Question about vocals

[Matt Crooks]

NK -

I have a vocalist who's voice is a little bit on the thinner side. We noticed that on the early White Zombie records Rob's voice is a bit thin as well. However, on the new Rob Zombie records his voice is "bigger". Do you have any suggestions on how to achieve this. Maybe not the specific R.Zombie effect, but how to "beef up" a thin voice? I'm thinking the Eventide has a detuning patch that is suppossed to thicken out voices, but I'm not certain, and I'm wondering if there's other ways. Thanks in advance!

BTW, we're talking singing and not death vox

 

[NK]

Sorry, but I've never ever recorded clean vocals, so I'm afraid I can't be of any help there.

 

[NK]

Just kidding Matt...

First of all, try a few different mics to find the fullest source sound. You may be surprised what ends up doing the job. There are definitely ways to thicken it up electronically, but I'm not sure if that's the way you want to go. Depends on the tolerance of the project of course - processing can sound really out of place at times and work well at others.

 

[FrostGiant]

Did you try layering a couple 3, 4 tracks of vocals to achieve a fuller sound?

 

[Matt Crooks]

Sorry, but I've never ever recorded clean vocals, so I'm afraid I can't be of any help there.

Then I'm really looking forward to that unreleased M. Bolton brutal death CD.

 

[Matt Crooks]

First of all, try a few different mics to find the fullest source sound. You may be surprised what ends up doing the job. There are definitely ways to thicken it up electronically, but I'm not sure if that's the way you want to go. Depends on the tolerance of the project of course - processing can sound really out of place at times and work well at others.

The problem is that the vocals are already all tracked, so unless he wants to spend more money to try different mic and micpre combos, I'm just trying a way to thicken them up electronically. Recording another set of tracks makes it to "chorusy". It will have to be "fixed" electronically.

I actually like the way it sounds right now, since this is an acoustic guitar driven soft rock project, but in this case the person I'm working with is producing the project, and he doesn't have a clear vision as to where things are going. He's a metal guy who's doing a softer project and is comparing it to the latest hard music CDs for tones (i.e. our reference disca for the bass sound is Sevendust or Papa Roach). I personally think that the Zombie vocal sound will be out of place on the disc, but it's not my call.

On the plus side, he's got a good deal of money to spend, and keeps booking hours and paying for them up front, so I will not complain!