Vocal Tracks and Home Work (In the Studio I)

This past Wednesday I went to the studio with Break the Fall's singer Gavin to hang while he was recording. This was the third trip I have taken to the studio so it is about time I get some words out about it. To me, being in the studio with the pros working with you is a dream come true. You can spent a year watching videos and reading posts on the internet to gather information to help you understand studio life more, but nothing comes down to spending 10 hours in the studio watching someone who knows what they are doing. In the picture to the right you can see Gavin in the background running through vocals while Matt is running through different vocal effects. If i have learned anything it is how to place vocals and the strategy that it takes to record them. While I'm not revealing specifics about the song we were recording, we did double the vocals throughout the track. One thing I never really took thought in is how powerful doubling vocals can be. Not to mention that you are not just doubling to fill out the sound, but the second vocal track can contain harmonics and effects. Of course, you need to keep in mind that one of the vocal layers needs to be played out more than the other, which is the lead vocal track. The lead vocal track sits just above the guitars and never drowns out the entire mix. The second vocal track whether a harmony or only having effects applied fills out the first layer and says "hey, I'm here, listen to me." Overall you end up with the coolest sounding vocal tracks ever. Gavin always says that the best part about being in the studio is being able to harmonize to him self. When your in the studio you get to experiment. Your not in the studio to just record your track and get done with it. As a band and with the input of the studio we try to one up our selves. We want to make our studio tracks better than what we started with. This way we have something to work towards and we get to be creative with the tracks. The best way to do it is to accept advice from the Audio Engineers that are recording you. There is why they work in the studio and chances are they know what they are doing. Don't forget that you get what you pay for. So, your neighbor that has a iPod recording app is not a favorable choice.

In between watching Matt work his recording magic, sadly, I had homework. If you have ever heard of the saying "mind over matter" then you should find this next statement to contain some humor. My mind was in the studio and my matter was with Anatomy and Physiology. Luckily I was taking notes, so I basically copied the textbook word for word in note taking form. If you're thinking "what does this have to do about music," give me a second, I'm getting to the point. Normally, when my teacher has us take our own notes over the chapter it means we are having a quiz the next day. So, I was content on taking good notes to be ready for the quiz. As it so happens, my teacher was in good spirit and decided not to quiz us. 5 pages of notes wasted. Now, what you have been waiting for, when in the studio you can watch and take notes of what the engineer is doing. You may not use the new techniques and ideas the next day or for quite some time. But, later down the road when the test comes, you will be glad that you were paying attention.


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