El Borrachito
Premier Staff
It’s all about the vocal! All other elements of a song put together do not add up to the importance of the vocal. The vocal IS the song as far as the casual listener is concerned. Any other element can make a song better or worse, but the vocal sound, mix treatment, and especially the performance, are what make or break a song.
Is there one ideal magic signal chain for vocals? Hell no! The only way to find the right mic for a particular singer is to put up a bunch and listen. U-47? Sounds great sometimes. ELAM-251? Great if you can find one. C-12VR? Worked for Mick Jagger. SM-7? Good for screamers. Brauner VM-1? That’s Wein’s favorite. If I have options I will always explore them. The standard procedure on many records I worked on was to set up every nice tube mic in the studio –even ones of the same type –and try them all. If I had to get by on just one mic for vocals it would be a M-149. It’s my favorite contemporary tube microphone. Nine times out of ten, it will be good if not great on a vocal. And, since they are relatively new, they all sound the same. Try finding two U-47s that sound the same these days. For screamer rock/metal guys the SM-7 is a great solution. (And only $350!) The other trick I have seen for guys who are loud enough to kill a tube mic is a U-87 with a big foam pop filter on it. (That is about the only time I would get out a U-87.) My favorite under-$600 vocal mic is the Audio Technica 4047.
All too often, placement of the mic and position in the room get overlooked. Distance from the mic is usually a style choice. I keep the singer between six inches and a foot away unless I want a very “in your face” thing where they get right up on it. Try to keep the pop filter –you always use a pop filter right? –about half way between singer and mic. If a singer gets right up on the mic, proximity effect starts to take effect. You may need to start rolling off low end. Once the positioning is set, I put a piece of tape on the floor as a reminder for the singer. More than once I’ve gotten everything set and sounding great only to then watch a chick singer kick off her four-inch heels right before the first take. Now I always ask to settle on a footware situation before we start. Ideally the room should be set up to contain the ambience as much as possible. In a medium to large room, the usual approach is to build a little three-sided cubicle out of gobos. Some sort of rug on the floor is also very helpful. In a small room, back the singer into a corner. If there are curtains or soft walls, great, otherwise grab a couple packing blankets and throw them up. Also, keep music stands as far from the mic as you can, and throw a towel or felt square over it to deaden any reflections. Keep in mind that any ambience or headphone bleed that gets into the mic now will be exaggerated by all of the subsequent compression. This is especially dangerous if there will be multiple tracks of vocals. I was once set a track to mix that had twelve tracks of vocals on the chorus. The headphone bleed on any ONE track was barely acceptable. Times twelve, it was a disaster. I sent it back and told him to redo it with some closed-back headphones!
The rest of the chain can be a little bit more standard. The big question is, are you going for something hi-fi or do you want color? My favorite hi-fi mic preamp is an Avalon M5. The Millennias and John Hardys are also very good. For something a little more rock and roll, bust out the Neves or APIs. A $200 dollar plastic box with a cheap 12AX7 soldered to a PC board is not a good way to make a mic preamp. Neither are the mic preamps built into audio interfaces. Anyone who wonders whether the preamps on his Fireface or MOTU box sound better or worse than an 003 should keep in mind that it’s different flavors of the same cheap parts and minimal circuitry (in this case a bad thing.) The best investment for any project studio is a few good microphones and a couple channels of high-quality signal chain. Good mics, preamps, eqs, and compressors never become obsolete. Computers, interfaces, and pretty much anything digital get old fast, but good sounding analog input gear will last forever.
The amount of compression I use on vocal has increased since the days of tape. Ahh GP9 on a Studer. That smooth high end, fat punchy drums, watching those meters, razor blades -I miss tape… I digress. To make up for not having the tape compression, I will tend to compress things a bit more on the input. None of those faux-tape compression plug-ins do much for me. They do something, but it’s not tape. Probably the quintessential vocal comp is the LA2A. They are magic on vocals. They currently make a reissue that’s not too bad. If the singer is extra dynamic, it might help to put a second fast compressor in front to knock down the peaks. The 1176 is the ideal down and dirty option. If I am doing some sort of lo-fi thing, often I will stick a plug-in compressor on the channel as well to approximate the amount I will squash the vocal in the mix. This can be handy to ensure I don’t overdo it and end up with an overcompressed, unpleasantly distorted, pumpy mess.
Unless I am compensating for a less-than-ideal mic, the only eq I may add is perhaps a little 10K boost. This is especially nice with a Pultec or one of the many tube eq clones. Even so, a little goes a long way! If the vocal sound is too sibilant, move the mic, swap the mic, whatever. Just fix it now! I don’t think I have ever recorded a vocal with a de-esser.
