White Room cover

[davisonp]

Pretty new to this. Bass and drums are from a downloaded midi. No, I can't sing !!! What I really want is to get some "space" into it and I don't know how.

[Quarry]

Pretty good version of a classic...

One trick to try out is to record the rhythm guitar twice, and pan each track hard to each side - that might help create the "space" you're looking for.
I would also try doubling the vox, especially during the falsetto parts.

I'm listening to this rather low volume (my wife's sleeping in the next room), but it sounded like there was a fairly wet reverb (or delay) on most parts, except the lead guitar(s)... you may want to make the leads a bit more wet (or everything else more dry, or both) to try to match up the sounds a bit...

Still, I liked you recording.

Just my take - worthless, but free!

[davisonp]

Thanks for listening.I'll try the guitar trick. When you talk about doubling the vocals do you mean copies of the original track or sing it again. (groan) Listening to your Neil Young cover I'm trying to work out if the harmonies are tricked up or you just sung em. Very smooth.(The kids have pinched my headphones). I think I'll take reverb off everything and put it back one track at a time.

[Fiasco]

Is that a stereo reverb you have on the vocals bouncing the vocal from side-to-side? I think the vocals sound too busy with effects. I know you said you feel you can't sing but I would rather hear a more defined front and centre vocal with the double tracked vocal with more subtle effects applied in the background.

Also are the vocals clipping at some points? You might wanna check the levels and maybe re-record at a lower gain or use a limiter on the 2-bus to make sure there is no clipping.

Just my two cents but they might not be worth a dime I don't even know the original song! Or if it even is a cover!

[davisonp]

I must be getting old... it's a cover.. Cream. Yes I have tried to hide the vocals behind lots of effects.I think the levels on the raw recording are ok. What you can hear as clipping might be artifacts from effects. There is compression, an autotune thingy (it does work, I gave it lots to do) and reverb. There may be more I can't remember till I get back and have a look. Your two cents worth is valued. By the way what do you mean by 2-bus ?

[Tacloban]

Neil Young cover? good grief.

Great choice of song. The best suggestion I can make for creating space is to remove the synth and just use a guitar for the sustained high notes in the intro. Also less distortion, keeping some overdrive, on the guitars. Again, a noob's free advice and guaranteed for the full amount.

[Fiasco]

The 2-bus is just a short hand for the master output channels (left and right).

If you put a limiter on any channel it will ensure that you won't get any clipping although it may introduce some other (much less obvious) artifacts into the mix such as a more muddy sound.

Try applying this free plugin to the master channel:

Kjaerhus Audio - Professional Audio Plug-ins

I do it for pretty much every song to keep my master volume as high as possible but without clipping. Although I think you have some glitches on the vocal track only so I don't think you need to do anything to the master. I think its clipping with too high an input or else you've possibly just blown on the mic during the take (did you use a pop shield?).

I think everyone here would agree that you can't really mask a bad take using effects. The autotune thing will probably do some good but I find their range of ability to fix vocal tuning to be quite narrow and their ability to make a vocal sound unnatural quite far-reaching! Perhaps a well adjusted reverb could help lessen the effects of off-notes whilst sounding a bit more natural? It doesn't sound like such a bad vocal and I would like to hear it dry to really critically evaluate it. For most people the vocal is a real point of connection and I'm not sure there is any way to get that connection without a fairly natural voice out front and centre. Personally I've struggled for years to mask my (*truly* awful) singing and there is just no way getting around the fact that you must sing a decent take. It may be to late now but some things I would suggest to get a good vocal are:

Be comfortable in the room you are singing. If you're worried about someone listening from the other room then don't be or kick them out! (Or a glass of beer/wine

Be comfortable of the key your singing in (that may be difficult to change particularly because you downloaded the backing track).

Try loads of volumes of mix between what you hear in your headphones and what you hear naturally.

Try removing instruments entirely. Sometimes just the guitar works well.

Try no headphones, try no pop-shield, try holding the mic, try jumping up and down, try screaming the song, try everything till it feels right!

You may or may not need that advice but sometimes its nice to hear things again that you know already. Sometimes I'll take two or three days to record even a mediocre vocal. All that said, it doesn't sound like a bad vocal its just a bit too effects driven for my *taste*.

The guitar work is sweet

Hope something in there can help!

[magno]

I think you're trying to create space by adding arena sized reverb to everything.
Try adding bits of small reverb on individual instruments to add space and DEPTH.
Think in inches and feat not trying to bounce the vocals of the south stand billboards.
Add some big reverb on your 2bus when you're done that if you want to go for the arena sound, but you probably won't.

[Quarry]

Hey davisonp...

In my experience (which is like, ah, nil!) actually singing (argh!) twice is more better (bad english on purpose) than copying the track... However, I still sometimes do just that (mostly out of laziness). You might want to at least try doubling via copying the track, and maybe offset the second track by a few fractions of a second (and/or detune it by a few cents)...

I use Autotune, also. I really like it - I would probably sound like crap-ola without it!

I thought I noticed some clipping, too. But that might be the autotune working like a banshee

If you do double the vox track, maybe you can use a send to apply the effects, so that you aren't using twice the effects, and thus twice the processor load....? I dunno what DAW you're using, so I don't know if you can handle that, but I assume you can...

OK, I'm rambling... Good luck!

[rexde]

I think the drums could be "bigger". I'm not entirely sure, but I think it is just sound of the samples you are using, i.e. I don't think any amount of processing will make them sound bigger. You need something "boomier".

There is definitely distortion on the vocals. If you want a sound with more space, I think you need a stronger voice. Just my worthless opinion.