THE PLAN IS TO START HOME RECORDING CONSIDERATIONS IN INDIVIDUAL SCENARIOS.

FIRSTLY: VOCALS TO CONSIDER.

BACK TO MICROPHONE BASICS.

I loved the choice that was the Shure SM58 Dynamic microphone that I have sung into ever since I picked up the guitar in the 1970s and sang with true purpose. I had strummed in the late 1960s. It wasn’t my own microphone. From the word go, we had a school friend who had ambitions to be a Sound Engineer. He joined our ideal. Our party of dreams. He owned all the gear for setting up and playing live. Also, he had the essential 8 track reel to reel posh ‘tape recorder’ recording equipment too. We had the guitars and amplifiers. And drum kit. All in all. Synergy of equipment perfection.

So it is a very strange turnaround that the modern day recording scenario I find myself undertaking is now a whole different ball game.

One of my lyrics in the song ‘18 years was 50 years ago’ states:

‘Gone are the promises that held your hand.

Leading you into the fight.

What once was, is now has been,

So drag yourself into the light’

They are specifically referring to this sharing in equipment, knowledge/confidence within our own specialties and resulting comfort zones regarding the decades past situation. Because I now find I have to find all of the answers out myself. Answers to all conundrums that present themselves.

So with next January soon arriving….new thoughts on re-beginning beginnings again are in mind.

VOCALS.

Vocals on GarageBand (GB) recordings have become something that needs to be really looked at over the next few weeks. Choice of microphone is the main consideration. There is an intention to re-record all the songs from scratch. Currently the tracks are not to their full song’s length, or are in no arranged format whatsoever. Arranged? Intro to verse to verse to chorus to middle 8 or bridge, to verse, etc. The considered format that brings a dynamic to a song’s delivery. Maybe all of them need an outsider’s ear too. Someone with a musical mind and a sense of each song’s purpose. I am maybe too involved in my own songs that I cannot see the wood because of all the trees.

1). VOICE and GUITAR SEPARATION.

A few weird processes that I have done over past songs, is to sing and play guitar into the same microphone at the same time. However. The vocals and guitar could never be separated for future manipulation of compression, echo, reverb, volume, etc. . ‘Why do it then?’ you ask. There was never an intention to keep songs as the ultimate finished articles, but to use the first step of voice/guitar to layer and hang other sounds on to. And it so easy to play and sing at the same time in order to remember where you are exactly in the song’s progressive. There is no way I can do this in future recordings. Separated voice and guitar format is vital.

2). LATENCY

There is also something called ‘Latency’. When using the inherent computer’s MIDI systems, like the GarageBand app and the Akai Keyboards, the sounds are of a specific metronome pace. The laid down sounds are all regulated with each other. Perfectly. The problems start when you record externally. An electric guitar plugged into an audio interface for example. The alien outside the comfortable computer programmes is introducing itself to the computer system by using a converting system that allows it to. Synchronicity of external introductions can then be problematic and result in being a little slower than the inherent system. Bluetooth systems are well known for delays. So are audio interfaces. So a catch up scenario can exist. It also happens with a microphone too. So if I play acoustic guitar or sing into the microphone (which is plugged into the audio interface) along to what I am hearing through headphones, on listening back it can produce a weird marriage in the song’s final sound. Catch up delay! A microphone plugged straight into the computer is okay. But different equipment has different requirements to connectivity. So it is not possible, with my microphone of future choice, to go direct. The chosen vintage 1970s Shure SM58 Dynamic microphone has connectivity problems aplenty. To use it I needed another piece of equipment. A pre amp booster that plugs into the audio interface! I bought the ‘TONOR TA20 Dynamic Microphone Preamp Booster. It is a professional mic/voice amplifier/preamplifier with ultra-clean gain for studio singing’. And so……a chain of equipment begins. Reminds me of that song. ‘The foot bone’s connected to the leg bone, the leg bone’s connected to the knee bone, the knee bone’s connected to the thigh bone, doing the skeleton dance. The thigh bone’s……..’.

3). CONFIDENCE IN MY VOCAL SOUND.

Vocals are strange when they are your own. Out there and laid bare. You hear back and think ‘Is this the best I can do! Is this how I actually sound?’. Well, I do ask those questions of myself actually. I strive for better technique. As yet I don’t know how to achieve it. Or, don’t know if I can in reality. The sound of vocals on GB provides you with a ‘slip road’ to confidence. Out and off the main road to where other choices of changing the sound of your voice exist. Basically, what you do is manipulate your voice to be honest. You then become insular, feel a fraud and can sit quietly and reflect. This isn’t who I am! I do use echo and reverb from time to time. If John Lennon did, then ‘why not?’ I say….. but I do want to consciously reign it in. But definitely no choosing pitch perfect opportunities. I say that, but I do not consciously know what may be inherent in certain vocal programmes! Maybe there is a little tick box where you have to turn it ‘off’ not ‘on’.

