How to Record Vocals like a Pro from Your Home Studio! | The Keys to PROFESSIONAL QUALITY VOCALS

what's good youtube you already know who it is man it's your boy q aka the waves man man man here with the wave knobby.com to make sure your vocals go from something like this let me on and now hold on to something like this [Music] what's good everybody welcome back to away monopoly tutorial where today we are going to be going over how to record vocals properly like the professionals okay so today we're going to be going over a number of different techniques that are going to be super instrumental to getting you the sound that you're looking for coming out of those speakers okay so what we're going to be going into are a number of different things guys and right now we can take a look at it right here as you can see we're going to be going through these right here all right now these are going to make sure that you're able to get a good sound going into the microphone so that you have a great sound coming out of it all right guys now let's go over one of the most important aspects when it comes to recording vocals anywhere all right and that's the actual environment that you're recording the vocals in now when i say that i mean the actual room that you're recording your vocals in all right now most of us we are at a home studio right so we have a lot of blank walls all right we might be in a square room where there's a lot of blank walls and that's very bad for vocal recording because you'll get all type of slap back delays all type of reverbs echoes and these are things that come with the room so if those things are in the room already that just means that something that you can't control all right now when it comes to recording vocals the most important thing is having control over what goes into that microphone once it gets into your dog you want ultimate control over it so the best thing to do is have a dry sound going into that microphone so that you have ultimate control over it inside the door so how do we conquer that problem well we have to treat the room now yes treating the room can become very costly but at the same time there's many different cost-effective ways to go about treating your room and the room that i'm currently in right now is acoustically treated each of these walls have a two inch thick fiberglass acoustic panels behind the fabric on the wall okay now that can be very expensive okay so there are other more cost effective ways to go about treating your room for instance if you see my last home studio tour you'll see that i actually had the room treated before with acoustic panels though it didn't cover the whole entire wall like this home studio it definitely did the trick and i was able to record amazing vocals inside that room now if you need a more cost-effective way and you just can't afford to get that type of acoustic treatment you're still in luck all right because most of us have a closet okay filled with clothes filled with clothes i've done it before i've recorded a lot of songs that you guys have actually heard inside of closets before okay now if you have a closet and you you just stick your microphone in between that bunch of clothes okay you pat it with you pat it with pillows you get a cover hang it over your back on top of the you know top of the railing anything that you need to do to basically get a fabric around that microphone with a little bit of space to eliminate the blank walls is gonna do you very well with acoustically treating your room okay guys so that's acoustic treating now step number two is your microphone all right everybody is just such a pandemonium about what microphone people are using um and and what i think about it i think it's less of the microphone that you're using but actually how you're using the microphone okay i believe most microphones do the trick okay i definitely do yes there are microphones that sound better than others of course of course but i think most microphones do the job whether they're around a hundred dollars up to 500 or even further of course but it gets super miniscule and the quality that changes from about 500 up into those higher range of microphones but of course you know professionals are very very very antsy when it comes to all those little details make the big um difference but like i said guys i think most microphones work now when it comes to microphones i definitely recommend anybody giving a vocal performance to get a condenser microphone with a cordioid polar pattern now what is a cardioid polar pattern now what that means is using the front of the microphone it's picking up sound only coming from directly in front of this diaphragm right in front of here see that diaphragm is kind of shining yeah picks it up straight in front of that okay now the reason being is because basically when you're recording you want as little room sound like we said as possible you don't want it picking up your ac you don't want it picking up your fan from your computer you want it picking up your voicing your voice only so i would definitely recommend that a cardioid polar pattern condenser microphone okay if you want to know what i recommend around 100 or so these are the microphones i recommend for about a hundred dollars and these are the microphones i kind of recommend for about up to 500 all right now regardless of the microphone that you're using guys you're going to need a pop filter what is a pop filter a pop filter is a piece of fabric whether it be you know fabric or in this case i have a metal pop filter that stops all the plosives between you and the microphone this is very important because what happens is if you do not have a pop filter and you're recording it to the microphone you're going to be getting a lot of plosives okay which are very those those airy type of clicks and pops that you're not looking for when you're recording one of the main things that i want to go over right now is called the proximity effect okay so proximity effect is basically going into how close or how far you are to the microphone okay so we have our microphone and we have the pop filter okay now i recommend being about this far from the microphone your hand about open handed this far from the microphone when you're recording vocals okay this is what i recommend now what the proximity effect is the closer you get to the microphone the more closer it's gonna sound it's gonna have a lot more bass picking up into the microphone it's gonna have a lot more bass uh be a lot thicker vocal okay now you can use this to your advantage when it comes to maybe a you know maybe you have a higher tone of vocal and you don't have too much bass in your voice so what you want to do is come closer and you want to be up on that microphone and you can kind of use this to achieve that more fuller sound okay and likewise if you have a lot of bass in your