Backing Vocals
Well, since it was much cooler today, 104 degrees on the official Myrtle Beach poolside thermometer rather than the 108 degrees of yesterday – what a relief, I thought I’d work on my notes some more and try to get something else posted. I found out the heat index yesterday here was 121 degrees! Everybody is swimming and enjoying the sun – I don’t get it, how come nobody else has their laptop with them on the beach? How strange . . . must be the heat getting to them!
I decided to do something different for the backup vocals this time around. On “Skin” Steve did most of the backups with a couple of overdubbed vocals by Dean and I, and even some by Rob before he joined the band. I would liked to have done what I’m doing this time but there wasn’t really the luxury of time while recording “Skin.”
I want the backups to sound big and endless on this record without relying on reverb and delay so I’m going for the Mutt Lange/Mike Shipley method of recording and mixing vocals. More or less. For those of you who don’t know Mike Shipley, well, I don’t know him either. I know that he is Mutt’s right hand man and has worked on all of Mutt’s big records – AC/DC, Def Leppard, Bryan Adams and even worked on Shania Twain’s recordings a bit. He’s one of the best engineers in the world – you’d have to be to work for a perfectionist like Mutt. Their method, as described by “Ship” is to record twenty or so takes of the same part, scoop the mids out a little, boost the highs, and squash the shit out of them with a nice compressor. The resulting vocal sound really speaks for itself. The only problem I have with that is that if you have a vocal part with three harmony parts, that adds up to sixty takes of the same line. There is no chance I could have talked Steve, Jimmy and Rob into that. (Dean’s playing schedule prevents him from being available for backups – but I think those three can cover for him!)
So here’s what I did instead. I recorded each part three times with Steve, Jimmy and Rob around the mic. For the first take, Jimmy in the middle, for the second Steve in the middle and the third take has Rob in the middle. This way no one voice will be dominant in the mix and I get nine voices for each part and since most parts have three part harmonies, that gives me twenty seven voices all together. (Whoa, check out the big brain on Brett – you one smart motherfucker!) Not precisely the Mutt/Shipley sound but close enough for me. Effort per gain factor you know.
I recorded all the backup vocal tracks in Sonar synchronized up to the VS-2480. I could have done them all on the VS and bounced them down, but the machine tends to slow very slightly when a project gets loaded up with v-tracks and I needed to do a little editing of the backup tracks before I flew them into the VS. One of the things that happens when you record that many voices on that many tracks is the voices flam a little at the very beginning of the phrase. I just used the regular editing tools in Sonar to chop off the very first several milliseconds of each phrase so it doesn’t sound loose whenever a backup vocal starts. It’s easier to edit the tracks in Sonar than to edit that many tracks in the VS environment. Also, anytime you get three guys in a room doing backups under the pretense of some discipline, there tends to be some clowning around for relief that inevitably gets on some tracks, so I had to go in and edit all that shit out.
There was one song that had a shit load of gang vocals that got really fucked up when I tried to move a track and didn’t do it right. Suddenly the song on the VS was way out of sync with the backing vocals in Sonar. I tried to backtrack (undo my way out of it) and then Sonar started playing back the vocals at a different sample rate for some reason. Rob suggested exiting Sonar and rebooting so that’s what I did. Magically Sonar was back in sync with the VS and playing tracks at the right sample rate so we moved along. There were several anxious moments had by all when it seemed like we may have lost all our work on that song. That sidetracked us for about twenty minutes. This song was also one where the backup vocals were so high and such a long duration for each part that we only did two choruses of the first harmony and one of all the others. I copied those phrases to the other choruses in the song instead of having them do each chorus – we cheated a little. Those guys were absolutely worn out and their heads were going to explode!
I mentioned earlier the idea of scooping the mids out of the backup tracks. I didn’t do this in Sonar before running them over to the VS. I mixed all the parts after I edited them (where needed) down to a single track for each harmony part on every song. Then using the track dynamics and EQ’s on the VS I made my adjustments there. I shelved off the backups at about 250 and made a nice smile EQ curve between 250 and 10k then boosted about 3dB around 10-15k for some air. I did it this way incase I inadvertently did something horrible to the backup tracks. I could just re-mix them down from Sonar if I need to.
The result is nothing short of phenomenal in my opinion. If you like the backups on Journey and Def Leppard albums, then you are in for a treat with this record. I gave Jimmy a couple of mixes with all the backup vocals mixed in and he’s been calling me “Mutt” Schenker over email. Funny guy that Jimmy! I think that means he thinks it sounds phenomenal too . . .
One of the things that I had a lot of fun doing was a backup vocal effect on a song called “A Thousand Thank You’s.” The idea I had was to use a technique that the Beatles had used on some backup parts on Sgt. Pepper, “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” I think it was. They sang some of the backups through cardboard tubes to get that telephone-ish effect. You know, the kind you hate to see as the Christmas wrapping paper runs out when it won’t completely cover the gift you are wrapping. Sounds silly to do and I’m sure those who did the singing felt really silly singing through cardboard tubes. I can sympathize. Luckily for Steve, Rob and Jimmy, I neglected to procure said cardboard tubes before this backup session began. Oh well – not sure I could have talked them into doing it that way anyhow – even citing the Beatles as an irrefutable example! I knew I had some tools I could use instead to get the same effect.
What I did was copy the backup part to a stereo set of tracks – the part only happens twice in the song. I ran one side through an AM Radio simulator and the other side through a Bullhorn simulator then recorded only the effect return so there was none of the original signal in there. The Bullhorn simulator added a raunchy really bad honky distortion to the track – just like what you’d imagine a bullhorn sounds like. The AM Radio sim was also very accurate, it sounds like some shitty transistor mono tiny speaker radio with a little bit of that classic AM interference. Since they are on stereo paired tracks, you get a different effect on each side. I also took the right side and panned it into the middle as the part fades out so it seems like the part sweeps and changes as it is sung. Actually much cooler than just singing through cardboard tubes! It turned out great – Steve was really bowled over by it. Rob said I may have put a little too much reverb on it and he’s probably right – I can fix that later no problem.
Next, Jimmy and I recorded the drum tracks for the final eight songs completely all in one day, check back soon! And stay in the shade!
Mark