The GB ‘slip road’ of GB has a voice library with sound choices of flat, compressed, echo, reverb, etc.. But ‘slip road’ quality time is not based on sound choices. It doesn’t do it all for you. It is based in the way you record them. Basically, through headphones. You hear in a very comfortable, intimate and private way. Your World exists for you, and only you. You’re alone in that specific moment in time. No others to listen to your voice. Or watch your delivery and judge your results. So your delivery is still all important. Confidence? It actually does come purely from the ‘wearing headphones’ phenomena. You are enveloped in the sound of guitar and voice and it swirls around in an ethereal fashion. But the vocal library, for myself, is a non starter. Sing naturally and then add ambience of slight reverb, echo, etc. to marry with the song’s delivery.

Singing into the iPad externally with no headphones is completely the opposite. You hear your voice in reality. Vulnerable and as it does exactly what it says on the tin. You can alter your voice with different delivery and use a false mimicry. I actually don’t want to. I like a voice that is the singer’s own. Some singers are so unique they have magic in their vocal cords. I don’t mind mine. I truly don’t. But I have no magic in uniqueness.

4). EXPERIMENT FIRST ON IPAD? OR GO STRAIGHT INTO GARAGEBAND TO RECORD?

The iPad is ideal for capturing ideas in the moments an idea springs into your mind. A narration of a lyric. A little new melody. But no intimacy exists. Is that why some singers close their eyes on singing live? To connect with what is within. To focus on their pronounced ambience. Giving them a strength of dynamic to express in a different way.

Other GB users may have the answers to capturing vocal ambience. Currently I do not. But the simple fact of only seeing these songs, up to now, as experimental captures to learn technical knowledge has led to the lack of focus on getting a professional sound. That does not mean professional playing skills. It means achieving overall finished and polished sound that delivers properly. My vocals have been, up to now, simply trial and error.

A lot of the rules for vocal capture are very wrong. The location of my microphone is in front of my Mac screen. A piece of glass that bounces my guitar and voice straight back at the microphone and causing more echo. Also. My personal distance from the microphone is a few feet away because I am holding a guitar whilst singing. The closer your voice is to a microphone causes intimacy and depth to be present. You can sing quieter and with more soulfulness. Well…..if able to produce quality soulful vocals. I haven’t tried that sort of emotional focus.

Speaking of confidence earlier. Actually, the red button scenario can hanker results. Being in front of a microphone can be very difficult for the need to get it right. Natural delivery goes out of the window. A self consciousness creeps in when the red recording button is pressed and mistakes happen. I never check if I am hitting peak volume either. Going into that ‘red zone’ overload where the computer cannot grab and keep the vocal. It simply goes out of the recognisable capturing ability. The vocal then isn’t recorded. Literally the computer says ‘No!’. Therefore cutting off certain vocal sounds, which then fails to give true performance. So that will need addressing too.

There is still so much to learn and get clear understanding of what to avoid. And what to keep that works. However, by actually asking the right questions you get answers.

5). BRINGING EMOTION TO VOCALS.

Emotionally, there has to be an input of belief in what I write lyrically. Not all songs have to bring intense emotional content. It’s not my way of expression. But warmth, interesting lyrics and energy have to be present. The songs so far, as experiments, have brought about ‘off the cuff’ deliveries. I suppose ‘18 years was 50 years ago’ can be the first vocal experiment to up the way it is emotionally delivered. Tweaking its lyrics can assist too. It’s soon Christmas.

‘In this season, there’s a reason to chase your dream.

Blow all the blues away.

There’s no hiding in the pockets of an empty room.

You’re just sitting there wasting the days’.

Tweaking lyrics should happen on many other songs too.

6). HARMONIES.

In singing against my own voice for both strengthening the main vocal by doubling up and also harmonising for accompaniment, it has been all done ad hoc. Just gut feelings in choosing notes. No separate backing singing of ‘oohs and aahs’ and certainly no separated calls or answers against my lyrics. Having listened to the power of harmonies all my life when listening to the bands I loved was an influence from the very first time we started playing ourselves. No simple lead singer singing alone when playing live. Others contributed too. So a bit more investigative thought may be a good idea on how to both polish it all tightly and let it fall naturally emotionally.