voice you might want to push away from the microphone to kind of get a more thinner cleaner crisper sound okay you want to push further away from the microphone looking directly into that microphone so that you're getting the best sound possible okay that's the proximity effect and like i said you can use it in many different ways guys um so when it comes to trying to achieve a more emotional effect you might want to pull closer to the microphone to get more intimacy with that microphone okay and like i said when you're getting you know maybe you're doing a chance a chancy type of hook you might want to literally step far away from that microphone and scream and chance and use the actual room sound to get picked up into the microphone so it can actually get that chancy type of vibe guys that is how you take advantage of the proximity effect now the next thing that i think it's really overlooked when it comes to recording vocals guys is headphones all right headphones i think this gets super overlooked many different times guys is the headphones that you're using and how you're using them when you're recording okay lots of times i'll receive mixes guys and i'm literally hearing the song if i mute the beat i'm gonna be hearing the song while the person's rapping like i shouldn't be hearing headphones in your main vocal leads all right so the first thing is guys make sure you have a good vocal balance in your headphones okay um many people like i said crank the volume way up to the point where you cannot you can't get rid of it it's double vocal inside okay and that's what you don't want okay you don't want headphone bleed the music bleeding into the vocal recording okay guys so i definitely recommend closed back headphones okay closed back headphones are exactly how they sound they're closed headphones with this this kind of foamy material here it kind of muffles so when it gets on your ear it grabs the whole ear now what this does it eliminates anything coming in you know what you're hearing and you don't hear background noise you don't hear any of that and it keeps what's in here in your ears okay so definitely when recording get closed back headphones and these are some of the closed back headphones that i recommend all right now i don't really recommend going over 200 for headphones it's just something that i've never done and i've been totally fine uh really the headphones that i use are only a hundred dollars and i swear by them now when i'm recording guys with headphones i have one side actually fully on and then i have another side halfway off and on now the reason why i record this way is because i feel like it gives me a truer sound it gives me a truer perception of what i'm putting through the microphone i've seen people definitely record with two ear muffs on but in my case guys that that that that kind of skews my performance when i'm going through the microphone i'll i'll overdo it sometimes because i'm over compensating for not really hearing my actual voice come through my ear so like i said guys i kind of do this to make sure i'm in tune i make sure that i'm you know getting all my pronunciation all my little nuances correct i like to have a headphone off to hear that alright now that we got all that out the way guys the next thing is checking your levels all right levels are very important guys because levels literally are is your vocal gain and levels going into the daw alright now this step is probably most crucial because when you're recording your vocals guys there is no undoing this the only way to undo this is going to be you actually recording your vocals all right and a lot of people and i've had this problem before where i'll record vocals you know i'll start a song then go to the next day and start to record that same vocal uh track and it doesn't sound the same and that's probably one of the most frustrating parts of recording music and this doing it this way i would hate for you to go record and you hear your song and you hear it clipping you hear noise in it you got to re-record it and it just never was the same drizzy nothing was the same okay i don't want that to happen to you so guys please please please please please pay attention to your vocal levels okay guys so optimal recording level i will tell you to record anywhere from about negative 16 um negative 12 to about negative 10 dbs okay now always when checking your levels guys look at the meters look at the meters do not look at the waves okay because in different daws guys those waves that you're looking at can actually be changed and it has nothing to do with the game coming into the microphone so please always look at the meters guys meters don't lie right always look at the meters okay now that we went over the mic the microphone placement headphones room treatment and microphone levels guys the next thing that i strongly recommend is recording into a preset okay recording into a template all right now what a template is it's basically a session that is mapped out with all the vocal chains that basically get you to that almost finished level okay of recording quality now the reason why i say recording to a template is because for an artist this all this is all the difference all right it gives you confidence it gives you a a a kind of like a a map of what that song is gonna sound like from the start of how it's gonna sound like at the end okay with minor tweaks you know what i'm saying so this gives you that confidence to actually get a great performance out of your artist now that is the most important part guys getting the performance out of your artist the confident performance okay now recording to a dry session a no-go all right you have no vision of where that song is headed to all right another great reason of using a template is because it gives you a lot of inspiration all right not just inspiration to record but what to record it it'll help you get different different nuances in your voice because you're hearing what that's going to sound like on record you get what i'm saying so i strongly recommend finding a template building a template or if you don't have a template guys visit wavemanappy.com where we have vocal preset templates guys it's fully mapped out for all type of different sounds vibes voices all type of different things guys it's literally like being over the shoulder of the mixed engineers to your favorite artist except for you have it first hand on your computer like if i had templates when i was you know first starting out it literally skips so much of that learning curve that it takes to learn how to vocally mix when you have it right in front of you seeing how these chains are created and how these things are supposed to look and give you that idea for you to just customize to exactly your voice all right guys so definitely check that out link in the description wavemanappy.com okay guys so