Tracking vocals; to compress or not to compress?

This is where a good quality hardware channel strip is worth it's weight in gold.

For Metal, we use a fast FET style comp/limiter to catch the peaks on the way in and give the vocal that aggressive character. ( Distressor, UA 6176, anything in that catagory...Presonus Eureka is the cheapest alternative to those spendy ones that dos'nt suck and you can sweep the transformer )

If the vocalist is too far from the mic, ( over 12 inches ) you will get more of the room and less of the mouth and vocal bite. This is where a pop filter is most important especially with brutal/death screams and growls.

The mic is key here for metal as well..Shure SM7b is the goto mic for most metal/hard rock. Its not the most expensive but, Its the standard. If you cant pop for the 300 bucks then beleive it or not, a 58 with a pop filter will come pretty close but you will have to crank the crap out of both of them as they are dynamic and not condensor mics....this is where the mic pre-amp / channel strip starts to earn it's money. 

Its garbage in, garbage out...one good channel strip will make the most of an inferior audio interface's mic pre's and save you work later. The goal is not to overcompress on the way in, its to keep from clipping while capturing all the crazy dynamics that a metal vocalist is gonna throw at you.....from wild screams to whispers.

Sonar has a great compliment of comps once your tracked and you can tweak till your hearts content after the fact.

Good points.

Unless you have the budget, software will outperform hardware at most price points, certainly at the lower end of the scale

Using a less than stellar comp on the way in will only compromise the recording.

Just make sure you record @ 24 bit and adjust the gain on your interface so that the peaks are anywhere between -18dB & -9dB  and you''ll be good to go.

Sidroe - Out of curiosity, what compressor are  you using for vocals and acoustic guitar?

Thanks!

A good singer is always the KEY to a great recorded vocal of any style...just my 2 cents. Being that this is a metal guy...a good few beers and/or shots...set the mood!

Thanks to all of you. All good suggestions...i love that forum...

Hardware, I have several laying around. Dbx, Alesis, Behringer, but the one that stays in line is on old 1174. I don't use it to crush the input with. It is set very low on the input. I just want to keep any overloads from coming thru. I do a lot of remote recording so I have a rack of comps just to keep any thing from getting into the red. You also need to be aware that -12 on your meter in Sonar equals 0 on an analog board. That means, of course, that if you are recording over -12 you are already risking distortion in your board. Thus, you have plenty of headroom as was said before. You may not need compression at all. The comp is just being safe before sorry so to speak.

I set up a compressor for tracking so that the singer can sing in to it expressively and drive the compressor just they way they want to achieve their sound.

The good singers use great mic technique and many enjoy singing into a compressor as well... it adds an extra dimension to the mic technique that allows for enhanced self expression.





It's pretty obvious; P's and S's don't sound any better going through a compressor.... well, at least not to me.





No one should need a compressor going in... but it is a fantastic luxury to enjoy and make good use of.


best regards,
mike

Anderton


The best compressor is a singer who has good mic technique - backs off when screaming, gets close on the intimate parts, etc.

Then you don't need a compressor going in, and can get consistent levels that work well with compression during mixdown. The PC2A is a great vocal compressor for mixing.

I definitely agree with this comment. 


I read through a few of the comments above where people are relying on hardware to do their work for them. While that is ok.... I wonder if it's the best way.


In my rig, I have a Saffire interface by Focusrite. It has a built in FX DSP in it's control panel. I did set it up to run a very light compression on all the incoming signals..... guitar and mic. Nothing over the top. I have to pay attention to the mic technique I use or it can easily clip on the peaks.  As a result, I have learned better mic techniques and every now and them I have to redo a part that "gets away from me".  I do not often have outside singers in my humble studio but when I do I have learned to pay attention to the waves and instruct the singers on mic technique and punch in when they clip. 


As a result of this I get extremely consistent vocal takes which require very little compression to make them fit and set right in the mixes. 


I do not rely on the hardware and the software alone.... it is a combination, relying mostly on good recording techniques up front. 

LA610

So i plug the the mic in the LA610, the LA610 in the soundcard ( in my case Presonus audiobux usb). How much the soundcard has an impact on the sound? I suppose as good as a channel strip is, in the end the soundcard must have an' impact?

HELLYA, I have noticed that lower end interfaces can have undesireable Eq curves which are not in your favor. Have I tested them all? No. But I used an M-Audio card for a few years and the first thing I noticed when I moved up to a Lynx interface was that I was getting a tighter low end and I was not fighting translation to other speakers as a result. I generally think that less expensive interfaces do a good job of capturing the sound, it's the playback that you can end up fighting when EQuing that comes into play because interface companies spend less money on the critical D/A circuitry. All that said, some of the newer low end interfaces are very good and in any case, as AT says, they won't drastically alter a good sounding vocal.

I would never use heavy compression when recording.

Sometimes I use light compression from a hardware channel strips when recording.  Sometimes I record with no compression.

The purcpose of compression when recording is just to ensure that you have a fairly consistent recording—not to limit the dynamic range as much as you would when making the final product.

I would say that if you have any doubt, don't use it.

Somre free advice, if you want it:
Where many new engineers go wrong is failing to pad the mic sufficiently.  It is easy to get breakup at the mic level, no matter where you set the input (trim) or how much you compress.  If you hear distortion but don't see any meters in the red, make sure you are not over-blowing the microphone.  Some mics have a switch on the body (for example, 0, -5, -10).  If you can't pad the mic, you may need to change mics.  I have an RE20 (dynamic mic) specifically for singers who can't control the volume/distance when singing.  It is much harder ot distort a dynamic mic than a condenser.

Many microphones come with a Pad button which gives you the ability to attenuate the signal entering the mic capsule by a fixed amount. -10dB & -20dB are common, though other values exist

Thanks Jonesy,

So would I be right in saying that you use the Pad to approach the optimum output from the microphone (coarse adjustment) and then use input gain on the channel (fine adjustment) to get exactly the right level you need?  

Thanks Jonesy, makes sense