EQ Magazine - June 2008 - (Page 36)

VOCAL CORDS COMPING ON THE FLY by Paul Grundman If you are someone who tracks vocals using the “Record 30 vocal tracks/comp for three days straight” method, I urge you to stop being owned by your DAW. The first step is admitting you have a problem. It’s easy to get addicted. When I first got a DAW, I over-tracked so much I couldn’t remember the songs I was trying to produce. But, consider this: Back in the olden days, we had few tracks to work with. We came to a project with the knowledge that maybe we could have three tracks (or less) to capture “the” vocal performance. This kept everyone poised for action, and, in many cases, the singer rose to the occasion and nailed the track in one or two takes. Magic happened. We didn’t have the options of tuning software or unlimited tracks from which to comp a brilliant performance. So what’s the old-school lesson for the DAW age? To try something new that takes less time, and usually gets better results. THE CHALLENGE When you record a vocal performance 20 times in a row, you end up with takes where one line sounds soft, one sounds clearer, one is tired, one is more intense, and so on. Furthermore, you can only give so much direction before the artist is so exhausted, self-conscious, or so preoccupied by the repetition that singing becomes a cerebral performance. More times than not, a less-than-emotive performance will ultimately bring on the dreaded, “Um, I think maybe we should re-track the vocals” statement. And that statement often triggers something like, “Thank you, producer X—you’re fired!” THE “COMP ON THE FLY” SOLUTION Tell the vocalist that you’re going to record three tracks—a rehearsal, a serious take, and a “fun” track. Consider the routing in Figure 1, so you can quickly punch and comp all in the same window. Yes, you are committing yourself to recording a useable vocal in just three takes. So do not spend too much time getting sounds and not recording. Be quick, and get the sound as the vocalist is warming up. As soon as you have the three takes down, assemble them into one basic comp track (Figure 2). Leave the unused vocal parts alone—you may need to audition them later, or steal a snippet or two from them. Now, audition the single comp track for trouble spots, and punch in to correct anything you don’t like. I sometimes like to punch in an entire line to get the singer in the mood of the song, but if you’ve got a brilliant vocal with just one glitch, then just punch the offending word or phrase. You have just done what I call “comping on the fly.” It’s all about making the final vocal comp at the vocal session. You’re not faced legions of tracks to sort through and keep you up Fig. 1. How cool is it that all my vocal tracks are arranged in the same window? Fig. 2. The master comp track in all its glory. at night, the energy of the performer is not beaten down by numerous takes, and singers feel like they’ve delivered a more or less “real” performance. A WORD ABOUT CROSSFADES Well, there’s a little more effort involved in this process, as you want any punches and edits to sound natural. Just “butting up” two edit sections together isn’t always a good 36 EQ JUNE 2008 www.eqmag.com http://www.eqmag.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of EQ Magazine - June 2008

EQ Magazine - June 2008 Contents Talk Box Sounding Board 3 Doors Down, Hard-Fi, Paul Manousos Tool Box Panic at the Disco Guitar Trax Bass Management Key Issues Drum Heads Vocal Cords Mix Bus Cheat Sheet Cakewalk Projects Apple Loops Utility SSL Duende Mini JBL LSR4326/PAK & LSR4312SP Holophone H3-D Creation Audio Labs MW1 Studio Tool Amp Modeler Roundup Eventide Timefactor, Electro-Harmonix Stereo Pedals, Korg Pandora PX5D Room with a Vu: Blues Tunes Studios, Silverlake, CA

EQ Magazine - June 2008

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