dirty up vocals

KarlSutton · Post by **KarlSutton** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 11:49 am

I've been working on a project & captured very clear, present, vocals. I recorded them with a TLM103 into my ghost with a demeter tube optical compressor lightly compressing it.

I think they sound great, but my client wants them "dirtier" or "grittier" I tried putting the preamp plugin on them & messing with that, he likes it when it breaks up, I however cringe as I tried so hard to get them so clear.

I think if he could have recorded his songs in the 70's on tape through that era of gear that is the sound he's after.

Besides DP's plugs I have wavearts & that's it.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

Dwetmaster · Post by **Dwetmaster** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 11:55 am

Try steve Massey plug

http://www.motunation.com/forum/viewtop ... ght=massey

chrispick · Post by **chrispick** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 11:59 am

Did you try DP's Preamp via aux? Might mix in better.

You could drop the cash on PSP VintageWarmer. It's a smoother kind of saturation.

markwayne · Post by **markwayne** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 12:45 pm

Vintage Warmer is the first thing that popped into my mind as well. Of course, you say you tracked with some compression already so you might end up with other problems with VW.

Maybe try bussing the track to a couple of channels and then mix in a touch of dirt with some of the nasty upper mids notched out and leave your nice pristine vocal full range and front and center.

kassonica · Post by **kassonica** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 5:00 pm

Copy the track then add the preamp (not to dirty tho but heavily compressed) to the copied track, roll of everything below say 100hz roll off everything above say 3-4kz push the midrange up.

Now bring up the clean Vox track while having the copied track off and slowly bring up the dirty track and blend the two till you get the best of both worlds.

You can also automate this for cleaner verses and dirtier chorus's.

The Massey plugin is a winner and is free as well.

SixStringGeek · Post by **SixStringGeek** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 9:48 pm

KarlSutton wrote:my client wants them "dirtier" or "grittier" I tried putting the preamp plugin on them & messing with that, he likes it when it breaks up, I however cringe as I tried so hard to get them so clear.

Route the track to a set of headphones, clamp the headphones over a mic, record the signal from the mic.

Try it when he's not around and see what he says.

Hey, its cheap.

KarlSutton · Post by **KarlSutton** » Tue Apr 29, 2008 9:55 pm

thank you so much for the ideas!

daniel.sneed · Post by **daniel.sneed** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 3:12 am

If you don't get where you want with DP's Preamp, a few more to try :

iZotope vinyl (free)
http://www.izotope.com/products/audio/vinyl/

CamelCrusher (free)
http://www.camelaudio.com/camelcrusher.php

You'll have to tweak to get somewhere, but chances are you'll like it !

BradLyons · Post by **BradLyons** » Wed Apr 30, 2008 4:40 pm

or you can have Andrew Dice Clay sing the lyrics if you want to dirty up the vocals

monkey man · Post by **monkey man** » Thu May 01, 2008 3:34 am

Oh man, good call Brad; he's one filthy bugger, he is.
Makes George Carlin and Moore/Cook sound like preppies.

ramadev · Post by **ramadev** » Wed May 07, 2008 12:16 pm

I posted this in another thread yesterday:

Wanting a gritty vocal, we ran a mult from the vocal into a miked guitar amp in a tiny bathroom, dialed in a bit of tube distortion on the amp, printed it to a separate track, and mixed a bit of the signal in with the original vocal - it worked great!

Man was I surprised, as I was skeptical at first . . .

chunkdz · Post by **chunkdz** » Wed May 07, 2008 2:13 pm

Try routing the vocal to a stereo bus, then out the analog out on the computer. Plug that into the mini jack input of a memorex microcassette recorder. Playback recorded vocal through a headset mic attached to a Skype phone calling Peru, then have the friend in Peru make an MP3 and send it back to you. Import and phase it in with the original track, and VOILA!

Dwetmaster · Post by **Dwetmaster** » Wed May 07, 2008 2:17 pm

chunkdz wrote:Try routing the vocal to a stereo bus, then out the analog out on the computer. Plug that into the mini jack input of a memorex microcassette recorder. Playback recorded vocal through a headset mic attached to a Skype phone calling Peru, then have the friend in Peru make an MP3 and send it back to you. Import and phase it in with the original track, and VOILA!

I'd like to have an apple pie with that?

ramadev · Post by **ramadev** » Wed May 07, 2008 2:51 pm

chunkdz wrote:Try routing the vocal to a stereo bus, then out the analog out on the computer. Plug that into the mini jack input of a memorex microcassette recorder. Playback recorded vocal through a headset mic attached to a Skype phone calling Peru, then have the friend in Peru make an MP3 and send it back to you. Import and phase it in with the original track, and VOILA!

LOL!

You could always rub some coarse sandpaper on the mic while tracking.

monkey man · Post by **monkey man** » Thu May 08, 2008 4:17 am

You could get the vocalist to throw in a little cussin'

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