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1. Simple, strategic EQ (roll off below ~120 Hz; scoop out -3dB ~350 Hz chest; +3dB shelf boost at 6,000 Hz) to clean it up and lift it 2. Strategic compression to bring the quieter parts up to be more consistent & up-front 3. Short slap delay mixed in to take it out of the bedroom and give it a sense of real space Super helpful! Thank you so much. Notes for myself & others.
This video helped me understand what EQ and Compression really looks like and I can't thank you enough. Everyone just talks about it or tells you their suggestions, but don't really ever show you what they do and how they work. I feel grateful to have come across this.
Just wanted to drop a comment and say that this is my go-to channel when I need guidance with mixing/mastering. Graham always gives simple, yet sound, advice. And I love the fact that most of what he teaches can be done with stock plug-ins! Awesome work, man.
Simple and to the point. I already do these things but the way it was delivered is going to help those starting out. Love how you deliver the content. Good job!
Love this tip man. I like to warm up vocals before any EQ with something like the slate VMR (Revival + Console collection) - makes things sound a little less digital IMO :)
I have a suggestion. Can You make a video how one singer can record great home studio cover? Using for example instrumental that all can sound decent for YT or IG.:)
I just want to take a moment to say thank you for all you do! I am cutting my first record and without your info I would have had the wool pulled over my eyes and lost a LOT of money and time with a studio who recently delivered me an extremely subpar product. If I had not been watching your videos I wouldn’t have known what to look for and would have assumed what was given back was as good as it was going to get. It would have been a terribly disappointing project and probably would have led to me quitting singing once and for all. Your wealth of information saved me that tragedy and has given me the strength to be politely honest and strict about what I want/need. Thank you for saving my tail!
Once again great upload thanks! One thing I've found is were you record vocals helps alot and the tone of the voice. Because I have a nasally voice the best results I got was using a cheap dynamic mic in a untreated room that had natural reverb compared to a treated room using a condenser mic. That might be outside the norm but I've even had people notice the difference..
nice but I wouldn't say that the recording sounded particularly home studio. Sounded like a pretty clean recording, actually. No 60 cycle hum going on or high hiss noise, and no room echo that I could really perceive so these 3 steps are really just common to all vocal recordings. I'd do those same steps pretty much on any vocal, home or not. Also, do you ever add a de-esser to beat down the S sounds or do you just pull clips down to lower the volume manually? And what about multiband compression? Do you ever use that instead of eq? Maybe instead of limiting the volume statically around 350 Hz, use a compressor on that range to limit it instead of reducing it across the board? Same as how you adjust the overall volume with a compressor, you can adjust a range of freq so you don't lose them, just beat down the loud ones? Just wondering what you think. thx
Was mixing vocals yesterday and wasn't sure if I was doing the right thing to get them to sound clear - got a new preamp (the Scarlet 2i2, it's great, thanks for the constent recommendations for it) so it's been a bit of a learning curve figuring out how to mix something new when I've mixed my old preamp for five years. Glad to see all the cuts and boosts I did were in this video, so I did the right thing :D always love your content, thanks for always giving us veteran mixers refresher courses on these concepts, always helps.
Excellent - subtle moves to my ears - except that slap delay seems too crispy in the upper high end for me. What about rolling off - EQ'ing - a bit of the highs in the delay as well?
Great video. Thanks for little tips. Appreciate what you do to show all of us home studio user how to master better. Your the man my friend looking forward to learning more from you. God bless
MAN, this is nuts. Just the EQ part alone, I have to admit, I could barely tell a difference between the vocals with and without the EQ tweaks. Undeniably, though, there was something different when you would switch between EQ'd and not. I'm sure thats why I don't mix professionally haha! (Or at all for that matter) thank you for the valuable resource!
I've studied your videos for the last month's and listen to what you said I'm starting new a studio but it starts with better songs better recording performance and then these three easy steps
In this video (and often in other tutorials throughout youtube) you demonstrate what you are doing in Solo. But I also know that many experienced mixers will say to avoid mixing in solo. So when you actually apply these tricks, do you do it in Solo? Are you only showing it in Solo here so that we can hear what these 3 tricks do? Or should I actually put my vocals in Solo when I do things like this?
Big fan here Graham. Could've done without having to listen to that that awful chipmonk vibrato but, that said.....I agree with many others here, the slap back delay was not a great 3rd move here IMO. It did nothing to make the voice sound bigger (as the stated goal) it just made the voice sound like it had a cheesy slap back delay on it. I believe a much better tool here is to use a stereo delay on a bus in the same way this was done but set the left and right channels to slightly different super short delays about 5 - 10 ms apart with 0 feedback. Example ( L - 15ms / R - 10ms ) when mixed in correctly this will make the voice sound way bigger without hearing any audible delay. Adding a second delay buss using a longer (tempo driven) stereo delay (set to like L - 3/4 / R - 2/3) for an actual delay effect would be another (4th) move that will really put your vocals into the pro studio sounding level without ever going to a reverb. I would also add one other thing.....I recently switched from a Scarlett interface to the new Clarett 2Pre and with it's massively improved dynamic range as well as the new "Air" feature, It took my original (dry) vocal recordings to an entirely new "PRO" level before even implementing these great tips. It cost a good bit more but it was the best investment I've made so far! DI guitars and bass using the "Air" feature also sound 10x better!
I think you just solved 3 problems for me LOL! I'm finding myself too heavy on the reverb never thought of using tje delay instead. And i always thought a compressor makes your music too quiet or something! Big misconception!
I have idea. Automate the compressor so the parts intended to be low in the mix stay low or automate the volume of the track that way. It's so much more exciting if none can tell there is compression. It's a lot of work but I think makes things so much more exiting.
How do you control the size of the reverb with just a delay? I use delay and then reverb to change the tails so they smoothen and fit along with the rest of the mix (decay and predelay)
Great lesson learned! Thanks. Does the order of the effects has an effect on the sound? So first EQ-Compr.-delay of can you use any order of these effects?
Hi Graham, thank you for that „not too much talking, yet all neccessary infos“ Video. I have a question though, how do you operate with the much higher volume following the part you showed in the video? I find it hard to tame all of the dynamic of the vocal. Do you use automation or maybe a different track?
