attenuating it a bit more would help. See below:

http://www.sonicaudio.com/eqs.jpg

You could be right I think I need to give the ears a rest for a few days, I should know by Sunday if we can re-track it. Thanks for the compliment on the B/U vox
 
I think I can see a little difference. I don't know that we are looking at the same charicteristic. Really it's the E's that are getting me. Sometimes an "a" or "I". If he is at the upper end of his register he is likely tightening his throat which makes it worse.
The rest of it's not that bad. With his voice you may want to dial in a little 100hz ..... 120hz. I still think the E's are going to get you though. You could eq the E's to be better but it might muddy up the rest of the vox too much.

I'd be happy to dink with it if you want to email me the vocal track. Just an offer

I wouldn't be to worried about putting some major eq adjustments on it. You got to do what you got to do.

There is a method of darkening your vowels to make them sound more like your consonants, but it's generally used with several other techniques that take longer to develope. I am not sure how well it would work on it's own, but if you think the singer would be interested let me know.

F.S.
 
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It just sounds like it could use a boost around 100hz, and a thicker, lusher reverb. But then again, what do I know?!?!?!?!

Edit - oops, it looks like FS beat me to it! Oh well, that's to votes for a low end boost. :D
 
NL5 said:
It just sounds like it could use a boost around 100hz, and a thicker, lusher reverb. But then again, what do I know?!?!?!?!

Edit - oops, it looks like FS beat me to it! Oh well, that's to votes for a low end boost. :D
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Great minds....... aaaaaa hows that go?

F.S.
 
Double track him with some chorus &&&&&&& use the motown exciter/compression method on a clone of the original to give it some presence (but add in some mids not just the highs as recommendsed in that process).
 
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