Vocal Effects

[Cthulhu Fhtagn]

For jazz, small venue, I run a Yami 312 to a pair of JRX115s. I have a passive out to a GemSound XPS-300, bridging a pair of Kustom 10" passives wedges on the floor. I control the mixer. The singer and the keys lets me do what I think need to be done. The singer is low maintenance and does not have a long history of live performance.

 

Envy me.

 

The Classic Rock Project - my mains, but the rest is the lead guitar's. He's a fiddler. He fiddles. All night. If we sound perfect, he fiddles. If we're too loud, he fiddles. If we're too soft, he fiddles. Before the band shows up for sound check, he fiddles. When the singer goes from an electric to an acousitc, he fiddles. He fiddles. That's what he does. THAT drives me up a wall.

 

Did I tell you he fiddles?

[Ross Brown]

Rehearsal last night. Guitar player was sick so it was just bass and drums again. My turn to sing came. I started with a little bit of Plate effects and some chorus. Small room, so everything is in the "monitor mix". The drummer jumped to the rototoms and the lead singer was shakin a shaker. I was on bass, of course.

 

I had been practicing this song in Eb instead of E and it was going realy really well all week. Last night, vocally I could not find the melody/key at all in the beginning. I blame: 1) Too much going on that I was inadvertently listening to and should have ignored. 2) Bass only killed me... 3) The effects may have had an influence.

 

I tried some reverb, got a little better. (Note: had been practicing all week without effects, mostly). I then brought up some tracks that had the keyboard/piano part playing in the mix. This made all of the difference in the world. The vocalist, who is biased against any vocal effects (she is wrong) said she thought the effects were messing with me. She asked also if I could sing it with out anything (accapello...sp?) else going on. I did it without any problem.

 

I am still trying to find my way but it made me feel like I need a melodic instrument playing and/or I need to learn to ignore most everything else and/or effects are a problem in the monitors mix.

 

Not sure what all of this means at this point. Just sharing.

 

ok... continue fighting....

[plangentmusic]

Okay, I guess that's where we're on different pages. I don't see singers (or guitarists) as an opposition. And I sing and I like a little reverb in the monitors and it doesn't throw off my time and I don't think I'm a prima donna -- or primo ragazzo if you will. And yes, I produce and have done live sound. So I guess it's just an opinion, but in the end, it's about what makes people perform better -- not enforcing an opinion on them.

[Griffinator]

So you would, for example, be okay with not being able to hear yourself in the monitor mix, so long as you had a little reverb on your voice (because the monitors had to be turned down to accomodate this request)?

 

I've worked in too many rooms where it's just not feasible to add reverb to the monitor without causing feedback problems. That's the point where I draw the line and say no, you can't have reverb in your monitors.

 

When I sing live, I prefer the single-slap and either a vocal doubler or chorus if the doubler isn't available. Most of the folks I've worked with over the years, once they hear how that actually sounds from the FOH, as opposed to the audible reverb they think they want on their voice, drop all objections.

 

The few that haven't, well, they were prima donna about everything, including that stick point. What I also found out later was that they all hated the sound of their voice, no matter how good they were, and the reverb was a way to mask it.

[fingertalkin]

The vocalist, who is biased against any vocal effects (she is wrong) ....

 

I don't get you sometimes. Now if you were saying that she is wrong in saying she thought the effects were messing with you, I understand. But if you are saying she is wrong in not using vocal effects, then you really have no say in what she likes or doesn't like which doesn't make your opinion any more right than hers.

[jeremy c]

I've never worked with singers who had good enough timing that anyone would notice a timing issue caused by reverb.

 

And I've never seen a band that brings its own pa using anything other than reverb as an effect.

[Ross Brown]

The vocalist, who is biased against any vocal effects (she is wrong) ....

 

I don't get you sometimes. Now if you were saying that she is wrong in saying she thought the effects were messing with you, I understand. But if you are saying she is wrong in not using vocal effects, then you really have no say in what she likes or doesn't like which doesn't make your opinion any more right than hers.

 

Something got lost in translation... I was being funny... I don't really think she is wrong.. her opinion is valid, as you state. She is a heck of a lot better than me. She knows what she likes and other people seem to like it too... As to whether or not the effects mess with me. It may be true. Not sure yet.

 

 

[Big Daddy from Motown]

If your the bass player , play bass and forget about the singers problems.

 

No really whatever the singers need to feel comfortable if fine with me.

 

It's all about the vocals in a band.

[Griffinator]

If your the bass player , play bass and forget about the singers problems.

 

No really whatever the singers need to feel comfortable if fine with me.

 

I don't recall ever being in a band where I wasn't expected to do backing (or fronting, for that matter) vocals. So the "singer's" problems are my problems, because I rarely have the luxury of multiple vocal FX boxes to give this singer one set of parameters and this singer another and myself another. I guess that's why I get so fired up about excessive reverb - it ruins the mix, causes feedback problems onstage, and in general creates a huge mess.

