Mariah Carey on LSD vocal?

[vibralux]

Hi guys

I am a huge fan of Massive Attack and lately I was trying to recreate this rap vocal
by Del Naja, that appears on every second track by them- its very airy , whispery and "ghostly". Kinda lika Mariah Carey on LSD ;-) .Do You know how this can be achieved?

Cheers

Marty

[vibralux]

Bump... Anyone?

[thethrillfactor]

Originally Posted by vibralux

.Do You know how this can be achieved?

Sure...


Get Spike Stent to mix it.

[grahluk]

Shoot. I was hoping that this thread would be about a secret recording of Mariah on acid. Might actually be interesting. Better yet Dust her and press record.

[jonnyclueless]

I don't know anything about the song in question, but I can tell you from experience that there is nothing special done for Mariah Carey. it's always a C-800g thught various standard pre amps and compressors, depending on the song. But that's about it.

There is a waves plugin called "Morpher" which I have sometimes used to add breathy/ghostiness (for lack of a term) to vocals. But not having heard the song, I hav no idea if it's what you are looking for.

[Lagerfeldt]

Originally Posted by vibralux

Hi guys

I am a huge fan of Massive Attack and lately I was trying to recreate this rap vocal
by Del Naja, that appears on every second track by them- its very airy , whispery and "ghostly". Kinda lika Mariah Carey on LSD ;-) .Do You know how this can be achieved?

Cheers

Marty

Could be an exciter. I know Mark Stent uses one once in a while (Darren Hayes e.g.).

Tell me the MA track you're referring to and I'll let you know.

Quite often it's simply a question of the vocalist adding a lot of air during the take (that's what causes 99% of the Mariah air sound), and/or eq/exciter.

[vibralux]

LAgerfeld - what about the „Future Proof" from the 100th Window album? Do YOu recall that whispery, acid, twisted, foggy, dark, sick male vocal? How did he achieve that kind of sound ?

Cheers

Marty

P.S By the way- it would be a killer if we could have Del Naja hang around on this forum for few days, like the mastering guys, so we could ask him few questions. I know I would !!!

[sismofyt]

thrill, it's not stent's doing, it's all robert's vocal. and it's not hard to do, just listen and duplicate it, i did a similar thing with a track recently

i doubt very much robert wanna hang here, nor any of the other guys from the wild bunch. he doesn't even hang at his own forum; http://forums.massiveattack.co.uk/

there are a few cats there who are quite intimate with the bristolian climate so to speak. you might wanna drop some question there

maybe getting neil here would be realistic. he did afterall make half of 100th window and a good bit of mezzanine

oh and, collected is out. get it. there's some _very_ interesting tracks there (especially if you're into the vocal work), check 'em out at; http://www.massiveattack.co.uk/collected/

all the best and kind regards

ole / sismofyt

[vibralux]

Thanks for the info. I am also a music journalist so I got the Collected cd a week ago ;-)

Cheers

Marty

[sismofyt]

great. what do you think about it? there's also a couple of good ma articles at sos

i really do not think there's a whole lot of mystique about ma's sound. it's 'just' really really well composed and recorded. it's quite easy to hear what's going on and to replicate parts / ideas that one fancies

[sismofyt]

forgot the most important thing. he's not singning. he's talking. also notice the haunting background vocals

[vibralux]

Well, I got the single CD version, so its basically all the pieces I ve heard before, but ots nice to have it on one album. On the other hand it was kind a new experience casue I listened to it on my new ADams 3SA's ;-) Cant wait till my real traps arrive- I will listen to the album once more then and probably will discover few more things ;-)

As for the Del Naja vocal- its not that simple to me. I tried some delays and choruses, but cant pinpoint the sound. I must be doing something wrong.

Marty

[sismofyt]

i think 'future proof' is straight forward. he's just up front real close (to the mic + compression), it's the haunting background vocals, spun / flipped (i mean moved around the main vocal), delayed, breath & sighs added that makes it sound cool, imho

'course i'm no robert, so i can't make it sound exectly like that, but it's close enough for rock'n .. err .. trip hop

the chorus is just , 'ahhh', 'ahhh'..... + lotsa fx

speaking of chorus my fav ma, is the stuff on rising son. very eerie

now, horaca andy, _that_ vocal have always puzzled me. that's 100% his own work. i got several non ma horace albums, seen him live several times and he just sound like that. very unique in my book

[sismofyt]

listen to how little energy he puts into his vocal. that's the sound

[vibralux]

Well, that might by the key- very, very little energy and high gain while recording
I think that he also fiddles with a compression a lot while tracking and than in a mix- its so upfront.

