Getting a good vocal sound (for n00bs)

[Rip-G]

This is the first time I hear about closed cans but it's well known that singers tend sing too high if mix in the cans is too loud. Also if you make their own voice lower in the mix they will try to compensate and scream louder. The opposite is also true - if they are very loud in the mix their singing will be softer.

You can try recording without cans - with your monitors blazing, just cut out stuff without voice later on. Works for rock and metal.

 

[colonel kurtz]

fuck tracking vox with open cans

it's all good when you're doing it, but not so much when you've got the vocal track solo'd and can hear the instrumentals bleeding into the track through the phones...

 

[ahjteam]

I would rather get some bleed from semi-open headphones than out of tune singing with closed headphones. But some like tea, some like coffee.

 

[Polpotkin]

+1
I have tracked vocals many times with a beta 58 (not growl/scream though) and I must say that it's a really good mic.

 

[Metaltastic]

Just do one can on, one can off, or better yet, have the vocalist in the control room and crank the monitors! (trust me, I've done this, and with a cardioid mic with the rejection axis facing the monitors (and at least 6 feet away, and preferably off to one side), it's completely drowned out when the vocalist is vocalizing (can't necessarily say "singing" on here ), and you can strip-silence the rest - and many would much rather sing along without any headphones!

 

[Damphire]

What about in-ear headphones?, maybe just one. Singers often cover one of their ears to hear themselfs more accurately.

 

[Ermz]

I witnessed some work completed by a fellow sneapster Ermz earlier on tonight.He tracked some vox with this U87 thingy and man i was blown away.
Not just by the mic ofcourse but also the intensity and delivery in attitude the vocalist put out.
Ahjteam makes great sense in his post's above and just to add regarding the headphones,the alternative i suggest to clients is to take one can off the ear so to better hear themselves pitching.
I have not yet tried alternative headphones and haven't yet had a scenario were we didn't get the results we were after,so i'll just keep powering on with that.
To Freak Of Metal,don't chase perfection in your signal chain if it's not available to you.
As already pointed out,chase an awesome performance and then do what you can to reinforce the performance.
Most people will critisize a well recorded voice thats out by miles.So i would encourage you to capture the essence with what you got and then do what you can to give it the justice it deserves.
Mind you a 58 Beta is a good mic,atleast i think it is anyway.

Thanks again mate.

It's all in the source with vocals above all else. The most you can do to get the vocalist feeling comfortable and happy with his or her cue mix, the better the end result.
The Neumanns, Distressors and APIs just help the process along (a lot)

 

[TravisW]

The closed headphone thing is absolutely true. Monitoring with one ear makes a huge difference. Another thing that helps is running a slightly bass-heavy mix for a singer to monitor from. Distorted guitars can get a bit mushy to base your pitch from in some situations, while a clean in-tune bass is considerably easier for some people.

 

[schnarf2]

I'll second the suggestion of just tracking with monitors on the rejection axis of the mic. You're going to get bleed anyway because it won't perfectly reject the sound, and because of room acoustics, the sound will bounce back towards the mic, but it doesn't matter.

I've found that singers get a much better vocal performance with the music coming out of the monitors than with headphones. And the bleed is very quiet to the point that I don't worry about it -- I figure it's worth it to get a better performance.