Vocal Effects: R&B

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ron1ron11
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Ron1ron11

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I'm recording and also producing my own songs. I do mainly R&B. What I'm trying to figure out is how to add effects to my vocals. I wanna add thickness and give them some great effect changes. For example, Marques Houston's "Circle" ,Omarion's "Made for TV", Ne-Yo's "Mirror". Would appreciate if someone could give me advice. Also if you could, tell me what instruments are incorporated in some of those songs. Thanks.
 
I'm no expert but I can say that being able to listen critically to those songs you mentioned is key. Listen in headphones as well as monitors to see if you can pick out if there are layers to those vocals, if so how many, where are they panned, are the leads dead center? Are the backgrounds spread out? Are the leads dry? Do you "hear" effects on backup vocals?,Try to figure out what they applied and maybe tr to incorporate that into your mix. A lot of times vocals are compressed to add a thickness to them. Vocalist should do thier own harmonies but there are plugins to create 2,3,4 part harmonies but why do that when they can sing it themselves. Well if they can sing that is. what I would suggest is use fx sparingly on vocals. Be very subtle so that the vocalist voice sounds as natural as possible.
 
^^^ Word. Just some tips for vocals. Generally speaking, for R&B, main vocal tracks are EQ'd differently from backups. Its the contrast between the two textures that makes it sound good. For the main vocals, you can add a lot of high-end boost to give it clarity and presence, while backup vocals have little to none eq so it sounds almost dull. OR Vice versa. Or have the main vocals lacking prescence a little bit, and cut the bass frequencies of the backround vocals with a little high-end boost. That last technique I've noticed from songs like Chris Brown - Yo. Again its the contrast between the two textures that make it sound good.
 
Any Idea of what frequencies I should use for the backgrounds or even the Leads. You said add a high-end boost to the leads. Will this prevent my leads from mashing with my backs. I often hard pan backs so my mix won't sound so crowded. But this often makes things sound weird. I think its just all experimental huh. I know, I know. But I like to have at least an idea to what the Pros are doing, so I can make at least one clean track. It helps me lay out a palette for myself.
 
Listen *critically* to the songs you like. Pay attention to detail and analyze what techniques are being used. And just mimic them for a start.
 
The way you get fullness is with layering. Make sure when you record your backing vocals, you get them to exactly match each other in pitch and timing. If you get 3 good takes, you can pan one to each side and one to the middle, creating a great stereo picture. If that is not thick enough, you can add a couple other takes in there in between center and hard pan. You can also add stereo delay to one or more of your tracks to fill out the space. This delay should not be heard as much as it is felt, it just sorta fills out the space a little. Hope this helps.
 
so bringin the high end of the eq is wut i shud do when i eq my voice?
 
try cutting around da presence area on da bgv. id say 3 khz
 
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