Making Space for the Vocals

Hi Guys,

I've seen it mentioned in different books and magazines without really understanding exactly how its done.

I'm talking about the idea of 'scooping out a whole for the vocals' or 'making room for the vocals' etc.

I suppose it basically means taking the mid out of the instrumental arrangement, right? I was wondering if I could get any tips on how to do this properly without making my mix sound weak.

As always, any ideas are really appreciated.

Ed.

learn-TRY LCR MIXING.

that'll get your hole workin'

"Finding that perfect fit and level will take time and become easier with experience." Yes, I agree, I've been with several WAIT!!?? Are we talking about the same thing?

+1 Jeff.  I start with the lead vocal, bass, drums, keys, and guitar.  Once everything is in and balanced, I start working from a very low playback volume to see if I can hear everthing clearly - including lyrics.  I don't do the mono thing like I used to but you are right on track with that as well.

Rimshot

One possible explanation for mixing vocals soft is that when you are right down low, our ears don't really hear the high and low end of the spectrum very well and what is left is mainly middle I suppose. Not only the vocal middle but the music backing middle frequencies. Without all that extra bottom and top end around it just seems easier to balance the music and the vocals much better.

Even doing an instrumental mix at low volume on a small speaker is very revealing in terms of getting the balance right especially if you have quite a few things going on.

We still need the higher volumes too for bass, kicks and reverbs etc.

greekmac7


Thanks guys,


Ok so if I record the Vocals, then mute everything and bring the other instruments in one by one - hows that for a plan?
Also, why does mixing the vocals at a low volume work better than mixing loud?

Build your center first. The vocal, then kick drum then bass and finally snare. That should pretty much be the song right there. If there is a good pulse and rhythmic interplay, you can move on. There will be some conflict with the snare and vocal, so work the EQ on those. This is the C in LCR. Now you can bring in the other instruments, likely rhythm guitar or keyboard, whatever is the chordal framework. This needs to go mostly L&R and have the middle cleared so you don't conflict with the work you did in C. There are many ways of doing this, i.e. wideners, copying a track and slipping it a few MS then pan both hard L and hard R. Another method is 3 versions of the same track LCR and brighten the center, hi pass it out of the kick/bass range and lower its volume then move the others L&R. Another approach with 3 copies is to sidechain a compressor and have the vocal key the middle copy to compress when the vocalist is singing. The list goes on.
 
Keep building up the rest of the song to the sides but any featured parts, when the vocalist is not singing can move to the center.  This is a general guideline and there are other approaches where you start with the drums but it's hard when you bring the vocal in later because then, you are having to craft a hole in the mix and you can end up chasing your tail for hours.
 
The reason you mix low is you get a better sense of balance at low volumes and you can balance the vocal volume against the mix better. As well as other things. If the mix sounds good at a low volume, it will generally sound killer when you turn it up.
 
Also mono anything in the center, actually as many tracks as possible except for drum overheads, keyboards, anything you want wide can be kept in stereo, make the rest including kick, snare, bass and vocal mono.
  
  
  
 

Thanks guys,

I've recorded a Dummy Vocal and I'm gonna build my instrumental mix around that like you said - drums and bass, followed by rhythm, followed by supporting parts. I'm probably going to switch between mixing at  low and hi volumes (I normally only mix loud because everything sounds better loud :P)

Then I'm going to rerecord the vocals ready to work on in melodyne - I'm hoping that with a better mix coming through my headphones during the recording, my vocal performance will be a little bit better.

Any more ideas are more than welcome.