Screaming Vocals Drive? Is this normal?

[REDBOX04]

Me and my band auditioned a vocalist yesterday by recording him on our latest track. When I tracked him he preferred using some type of drive boost/distortion/saturation plugins which helped give his vocals a much needed extra boost. It was a moderate gain boost, just enough to break it up and drive it a bit.

Signal went like this >
Shure SM7b - RME Fireface 400 - Plugins: Tube saturation plugin, and I used Line 6 Gearbox with a Vocal preamp setting, cranked the drive a bit, and then put on the Boost/EQ in the stomp section for a lil more gain.

It sounds good with the drive/gain on his vocals but is this common practice among most screaming metal/death metal vocalists? Or is this the sign of someone who has to hide behind drive and saturation just to sound good?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Ermz]

It's fairly common practice.

On the last project I used Dist 3 mode on the Distressor for grit, then in the mix I used Tessla Pro and also iZotope Trash on the Tape Sat setting. Added enough grit for the vocals to sound really aggressive and lively.

 

[ahjteam]

Me and my band auditioned a vocalist yesterday by recording him on our latest track. When I tracked him he preferred using some type of drive boost/distortion/saturation plugins which helped give his vocals a much needed extra boost. It was a moderate gain boost, just enough to break it up and drive it a bit.

Signal went like this >
Shure SM7b - RME Fireface 400 - Plugins: Tube saturation plugin, and I used Line 6 Gearbox with a Vocal preamp setting, cranked the drive a bit, and then put on the Boost/EQ in the stomp section for a lil more gain.

It sounds good with the drive/gain on his vocals but is this common practice among most screaming metal/death metal vocalists? Or is this the sign of someone who has to hide behind drive and saturation just to sound good?

Thanks in advance!

Mike Patton uses this method too, so it cannot be wrong!

 

[Trevoire520]

Pretty normal in a recording situation but not something that normally would get done live I think.

 

[Fox Mulder]

I personally cannot stand extreme metal vocals without a little drive.

 

[REDBOX04]

Thanks guys!

 

[Fox Mulder]

Let us know how it turns out.

 

[SentencedToBurn]

if you suck, a little gain and drive isnt going to hide it

 

[Yhanthlei]

if you suck, a little gain and drive isnt going to hide it

+1

comparable to autotune... if the perfomance sucks, it sucks, but it can add a little

 

[nwright]

I personally cannot stand extreme metal vocals without a little drive.

Ouch! I never use any type of saturation or "grit" adding plugins on vocals. Maybe I should change that...

 

[Fox Mulder]

Ouch! I never use any type of saturation or "grit" adding plugins on vocals. Maybe I should change that...

You obviously squash them, right?

 

[nwright]

You obviously squash them, right?

I compress with plugins, yes. But I hesitate to say it adds any grit. I double tracked vocals most of the time, and the 2 tracks against each other on a screaming vocalist makes it more abrasive, no doubt. But I've never purposefully used any plugin to create an overdriven type of sound on main vocals. Don't really know why, I know it's used all the time.