Urban vocal mixing tips and tricks on EQ Lead & Back vocals?

[Solar]

Was just listening and wondering after i've been listening to song like "Run It" of Chris Brown or Destiny's child "Loose my breath" etc.. my question is how these engineer or you engineers mixing ITB out there, hwo do you do to make your bakc vocals to sound that OPEN/Wide and the lead vocal is not really upfront but you still hear it so well etc.. I mean do you guyz have any tips or tricks on how to try to achieve such thing ITB? Weither from plugins that you use or technics and so on..

I mean how many vocals do they Double during the back vocals or quadruple... do they use any kind of plugin like Stereo Enhancer or Stereo Controller plugins? And the think i notice is that some people in some forum including where saying, they double or tripple the vocals or harmonies, yes i got that but how do they do to blend them all together and it sounds so tight!!!

What are normally your Eq chain ITB with plugs when you're mixing the LEAD vocals?
Man there is so many things going on.. any response are more then welcome....

Thanx in advance!!

[matthew.sawicki]

I have a bunch of tracks up on my website at http://www.suburbanprostudios.com/player/player.htm, which if you like them, this is how I get them there.

I always try to do dubs in stereo, so I get two dubs everytime, and pan them out. Not too far in verses, and wide in hooks.

Every dub I record I use the VocAlign plugin to get my dubs sounding amazingly tight and pretty much perfect.

My chain is 22-251 -> Germanium -> Digi 192 -> Usually Channel G ->BF76

I think it works out pretty good, but if you have some comments or questions, just shoot em my way!

[Solar]

Hey matt!
Thanx for taking the time, appreciate it and im listening to your work, sounds good, love it. One thing thought i ain't using Pro Tools for my mixing even if i have it (m-powered version) but not enough track available as you know, so i prefer mixing in Nuendo. But i'll take down in note your suggestions. Thanx again...

Edt: by the way just discover today or should i say decided to play with a PSp plugin called PSP Stereo Controller.... man i dont know if any of you have used it before but i love this plugins , it really bring out whatever you assign to it to a Wider stereo range... and it does not have really much of artifacts in it... i'm gonna continue playing with it a bit more..

[matthew.sawicki]

Well, even though you're using Nuendo the basic ideas should apply just the same. VocAlign isn't necessary, although it would probably be available for a Nuendo system if you really wanted to get your hands on it.

Even still, the mix I described will work regardless of the system that you work on. Also, I forgot to mention that I often shelf out the highs on my dubs so that they don't draw attention from the centered main vocal.

[Neruk]

hey matt i checked out your mixes and site.. excellent stuff

I was suprised to see that you mixed for Gena.. I dont know if you know Wyshmaster from Basement beats.. but he's producing my album. just thought that was pretty interesting when i saw that.

Did you happen to mix Gena's song "Get It"? Wysh made that beat i believe.

[NesNeedsGear]

i always found that to get vocals to stand out, you have to EQ the sweetest frequencies of the artist's voice OUT of the beat submix. compression will make vocals sound louder, but at the cost of sibilance.

Multiple takes, slight off-pitching, autotune, different reverbs, BG Vox subgroups to 'verb FX, whole note delays...etc, should help you get that WIDE/3D effect.

Have fun mixing. that almost always equates to doing a great job.

[Solar]

Thanx Nes for the input, i will try to follow and see what all these suggestion brings

Appreciate!

[DivineMusic]

Originally Posted by Solar

Was just listening and wondering after i've been listening to song like "Run It" of Chris Brown or Destiny's child "Loose my breath" etc.. my question is how these engineer or you engineers mixing ITB out there, hwo do you do to make your bakc vocals to sound that OPEN/Wide and the lead vocal is not really upfront but you still hear it so well etc.. I mean do you guyz have any tips or tricks on how to try to achieve such thing ITB? Weither from plugins that you use or technics and so on..

I mean how many vocals do they Double during the back vocals or quadruple... do they use any kind of plugin like Stereo Enhancer or Stereo Controller plugins? And the think i notice is that some people in some forum including where saying, they double or tripple the vocals or harmonies, yes i got that but how do they do to blend them all together and it sounds so tight!!!

What are normally your Eq chain ITB with plugs when you're mixing the LEAD vocals?
Man there is so many things going on.. any response are more then welcome....

Thanx in advance!!

doubling or quadrupling vocals can easly get you this sound(when panned right)
not to mention tossing some waves doubler 2 or 4 in the mix.
sometimes i use a vocalign(stand alown version, i mix with nuendo 3 also)
i sometimes also use melodyne or the new melodyne plugin.

i personally never pan hard left/right... but for real wide bridges or hooks i will go as wide as 80/80

[Solar]

Appreciate your input, i'll check out Vocalign standalone..What did you mena, you mean you mix with Nuendo as a DAW? or you meant you mix Vocalign with Nuendo 3? Wich version of Vocalign sstand alone u're using that is compatible with Nuendo 3?

Anyhow thanx for the tips,

[DivineMusic]

Originally Posted by Solar

Appreciate your input, i'll check out Vocalign standalone..What did you mena, you mean you mix with Nuendo as a DAW? or you meant you mix Vocalign with Nuendo 3? Wich version of Vocalign sstand alone u're using that is compatible with Nuendo 3?

Anyhow thanx for the tips,

im just saying i too use nuendo so i understand there isn't a version of vocalign as a vst vs rtas..
i have the standalone version which is the same thing.. takes a little longer but its all good.

[Solar]

Originally Posted by DivineMusic

im just saying i too use nuendo so i understand there isn't a version of vocalign as a vst vs rtas..
i have the standalone version which is the same thing.. takes a little longer but its all good.

Cool Divine, i hear ya.. i'm gonna have to check out Vocalign standalone then... thanx again for your time