I'm currently doing a vocal workshop singing thing. My teacher has organised 2 hours of studio time for each student to go and lay down a vocal track at Woodstock Studio in Melbourne. She'll be there to help us, along with the engineer about technique, choosing takes, dealing with nerves blah blah etc. I think I'll be pretty right with most of the stuff she's planning on teaching most people but I thought it would be a great experience to go and check out a good studio with some good gear. And to hear some of my music in a pro studio room with a variety of monitors. I really want to hear the NS10's actually as I've never had an opportunity.

So just looking for any ideas to really make the most of this. I only get 2 hours.

I was thinking of recording a quick vocal track with my good mics (Rode K2) and set up my vocal booth which is all a bit of work, but what I'll be doing on my album. Then take that in with a rough mix of my most interesting song and lay down a vocal in the studio to compare results. Specifically, I want to smash out lots of takes with lots of different mics to see what's best for me. They have a large range of Neumanns which I'm looking forward to play with :D I'll bring my K2 in as well so I can compare it directly with other mics too. Then if the end result is much better than what I can achieve at home, I may book some studio time for my main vocal tracks or at least for my best songs.

They also have a Neve console and heaps of hardware so it'd be cool to take some tracks through tape and the desk to see what it does vs what I can get with emulators. They have an LA2A as well so I wouldn't mind smashing my vocal hard into that and compare with my freebee emulator from Antress Modern. Would be a good learning experience.


Anyway, that's all I can think of to make the most of this experience. Anything else that may be worth putting some extra time into? 2 hours isn't long to fit all the above in so I might need to prioritise! The gear list can be found below:

http://www.woodstockstudios.com.au/gear_recording.htm

Matt,  I am truly excited for you.  I can't at this moment, think of anything to add.  I think you will find the 2 hours fly by really fast, so I would make a list of what you want to accomplish, but definately prioritize what is most important to you. 

Please report back, I will find your experience genuinely interesting.

I know the guy (Troy Trigwell) who owns Woodstock. He is a very nice guy. Very nice set-up, been there many times. In two hours you are not going to have a lot of time at all so I would be careful with what you do.

If it is a great vocal take you are after I would practice the song very well before getting there so you know it then you can just do with feeling so to speak. You can get all carried away with technology but your performance over rides all of it. I would just pick a nice microphone that is going to compliment your tone and put it through a nice nice pre and print the tracks from there. 

Plenty of time to fiddle with plug-ins and things later. What you are going to get there is the raw sound of an expensive mic and pre hitting the A to D conversion.  You cannot get too carried with processing before going in otherwise you might not like what you do later. It could waste time setting things up creating complex vocal chains. 

Oh cool. Yeah it looks like a nice space. Looking forward to it. If he is the engineer on the day I'll say hi for you.

I'm actually not concerned about getting a good vocal take at all. I'm concerned about comparing the quality I can get in a great studio using the perfect gear for my voice vs what I can achieve with what I have at home. That's the major thing I want to get out of this. I don't expect to be using this vocal on my album at all. I'll still try and put out a good performance of course, but it's not a priority. Also want to learn any nice tips to help me along the way too.

I still have more work on my voice to do so I expect to be in better shape for singing closer to the end of the year than in a month's time. This is one big reason. The other is that if I can a substantially better sound in the studio, and I can't afford more time to do my other 9 tracks in a studio, the album is not going to really be coherent with one amazing vocal and the rest a bit so so. My gut feeling is the gear and knowledge that I have is good enough to put out a really great result and the studio will be mainly subtly and subjectively better. But I've never worked in a studio or with that kind of gear before hence why I want to test this for my own ears! I don'e expect to see a night and day difference. Hell, Gotye recorded his harmonies for the wordwide #1 Somebody that you used to know using his apple laptop inbuilt mic. It worked for him! Granted, he used a Neumann on the main vocals, but still!


I'll certainly post up a finished result though comparing the home vs studio as I'm sure it'll be interesting to hear.

Hi Matt. Oh well that is great, then I would do the opposite from what I said previously. Go for setting up a wide variety of mics and pres and try some different processes on the way in.  A very worth while thing to do for sure. It will certainly prepare you for the situation where you do really want a great vocal take and you wont waste any time trying to find the right configuration to get it.

Not sure of Troy will be on the day but you never know. He does have other engineers and people who work with him in that facility. John Butler has done a lot of recording there. They do have a great guitar room with lots of great amps and speaker cabs. Maybe take an electric guitar with you so you can try a few of these out perhaps! And also they have a room with a Hammond B3 and Leslie cab too. The real deal in there. There might even be a moog synth or two lying around.

Troy bought all my old analog synths off me because he has a love of them and was hoping a lot of electro guys would come in and use them but he had to sell them in the end because no one was basically doing that. They were all do their pre production at home on virtual synths and using them in the studio as well for final productions. Something I actually agree with these days as virtual synths are sounding just so amazing now and every bit as good as their original analogue counterparts. 

Looks and sounds like you're in for a good time.  Do take some pics and have a blast. 

Come back and report your findings and it would be nice to hear comparison samples from your studio vs the pro studio... just for grins.