[sismofyt]

no doubt about there's compression going on + a stent sheen, but yes, i think the key is the energy he puts into his vocal. when listening try to seperate the main vox from all the background parts flying around, it becomes quite obvious. i don't think the pre+mic is of much importance (here). they've used avalons previously, dunno if they still use them. most likely some kinda modern LSD, err, LD mic, might be a M147? there was some stuff in the sos articles

anyway, i think he has evolved quite a bit since the blue lines days. he's a really good vocalist now, imo

luv to talk about this stuff / these artists. hope we get that forum

[sismofyt]

to thrill, it's easy to hear the stent touch (comparing to his other works), but it does not sound very ssl to me. what do you think?

[thethrillfactor]

Originally Posted by sismofyt

to thrill, it's easy to hear the stent touch (comparing to his other works), but it does not sound very ssl to me. what do you think?

All Stent mixes you hear the SSL working.


Sometimes a little too much so.

[sismofyt]

i know, but i also know ssl too (is he on 4K or 9K?), it doesn't **** up the sound here, imo. probably not a lot of radical ssl eq / comp used

good thing

[thethrillfactor]

Originally Posted by sismofyt

i know, but i also know ssl too (is he on 4K or 9K?), it doesn't **** up the sound here, imo. probably not a lot of radical ssl eq / comp used

good thing

Its both.


What makes Spike Spike is that he is never afraid to experiment.


He'll take chances and add to the productions if he feels it makes the songs better.


And he works on a 4K.

[sismofyt]

thankx, yes i found olympics site. i have a feeling that a lot is created by ma + neil and the magic is not in the mix(er) or stent. but i've never heard any raw ma stuff so it's just speculation

there's an old article at sos about stent;

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan9...s/spike366.htm

a good choice for a guest mod

[thethrillfactor]

Originally Posted by sismofyt

thankx, yes i found olympics site. i have a feeling that a lot is created by ma + neil and the magic is not in the mix(er) or stent. but i've never heard any raw ma stuff so it's just speculation

there's an old article at sos about stent;

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan9...s/spike366.htm

a good choice for a guest mod

You'd be suprised how much lee way he gets in adding stuff.


More than most guys would.


But he's earned that kinda trust among his peers.


Mezzanine is a ton of his tricks.


I mean Bjork's Homogenic would never sound the way it does if he didn't.


I remember reading it shocked Bjork when she first heard what he did with it.


But she learned to like it and the rest was history.

[sismofyt]

yes, but ma is very much into their stuff, so that's why i thought / think he isn't _that_ present. he's not doing the full tla enchilada. what i mean is i think he's not talking the ma sound to another level, they do that themselves. he didn't touch blue lines (+) and it's very ma. but i'm not a mixer by trade. do you now spike?

could imagine that bjørk was surprised though. i reckon that's the effect she has on people too, so it's good for her to get a little does back

would you be so kind to tell us more about that you know about ma? i'm sure you're just bursting to spill da beanz

[dchapp]

hey....recorded MC vocals for 16 years...can't say I remember any LSD around the studio.....the vocal sound has a lot to do with the microphone...the Sony C-800G. I introduced that microphone to MC in 1993 and it has been used 99% of the time since then. She has an" airyness" to her voice sometimes that is enhanced even more by the brightness of the C-800G. At times, during mixing, the GML 8200 was used with a boost around 16k for more air. Same thing for BG vocals...BGV's also were compressed a bit along with the GML 16k boosts. Tracking her vocal is just the microphone, a pre-amp and a small amount of compression.....never used any EQ while recording the vocals. I've been told in the past that some of the "airyness" on the Stent records may have been the NTI EQ3 "AIR" feature.

[vibralux]

Now , thaaats the post I was looking for ;-)
Thanks for the info dchapp. As for the LSD- none in the studio? Cmmon...

cheers

Marty