Mixing Death Vocals?

[Nefilim]

My mate is just about to mix some death tracks and he asked me if I had any tips on mixing Death vox. Apart from the regular compressor, de-esser and reverb, do you have any other ideas on how to get a really fat death vocal sound?

Cheers,
Nef

 

[BrandonS]

Yeah. Record them twice with perfect timing and have them be twice as thick. If you've compressed and done all that crap you say, then they will be pretty damn thick already depending on the dude. Reverb might weaken them depending on how much reverb you put on. Cheers!1!?

 

[Skaldir]

Oinkness, you talk like you're doing nothing else then recording for a decade...

Personally I never double to pretend it's only one track. I usually treat the grows similar to normal vocals. Maybe you could try a little bit distortion. Dan has pretty much reverb on his own growls like on "Crimson" and I think it's fits, because it sounds huge.
Maybe he can tell us if there are special tricks for growls. But I think the main factor if it's good or bad is the singer itself.

 

[stefan86]

Yeah, screw doing two tracks on every damn growl. Maybe on a chorus or so, but not on the verses and such.

 

[Dan Swanö]

A good, dead room. A good, bright microphone. Proper placement. Then a combination a "squashy" compressor for energy (like 1176 in "Nuke" mode) then a LA2 for overall levelling. There might be some FX, like reverb, if it fits the track. I used to over-do reverb before since I didn´t know better. But these says I like to keep things a bit drier. Dub is nice. I prefer three then. One in the middle. then one dub in each speaker, maybe not compress them as much, then you get more "life" in the dub. Also try a "Chuck" with some harmonizer like minus a few cent in left and plus a few cent in right. Fattens up one take like hell. But to dub with a little variation in pitch (Growling...that is) is also nice. I have also added a whispered version of the growl and added that as "air". Works nice when your throat is fucked. Happy hunting.

 

[Naglfar]

A good, dead room. A good, bright microphone. Proper placement. Then a combination a "squashy" compressor for energy (like 1176 in "Nuke" mode) then a LA2 for overall levelling. There might be some FX, like reverb, if it fits the track. I used to over-do reverb before since I didn´t know better. But these says I like to keep things a bit drier. Dub is nice. I prefer three then. One in the middle. then one dub in each speaker, maybe not compress them as much, then you get more "life" in the dub. Also try a "Chuck" with some harmonizer like minus a few cent in left and plus a few cent in right. Fattens up one take like hell. But to dub with a little variation in pitch (Growling...that is) is also nice. I have also added a whispered version of the growl and added that as "air". Works nice when your throat is fucked. Happy hunting.

*copy and pastes that carefully into a Word document and saves it*

 

[Nefilim]

Thanks man, that was some serious advice there! We'll toy around with it a bit and see what happens

 

[MECOSARIO]

Man that whispered think it's a kick ass idea

 

[Priest of Evil]

I once had someone put reverb on my vox and I hated the end result, it was only a seven inch recording so it wasnt the end of the world.

When we recorded our album I said no to all effects and was thoroughly pleased with the sound -we were in a top quality studio, I was standing in a small and icy booth (the city was experiencing a heatwave).

I think I will try out some of Dan's suggestions on my next studio excursion as his voice has always impressed me.