MT 10 Tips Recording better vocals

10 Tips for recording

better vocals
Vocalists can have fragile egos and might only do their best work over
shorter sessions. Its important, then, to get everything right before
a session and have everything running as smoothly as possible
during it. Here are our top tips for the perfect vocal recording

RELAX
01 Create a relaxed atmosphere in your studio before
any vocal recording. Remember that the vocalist is
hopefully pouring their heart and soul into your recording,
so needs to feel as comfortable as possible. A nice glass
of water? Relaxing music? A comfy sofa? All of the above,
please. No loud noises, no fumbling with gear. Have
everything set up before they arrive, so theyre not
hanging around while you mess around with your wires.

THAT WAS GOOD NO, REALLY, IT WAS

02 During the recording process, gently encourage the
singer. Be constructive with your feedback, make the odd
suggestion so they know youre paying attention, or if you
have nothing positive to say, then just keep quiet. Theres
03 nothing worse than a producer or engineer sticking their
oar in with too many opinions during what can be such a
personal process.

Sometimes a singer is best 03

LEVEL UP AND DOWN

during practice, so record Get your levels right at the start of the recording
and you wont have to worry (too much) about constant

05 everything monitoring later during the recording. Always get your

vocalist to practise a loud segment at the start of a
recording, so you can see just how hot the signal will get
and adjust accordingly. Keep it on the low side as you can
boost a low signal, but you cant reduce a clipped one.

AND TALKING OR PRACTICE? RECORD THAT, TOO

04 Record everything. Sometimes, a vocalist will
sing their best effort when theyre just warming up or
practising, as when they know theyre being recorded,
it may put added pressure on them. If they dont know
youre recording them, that pressure is lessened and they
do their best work. Yes, it sounds a bit creepy recording
them when they dont know it but it works, okay?

RECORD IT DRY
05 Like any good recording, dont swamp it with effects
at source. Keep it dry and you can add effects later. Record
Tip 3: Here, were naughtily in the with effects and you cant get rid of them later [unless
red with our vocal recording. youre using one of those fancy reversing effects from the
Always go low, as you can boost
the recording later
likes of Zynaptic, that is, but you know what we mean
Ed]. In order to help you get a dry recording, youll
Tip 5: Reflection filters, like need to lessen reflections from your room, so consider
these from sE and Aston, are
great for helping deliver a vocal filters from the likes of sE (Reflexion Filter) and
decent dry vocal recording Aston (the Halo).

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 Recording better vocals 10 Tips MT

USE A P-P-P-POP SHIELD

06 Youll need to avoid excessive plosive sounds in
your vocal recording that is, the b and the p sounds in
words and the best way to do this is with a pop shield.
Many mics come with their own and youll need to place
it directly inbetween the mic and vocalist, about 8-10cm
away from the mic (and the vocalist the same distance
the other side). Back in the day, they used to make pop
shields with a pair of ladys tights and a wire coat hanger
but, come on, new pop shields are as cheap as chips
these days do you really want to try and impress a
singer with your studio setup by having a pair of your
mums tights on show?

KNOW YOUR MICS

07 You should know your mics well, and which one is
suited to which type of vocalist. Many engineers will have 06
a small but perfectly formed collection of mics suited to
different singers and will know which one to use in

Do you really want

advance of a recording. Consider using different mics
during a recording if theres a lot of dynamic change in

to impress a singer
the song its a good idea to use a condenser mic for
quieter parts of a song, and to allow the singer to

with a pair of your

experiment with a dynamic mic for the louder parts.

mums tights?
GET PERSONAL WITH YOUR MONITORING
08 Vocalists will want to sing along to a mix of the song
through headphones and youll want them to do this, so
they sing in tune so make sure you have different options
available, and that theyre ones that allow the vocalists to
just listen through one of the cans, so they can also hear
themselves at the same time. Youre best off choosing
closed-back headphones that dont allow the music from
the song to bleed through the headphones and get picked
up by the mic. Make sure the monitor mix level is set up
correctly for the vocalist at the start of the recording, so
theyre singing at the right level if its too loud, then
theyll sing too loud to compensate. Tip 6: Use a pop
shield to reduce
those bs and ps
LEARN HOW TO RECORD TAKES AND COMP
09 Unless Adele turns up for your session, or you only Tip 7: Know your mics
have five minutes to do a recording, then you should this Neumann U 47
is a great choice
make multiple takes of a recording by looping the of condenser
recording around a certain section within the song. Also,
Tip 9: Learn how to
try to run through a complete song as many times as you
record different
can. In most DAWs, recording like this is easy to set up,
07 takes and comp the
best bits together
so you can comp the best bits of your multiple takes
together to get the best results. Learn how to set this up
with minimum fuss in your DAW way in advance of your
session, and the extra takes you recorded may come to
your rescue when it comes to arranging the vocal later
as youll be able to comp the good bits from different
takes together to get one great result.

IGNORE THE TECHNOLOGY

10 Of course, we dont quite mean that. What we mean
is that you need to get to the stage with your recording
setup so that the actual vocal recording is fairly
painless and quick (theres nothing more boring
sounding than a bored vocal recording). So get everything
running smoothly, so you can actually concentrate on
how good the vocal sounds. Can you hear the words and
the emotion and is it actually in tune? Get the tech
running right, so you can think about the bigger picture, 09
and youll get better vocals each time. MT

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