Gearslutz.com - View Single Post

airmate · 6th January 2006

To me it still sounds funny that everybody recommends to buy this or that.
But I still think that it should be possible to get a very good vocal sound out of the setup described.

Personally I would try this before spending a couple grands on new stuff: get rid of all the digital signal processing and see what it sounds like then. Do some gain riding with a fader, perhaps another 3 db of compression, manual de-essing with the track automation and then judge the sound again. Do you still miss soemthing? Perhaps then you could improve the results by taking a different mic/preamp combination?

Recently I was tracking/mixing vocals with a very (!) minimalistic chain:

Neumann CMV563+M7s -> Telefunken V72 -> LA-2A.

That was it. Some fader riding/manual de-essing inside the DAW, but nothing else. Very simple signal path, very few active gain stages, all-tube. No IC-crap at all.

And perhaps this was the best vocal sound that I've reached so far.

To me this is the most important rule: If something does not sound as good as I want it to, firstly get rid of all signal processing suspected to be superfluous - and hear what it sounds like then.

So often one tends to put more and more processing into the signal path just to even out the disadvantages of gear put in the chain before. And the overall sound gets worse and worse.

I also own a FATSO, and I must agree I had some nice results with lots of hi freq EQ and the FATSO's "warmth" function behind that. But to me this isn't "bread and butter processing" at all. It's more like a problemn solving strategy that might work in a particular case, or not.

6th January 2006	#24
airmate Lives for gear Joined: Sep 2003 Location: Berlin Posts: 1,097	To me it still sounds funny that everybody recommends to buy this or that. But I still think that it should be possible to get a very good vocal sound out of the setup described. Personally I would try this before spending a couple grands on new stuff: get rid of all the digital signal processing and see what it sounds like then. Do some gain riding with a fader, perhaps another 3 db of compression, manual de-essing with the track automation and then judge the sound again. Do you still miss soemthing? Perhaps then you could improve the results by taking a different mic/preamp combination? Recently I was tracking/mixing vocals with a very (!) minimalistic chain: Neumann CMV563+M7s -> Telefunken V72 -> LA-2A. That was it. Some fader riding/manual de-essing inside the DAW, but nothing else. Very simple signal path, very few active gain stages, all-tube. No IC-crap at all. And perhaps this was the best vocal sound that I've reached so far. To me this is the most important rule: If something does not sound as good as I want it to, firstly get rid of all signal processing suspected to be superfluous - and hear what it sounds like then. So often one tends to put more and more processing into the signal path just to even out the disadvantages of gear put in the chain before. And the overall sound gets worse and worse. I also own a FATSO, and I must agree I had some nice results with lots of hi freq EQ and the FATSO's "warmth" function behind that. But to me this isn't "bread and butter processing" at all. It's more like a problemn solving strategy that might work in a particular case, or not.