Thread: Johns Track, I'll Be There - ITB vs OTB mix fest

Others are welcome to chime in. I wish they would.

This is a good and bad thing. When you get that close on a mic, it tends to get really wooly and bass heavy. I have done this too, because it feels right while we're singing. We can hear the lows inside our head better and its seems easier to hit pitch while overdubbing , yes? But the result is a muddy vocal sound. Its working though

I've always had a thin, nasally, squeaky voice. Years of training have offset that a lot. In my case I think the close micing is working because I start with a deficit in the bass and the prox effect brings it up to "normal".

Thing is, I'm playing in a band now, and I can never hear myself in the monitors. My mic can be cranked to feedback and I still cant hear. Everybody else can. Not just this band, but any live stuff I've done has been that way. Other singers just have so much more power and frequency range.

More about my process - when I overdub the vocals, I never playback the previous takes. I set Cubase to loop it and record multiple takes on one track, then duplicate that track, taking out the top layer on the second track so that two distinct voices can be hear. That's for double tracking BGVs. For leads I always end up comping them. You may hear some edit splices in the lead vox track.

So for double tracking, I only hear my live take in the cans. I learn the parts to a "T" so I can do that. Otherwise, I psych myself out listening to the previous take, and always coming in late on the new take.

How did you know about the standing wave at 256hz? Can you hear that or is there a tool that shows it to you? I had no idea it was there.

All your tracks that involved a mic have a certain sound in them that is around that freq / Comb Filtering. its in all the vocals. There are a few hot spots in your room. I can hear your walls.

Here is an example of whats going on in your harmonies:
Hearing Comb Filtering - YouTube

You are not alone, Its why we treat our studios.

When you are doing this many vocals, its extremely hard to keep them tight. If you fixed this, your vocal sound would improve massively!

Also, it makes for a nightmare mixing in this environment. You are not only recording in it, but mixing in it as well. So you are hearing the room noise twice in everything you do. Make sense?

To deal with it, I use an eq, boost a notch filter and sweep across the track finding the hot spots. The ones that sound terrible pop out more than the others. Those are the ones you pull out to try and fix the track.

When you are singing, your room is producing those standing Waves, thus, being added into the vocal track on top of your voice.
Then to add on top of this already, the reflections are causing a comb filtering effect. Like a 250 hz, to 800 hz slapback compunding it even more. make sense?

those area's are what gives a song body and we shouldn't have to cut them so much. It kills the punch when you start pulling them out. Eqing this much also starts effecting the highs because you are thinning the track to try and clean up the combfiltering and standing waves. It becomes a domino effect.

Resolution! BassTraps, absorption, ceiling and wall treatment.

To Add,

Singing really close into a dynamic mic will help. The last thing you want in a poor room is a LCD because it will pick up the room a lot more. Making more sense?

Cool!

(in response to the youtube video)

I liked both of your mixes....
John's online version has a lot of processing on those BGV...in some places it blended really well and did create that "etheral" feel that John mentioned, which I liked.
IMHO it might have had a tad too much in places but in certain parts it gave the sound an interesting modern tone.
The chorus harmonies really gel together in places, but in others they individually stick out, which I think should be avoided.
I think Johns voice should have a different verb on it because the quiet spots where he stops would add a vocal tail that will blend nicely into the following parts coming in....it would add to that etheral feel that I think John is wanting to hear. I think that sort of sucks you into the tune!
It's a nice song and Bigtree's summing is really bringing it out. There's a lot of good material there and many things that could be done.
The hard part IMO is the long distance explanations and trying to convey the exact sound you want back and forth. Dropbox is pretty cool for that and it's really sounding pro.