 

If you can hear the reverb on a vocal (unless it's a capella), you're using too much.

[plangentmusic]

So you would, for example, be okay with not being able to hear yourself in the monitor mix, so long as you had a little reverb on your voice (because the monitors had to be turned down to accomodate this request)?

 

I've worked in too many rooms where it's just not feasible to add reverb to the monitor without causing feedback problems. That's the point where I draw the line and say no, you can't have reverb in your monitors.

 

When I sing live, I prefer the single-slap and either a vocal doubler or chorus if the doubler isn't available. Most of the folks I've worked with over the years, once they hear how that actually sounds from the FOH, as opposed to the audible reverb they think they want on their voice, drop all objections.

 

The few that haven't, well, they were prima donna about everything, including that stick point. What I also found out later was that they all hated the sound of their voice, no matter how good they were, and the reverb was a way to mask it.

 

We seem to be talking about different things. If you experience feedback, that's not the fault of the reverb. (Unless it's ridiculously high).

 

And you also seem to work with bad singers. That's not the greatest way to judge a situation. That's kinda like someone saying that all the bass players they work with suck, so the bass should be kept as low in t mix as possible. : )

 

 

[WCriley]

I think a lot of the disagreement in this thread stems from differing definitions of the term effects as it applies to vocals. Plangentmusic's statement about slap-back in the 50s and chorus in the 80s is one definition of effects.

The more subtle use of static and/or modulating delay, as espoused by Griffinator, might come from effects devices but I would define them as thickening rather than true effects. Two altogether different things (in my opinion) which seem to be conflated/confused in this discussion.

 

Griff posted: If you can hear the reverb on a vocal (unless it's a capella) it's too much. I subscribe to that school. I'll also add that I think this applies to any effect or EQ added to vocals (unless it's truly being used as an effect). My philosophy on sound reinforcement is to make the system disappear for the most part.

 

Unless I'm outdoors, I seldom use reverb on a lead vocal. It takes away the front and center immediacy. Sometimes I'll use it for backing vocals to move them back in the mix without reducing their volume. (Even though reverb is a time-based effect, our brains interpret it as a spacial effect.)

 

Plangentmusic: I'm not a full-time professional sound operator, but I've done it enough over the past 40+ years to know that reverb CAN cause monitors to feed back in some situations (such as my practice space or highly reflective stage areas).

I typically run my band's sound from the stage, so I need a monitor with the same mix (including effects) as the FOH. Even though I'm only using effects to thicken and place the vocals, there are times when I need to position that cab differently than the other monitors to prevent feedback. There are also times when I can run the FOH mix though all the monitors to help us self-mix. Depends greatly on the room.

[J. Dan]

I agree 100% with everything WCriley said. I don't know what kind of rooms you're playing, but usually there's enough "room" going on that the challenge is getting the vocals to cleanly cut through the mix and be out front without feedback. Adding even more reverb can be detrimental. Now if it's a really dry room, and especially if it's outside, then a little can be beneficial. Most of the effects our sound guys use are actually "effects" - mostly echoes/delays where appropriate, usually on specific words...think Billy idol, rebel yell " more, more, more, more, more.."

 

Again, with the monitor, it's the same issue. The better your vocal can cut through and be clear, the better you can hear yourself, and the better your pitch will be. I would almost guarantee that a singer with reverb in his monitor will want to run it hotter than one without. Which, besides pitch issues, will increase the possibility of feedback. We use IEMs and keep the vocals dry in our ears. It doesn't get any drier than that, yet you can still hear some of the room picked up by the vocal mics. It took some getting used to, but I'm sure anyone who's heard us live would say our vocals are flawless!

[Griffinator]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who experiences those issues.

 

A band I ran sound for a few years back had a gig at this beer joint where the stage and dance floor area used to be a stage and a ballroom, and the acoustics were exactly what you'd expect in such a setup - ECHO CHAMBER. Feedback was a nightmare the whole night, and taming the high frequencies was worse - normally 100 dB isn't that loud in that sort of environment - but the room reflections were so bright it made the whole damned mix blisteringly loud. I had to slam the subs and back the tops down to near inaudibility just to keep customers in the building from rupturing eardrums.

 

I came in there a couple weeks later to see another band I knew, just to see how they dealt with it - apparently the guy who ran sound for them was partially HF tone deaf - he had the highs cranked up on the board and he was pumping a low-cut reverb on the vocals (on top of the room) and people were clearing out as fast as they could. I ran over to the board and told him what the hell was going on in the back, and how people were complaining - he was like "I don't understand - it's only 105dB in here"...

 

I ended up getting hired by that band shortly after they fired him...