Spent the last days listening to the great new foo fighters album. i really like the pretty obvious doubling on grohl´s voice. it does not sound as if it has been double tracked too much, the basic sound seems to be electronically doubled. does anyone know which fx unit has this signature sound or how i can build such a sound with a bunch of plugins (delaytimes/filtered/pitch offset/ etc/ etc)?
the coolest way would be an impulse file for convolution of course, anyone?

rock on!
pat

taking the time to DBL vox well (and a singer that can do it well) will give you that almost fake DBL sound. that's the point IMO. now a days of course with Autotune and Vocalign you can do "wonders".

To me, it sounds like carefully-sung dbl track vox which are panned to the middle, which is always a nice effect

Yup, that´s what it sounds like. IMO you get the best voc doubling results by doubling the vocal . Sing it twice ! With a good singer it´ll also be much faster than fiddeling your fx machine until it sounds almost as if the singer sung it twice...makes no sense to me, does it ?

I don't have any of their records, but it seems like all of the hits, at least, have doubled vox done my DG himself. I believe that doubled vox is a major part of their sound.

hmmm, am I really the only one who thinks it does NOT sound like a real doubled performance? it does sound electronic to me, everything follows so precisely.....I am not saying this sound is the best doubling sound, I know most peolpe here favour the real doubling, but I just feel it is not and this gives the sound a certain character which I would like to add to my palette.....

Rock on!
Pat

On colour and shape at least I know he did a normal double and then a lower octave double most of the time.

The reason I think it's Dave Grohl is because it seems to be present on all of the records (the singles anyway). I don't believe that the same producer and mixer did each record, but DG was there for them all.

I've also read that he's very fast in the studio, so doubles probably just roll off the guy.

I have chased that sound myself, and after meeting some of the folks involved, was told that Dave sings his doubles. He is a drummer, and sings with a VERY good sense of time, so it would make sense that he would be able to double himself EXTREMLY tight. Mere mortals can get close using Vocaligin and cutting the double and dragging it to match the main vocal. There are also lots of harmony vocal lines tucked in there tightly too... makes his voice big enough to compete with the wall o guitars and drums. Clever boy Dave is...

Yeah, he does actually do the doubling himself. I spoke to an engineer who worked on The Colour and the Shape about it, apparently Dave is a little bit insecure about his voice and generally likes to dbl it. Don't know why, his voice seems fine to me.

you could maybe get a similar sound maybe with the micropitch patch on the eventides.

I know of singers, who sing one take. Then the other WITHOUT hearing the first take. The end result is just astonishing, perfect, Idontknowwhattosay. What I mean is : if you have talent in the studio anything is possible.

Cheers,
Bill heh

I have someone who does the same. It amazes me everytime!

it used to be quite common and so singers got USED to doubling themselves...
it only takes a bit of practise.
most singers tend to hear the vocal a certain way and so can sing it again that same way, or awfully close, again.

Yup, this seems to work the easiest and most natural. But when I do it, I don't let the vocalist listen to the original track while doubling. It seems to make them alter their voice to try and "match" the first track, and ends up sounding crappy.
For what it's worth.

its an H3000.

Off the subject, but David Gilmour is another guy that was really fantastic at doubling his own voice.

I spent a little time in Foo land.DG does things the old school way.This is pre=production demo period I was helping on..... pre-protools.Vocal mic in untreated controlroom....a TLM-147.

I always thought that too , but his voice has improved over the years .

A real double track done well sounds bloody amazing. Actually unbeatable with any plug / box.

One thing i have noticed is this. It is often far easier to double track, precisely, singing live , no phones, to the monitors turned down. Psychologically, you just seem to stop trying to *chase yourself* and just sing it as you would, because you actually *know* the song. If that makes sense? it does to me and it's worked really well with a few other singers I've tried it with.

Is that Dave's studio in Virginia?

Yes ...thats his Virginia studio.

I've noticed the same thing. If the tracks are sung naturally and are good takes, it can be easier to double a voice without playing the lead track back while the second is being recorded.

--
Wheels

Celemony melodyne is the software your looking for. Melodyne you can copy to a new track and it will automatically make it sound like two vocal lines if you select add random offset to the copied track. you can then copy it again and pan them left and right and set the two panned tracks back in the mix with the centre up front.

sounds wicked everytime. melodyne is awesome flawlessly corrects all your vocal errors in time and pitch as well.

I'm sure I remember reading in Kerrang! about 13 years ago how on Colour and the Shape he would record another vocal take with loud whisper. Almost like when you sing a screamy metal song quietly.

If you want great vocals doubled or not melodyne is the beez kneez software it gives you so many options to perfect your vocal arrangements.

Do yourself a favour and check it out! If you want perfect doubles its the way to go

what is this melodyne you speak of? I've never heard of that before....please tell us more!

Seriously, much as I like melodyne for ease of use, try bypassing it once in a while and listen to the top end that's disappeared in the melodyne processing.

And as for doubles...what you suggest is fine if you don't have the option. It will ALWAYS sound better with a good singer and a tight, REAL double.

Next you'll be telling us about how PODs are great, they're just like real amps but it's so much quicker to get a good sound!

mix on line says had the following in an article about Dave Grohl



"A Soundelux 251 .....was used on all of Grohl's vocals. We used it into a Martek preamp and a dbx 160XT compressor, which is kind of funny — $7,000 worth of gear into a $200 compressor. But it sounds great.”

Monkey brain is obvoiusly the most cool producer ever so you better listen to him!

"But seroiusly"..... if your interested in software that can help and you haven't checked it out before melodyne is worth checkin out