Vocals

[Will]

Anyone got any tips for sourcing vocals, whether it be downloading samples, finding someone half decent to do them for you or a reasonably priced mic to do them yourself or anything else! I like the spoken word, ie not sung or 'rapped' or aggressive hip hop type stuff...

[xfive]

I have a cheap ass audio technica mic plugged right into my Mackie with no preamp and it gives me surprisingly good results.

[tocsin]

Can't go wrong with a Shure SM57. Excellent mics and not ridiculously priced either.

[rejasond]

analogx - sayit

robo madness!

[xfive]

Can't go wrong with a Shure SM57. Excellent mics and not ridiculously priced either.

Yeah definetly industry standard right there.

[audioinjection]

yeah i use the sm57 too, with my focusrite preamp it sounds pretty good

and theyre very durable

[RDR]

57 as industry standard? Are we forgetting about the 58?

[TechMouse]

57 as industry standard? Are we forgetting about the 58?
They're both industry standard.

I think the only difference is the casing - one being configured more for miking up instruments & amps etc, and the other being more suited for hand-held / vocal use - but both being reasonably adept at either.

[Will]

So buying your own mic is the way to go for vocals then? What if you were crap at the style of vocals you like? :lol: That Say it thing doesn't seem that great to me, why does it close when you click done or just hit return? Annoys me that does! Wipeout 2097 had cool synthesised speech using an Amiga 1200 program, be cool if I could get hold of that...

[TechMouse]

Wipeout 2097 had cool synthesised speech using an Amiga 1200 program, be cool if I could get hold of that...
Really?

There's a lot of programs to do it on the net.

Just google "speech synthesis"...

[FIK]

Before buying a decent mic, I recorded sven vath-style, just used my headphones

[tocsin]

So buying your own mic is the way to go for vocals then? What if you were crap at the style of vocals you
like? :lol:

Well, doesn't have to be for just vocal recordings. But, yeah, for original vocals, you'll need a mic. And if you suck
at doing them yourself, either get someone else to do it, or experiment with one of the fixup plugins. The new version
of Sonar has such a plugin (Roland V-Vocal) which I haven't played with yet. But, looks interesting.

[RDR]

I think what you are really talking about in the long term is mic technique.. this is incredibly important for music in general and you would be well advised to buy a decent microphone and practice micing up different instruments, sounds and vocals for future refernce.

@techmouse - i think there is a slight difference, but i cant be sure... ill check.

[RDR]

SM57
Instrument Microphone
40 to 15,000 Hz

SM58
Vocal Microphone
50Hz to 15kHz

so only about 10hz...

but that can make all the difference!

[TechMouse]

SM57
Instrument Microphone
40 to 15,000 Hz

SM58
Vocal Microphone
50Hz to 15kHz

so only about 10hz...

but that can make all the difference!

So, arguably, you might as well get the SM57 and then apply a hi-pass at 50hz for SM58 emulation?

[RDR]

SM57
Instrument Microphone
40 to 15,000 Hz

SM58
Vocal Microphone
50Hz to 15kHz

so only about 10hz...

but that can make all the difference!

So, arguably, you might as well get the SM57 and then apply a hi-pass at 50hz for SM58 emulation?

:lol:

touche...

[acidsaturation]

I use the little stereo one from my PC and distort the **** out of it..

[TechMouse]

I use the little stereo one from my PC and distort the **** out of it..
A stereo microphone?

How does that work...?

[RDR]

I use the little stereo one from my PC and distort the **** out of it..
A stereo microphone?

How does that work...?

:roll: oh my god, you are sooo behind the tymes...

[TechMouse]

:roll: oh my god, you are sooo behind the tyne...
As the Newcastle resident said to his mate in Gateshead...

[acidsaturation]

I use the little stereo one from my PC and distort the **** out of it..
A stereo microphone?

How does that work...?

:roll: oh my god, you are sooo behind the tymes...

It's just a crap one that came with a sound blaster, but it's quite good to plug into my MD walkman and record ****ed people burbling on about crap...

[Will]

Before buying a decent mic, I recorded sven vath-style, just used my headphones

This sounds worth a punt! Can anyone recommend some software to record vocals through my headphones for use in Reason? I assume they must be some free software I can download??

[vadarfone]

50hz!!!!

like you are going to want your vocals to get anywhere near that low anyway!!!

i am guessing you will want to record them in, effect them, slice them up, envelope them, distort them, process them, envelope them again, slice them into your rhythm work etc etc etc... just use any mic you can get, unless you are a frigging hippy and want to read from 'The Guardian' into the mic over your track.

[TechMouse]

just use any mic you can get, unless you are a frigging hippy and want to read from 'The Guardian' into the mic over your track.
... in which case, please don't bother?

[vadarfone]

haha. :) :)

[Basil Rush]

SM57
Instrument Microphone
40 to 15,000 Hz

SM58
Vocal Microphone
50Hz to 15kHz

so only about 10hz...

but that can make all the difference!

So, arguably, you might as well get the SM57 and then apply a hi-pass at 50hz for SM58 emulation?

:lol:

touche...

It's not actually that simple, you want to look at the frequency response curves for the m icrophones which varies considerably between the two. You can find them on Shure's web site I'm certain if you're curious.

In fact:

http://www.shuredistribution.co.uk/product_pictures/fsm58_large.gif
http://www.shuredistribution.co.uk/product_pictures/fsm57_large.gif

They probably have different frequency responses off axis as well ... not that that's probably gonna make a huge amount of difference but the basic curves above are important.

Usually you just have to pick a mic that sounds good though, never learnt much from staring at the curves, best to use them to confirm what you're hearing is coming from the mic rather than usingthem to choosethe mic.