Is there one ideal magic signal chain for vocals? Hell no! The only way to find the right mic for a particular singer is to put up a bunch and listen. U-47? Sounds great sometimes. ELAM-251? Great if you can find one. C-12VR? Worked for Mick Jagger. SM-7? Good for screamers. Brauner VM-1? That’s Wein’s favorite. If I have options I will always explore them. The standard procedure on many records I worked on was to set up every nice tube mic in the studio –even ones of the same type –and try them all. If I had to get by on just one mic for vocals it would be a M-149. It’s my favorite contemporary tube microphone. Nine times out of ten, it will be good if not great on a vocal. And, since they are relatively new, they all sound the same. Try finding two U-47s that sound the same these days. For screamer rock/metal guys the SM-7 is a great solution. (And only $350!) The other trick I have seen for guys who are loud enough to kill a tube mic is a U-87 with a big foam pop filter on it. (That is about the only time I would get out a U-87.) My favorite under-$600 vocal mic is the Audio Technica 4047.
All too often, placement of the mic and position in the room get overlooked. Distance from the mic is usually a style choice. I keep the singer between six inches and a foot away unless I want a very “in your face” thing where they get right up on it. Try to keep the pop filter –you always use a pop filter right? –about half way between singer and mic. If a singer gets right up on the mic, proximity effect starts to take effect. You may need to start rolling off low end. Once the positioning is set, I put a piece of tape on the floor as a reminder for the singer. More than once I’ve gotten everything set and sounding great only to then watch a chick singer kick off her four-inch heels right before the first take. Now I always ask to settle on a footware situation before we start. Ideally the room should be set up to contain the ambience as much as possible. In a medium to large room, the usual approach is to build a little three-sided cubicle out of gobos. Some sort of rug on the floor is also very helpful. In a small room, back the singer into a corner. If there are curtains or soft walls, great, otherwise grab a couple packing blankets and throw them up. Also, keep music stands as far from the mic as you can, and throw a towel or felt square over it to deaden any reflections. Keep in mind that any ambience or headphone bleed that gets into the mic now will be exaggerated by all of the subsequent compression. This is especially dangerous if there will be multiple tracks of vocals. I was once set a track to mix that had twelve tracks of vocals on the chorus. The headphone bleed on any ONE track was barely acceptable. Times twelve, it was a disaster. I sent it back and told him to redo it with some closed-back headphones!
The rest of the chain can be a little bit more standard. The big question is, are you going for something hi-fi or do you want color? My favorite hi-fi mic preamp is an Avalon M5. The Millennias and John Hardys are also very good. For something a little more rock and roll, bust out the Neves or APIs. A $200 dollar plastic box with a cheap 12AX7 soldered to a PC board is not a good way to make a mic preamp. Neither are the mic preamps built into audio interfaces. Anyone who wonders whether the preamps on his Fireface or MOTU box sound better or worse than an 003 should keep in mind that it’s different flavors of the same cheap parts and minimal circuitry (in this case a bad thing.) The best investment for any project studio is a few good microphones and a couple channels of high-quality signal chain. Good mics, preamps, eqs, and compressors never become obsolete. Computers, interfaces, and pretty much anything digital get old fast, but good sounding analog input gear will last forever.
The amount of compression I use on vocal has increased since the days of tape. Ahh GP9 on a Studer. That smooth high end, fat punchy drums, watching those meters, razor blades -I miss tape… I digress. To make up for not having the tape compression, I will tend to compress things a bit more on the input. None of those faux-tape compression plug-ins do much for me. They do something, but it’s not tape. Probably the quintessential vocal comp is the LA2A. They are magic on vocals. They currently make a reissue that’s not too bad. If the singer is extra dynamic, it might help to put a second fast compressor in front to knock down the peaks. The 1176 is the ideal down and dirty option. If I am doing some sort of lo-fi thing, often I will stick a plug-in compressor on the channel as well to approximate the amount I will squash the vocal in the mix. This can be handy to ensure I don’t overdo it and end up with an overcompressed, unpleasantly distorted, pumpy mess.
Unless I am compensating for a less-than-ideal mic, the only eq I may add is perhaps a little 10K boost. This is especially nice with a Pultec or one of the many tube eq clones. Even so, a little goes a long way! If the vocal sound is too sibilant, move the mic, swap the mic, whatever. Just fix it now! I don’t think I have ever recorded a vocal with a de-esser.