Quality microphones are cheaper than ever. DAWs are better than ever. But do you feel that your vocal takes are still not sounding as clean, present, or as professional as you’d like? Give these six easy tips and techniques a try; they can help you get the results you’re looking for.
Keep Hydrated
It’s no great secret that pushing sound out of your throat dries it out. That goes double for loud or aggressive vocal styles. A dry throat can result in a voice cracking, not reaching the right pitches/notes, sounding overly gravelly when you don’t want it to, and so on. Be sure to keep a beverage nearby so you can sip between takes. But not just any beverage — alcohol can dry out your throat, and sugary drinks can make it overly sticky. Also, beverages that are too cold can stiffen your throat, which is exactly what you don’t want. In general, a nonalcoholic, non-carbonated beverage that isn’t ice cold is the best — water, tea, and so on.
Use a Pop Filter
It’s tempting, if your microphone has a windscreen, to feel as if you don’t need a pop filter. But even if you have a good windscreen, plosives (“p,”b,” and other sounds that cause the mic to “pop” or “thump”) can still ruin a perfectly good take. Also, since using a pop screen means the vocalist can’t “swallow” the microphone, it forces better mic technique, especially if the singer doesn’t have a lot of studio mic experience. There are a lot of good pop filters on the market; you don’t need to spend a lot of money. Your tracks will sound far more professional if you use one.
Hang a Blanket or Duvet Behind the Singer
Reflection filters are great for damping sound waves that bounce back into the mic from behind. However, since we often record with a cardioid polar pattern anyway, much of the ambient noise that gets into a track may come from behind the singer, not from behind the microphone. While an acoustically treated space with sound-absorbing materials is ideal, that’s not always available. If you can afford mobile sound-absorbing panels to put behind the vocalist, that’s your best option. But in a pinch, household linens can do a passable job if need be. An easy way to dampen those sounds is to hang a heavy blanket or duvet behind the singer. If you can hang it with some folds and gathers — as opposed to tightly stretched — it will perform even better. This will catch most of the noise from behind the mic and result in a quieter recording.
Check Your Levels
One of the advantages of digital recording is that you don’t have to record at the loudest-possible level in order to defeat the noise floor. But that doesn’t mean you don’t want to get solid levels. If you record at too low a level, you can lose resolution and dynamics, and your tracks can be harder to mix. Be sure to do a level check to make sure that you’re getting good, solid levels for your vocals — generally, you want the meters to be in the -15dB to -6dB range. (And keep in mind that most vocalists will jump up in volume by 3dB or more compared to your level test when the red light is actually on and you’re recording!) That’s loud enough to be at full resolution and capture all the dynamics of your performance, while not being so loud that you risk overload. If your audio interface doesn’t have built-in preamps, or it does have preamps but they can’t get your signal up to that level, it’s time to invest in a microphone preamp. If you can’t record at a solid level, you can’t get professional-sounding recordings. It’s that simple.
Track Vocals with Closed-back Headphones
Nothing can compromise a great vocal take like headphone bleed coming through the microphone. Usually, when there’s lots of headphone bleed in a vocal track, the reason is open-back headphones. The best way to keep your tracks out of your vocal mic is to wear closed-back headphones, which cut the bleed to an absolute minimum. There are some great choices out there at every price range, so give a few a try and get ones you like. Even if you prefer open-back headphones for mixing, get a set of closed-back headphones for tracking vocals.
Lightly Compress Your Vocals While Tracking
Dynamics in a vocal performance are great — they give life, movement, and personality to a vocal. However, you don’t want your vocal level to vary so much that you can’t set your recording level without either overloading your interface or being too quiet. That’s why most professionals use some kind of processing on vocals before they hit the audio interface — not to squash the vocal, but just to add some dynamics control. Use a compressor on your input signal (meaning on the way in, before the signal gets recorded), set so that it only operates on the loudest passages — just enough to gently tame the peaks, but not enough to squash the natural dynamics of the singer.
If you have any questions about the best gear for recording vocals, don’t hesitate to reach out to your Sweetwater Sales Engineer at (800) 222-4700.