that's another tip to record into a vocal template all right guys so now that you have a session that's actually ready to record into guys there's nothing more important than perfecting the lead vocal okay guys nothing is more important than perfecting the lead vocal yes in a session there's going to be a lot more things going on than a lead vocal you got your instrumental you got your vocal dubs you got your background vocals you got your ad-libs here panning here left right everywhere but nothing is more important than nailing that lead vocal guy so make sure you're nailing that lead vocal take the time to truly perfect that lead vocal because it is the main part of the song all right guys now when you come into a session and you're ready to record guys unless you're creating the song on spot and your experience with creating a song on spot landing the emotions landing all those little nuances on spot guys please have your song rehearsed all right rehearse rehearse rehearse perfect it don't be in the studio reading it off your cell phone all right that's gonna skew your whole performance you're gonna be looking off to the side the microphone is not gonna be catching your vocal how it's supposed to catch it you're going to be sounding like you're reading off of something guys don't do it unless you're experienced with reading holding it here so that you're able to actually read straight here and you have the emotion and the projection going through the microphone a lot of people have not mastered that yet guys so if you're one of those people guys please rehearse rehearse rehearse perfect perfect perfect before you step in front of this microphone or you will be back to re-record or you will send it to a friend and you're not going to hear nothing back okay listen don't do it to yourself okay so guys perfect the lead vocal okay now the main thing that you're going to want to focus on when perfecting a lead vocal is projection okay you want to project all right you want to have timing okay you want to have your melodies and cadences and you're also going to want to put emotion through this microphone all right that is the most important thing guys getting that emotion that projection everything into this microphone so that it comes out sounding the way that you want it to sound all right don't think that you're going to come here i've been trying to get it every single day i've been grinding grinding grinding all the way i've been grinding grinding grinding all the way and think it's gonna come out sounded like grinding grinding don't think it's gonna come out yo don't think it's gonna come out how you think it's gonna come out all right you gotta go through this microphone i be grinding grinding all right i don't even know what i'm talking about but listen let's get into this guys i'm gonna give you example of how to project through this microphone guys you're gonna wanna project your voice through the microphone like you're talking to somebody behind the microphone all right gonna want to get your emotions into it guys your emotions emotions is very important all right all those little cracks that you'll hear in voices you know you might hear the young thug hey hey it's like a little cough he's putting in there okay don't be afraid of those imperfections those emotional things that's going to come across those grunts if you're singing do not be afraid to put that in the microphone because those are the things that's going to give you those nice characteristics to evoke the emotions that you're going to want to be coming through these microphones to your listeners all right guys by doing this guys experiment experiment experiment so that you find what makes you you as an artist okay guys experiment do not be afraid of those imperfections because that could be the thing that makes you you you get what i'm saying all right all right let's get into it man so let's go through an example a live example so you can see exactly what i'm talking about right now i'm gonna show you guys how to record properly with emotion and perfecting that lead vocal so that you're able to get what you what you want to come out you feel what i'm saying so as you can see on the screen guys we are looking at the kid roy's vocal preset template for pro tools this is the waves version and so we're just going to record right into it i didn't touch anything no eq's no anything let's go ahead and get into it and actually start recording all right guys now let's get it as you can hear this sounds amazing let's get into it man so let's go ahead and record my brain i'm starting [Music] i want you caught [Music] as you can hear you can hear the emotion that i'm putting into this record literally i'm literally i'm adding the grunts those those roughness in the back of my throat i'm adding that i'm adding the i'm adding the the cuts in between that vocal guys i'm adding those things to translate this emotion through this track let's listen to it um [Music] it's crazy like literally going through this already this template i'm already feeling inspired uh let me just go ahead like i'm feeling super inspired oh that's crazy [Music] let's try something let's try something out [Music] [Music] ain't been the same since you let me on and now i want you gone gone crazy super inspired by just hearing the different effects that this preset is bringing it's allowing me to literally just go in there and put my vision down let's get it it sounded like a full track already [Music] [Music] go i want you guys sounding crazy guys perfect the lead vocal that's like a little far here but perfectly vocal guys takeaway note let's get into the next step now the next step that you're going to need to take in order to elevate your vocals and your recordings at home guys is your vocal production and vocal arrangement now what is that that's literally all the extra things that go on behind the scenes those backgrounds those doubles there's a lot of different techniques that goes into making vocal arranging all right there's harmonies there's so many different things all right guys now there's artists like drake and roddy rich who mostly depend on their lead vocal and literally minimum to no ad-libs in the background guys literally straight lead vocals and that's enough for their music to to translate emotionally and and just bang and just make people gravitate to that music but there's so much other ways and different type of genres of music that allow to thrive in different ways and guys there's vocal doublings there's harmonies and r b type of records um pop smoke is super known for doubling all his vocals all right guys so there's many different techniques and we'll go over a few now which are doubles for instance what is a doubling vocals that you have in your lead vocal and that's also you having a second vocal that is literally saying the same things as that lead vocal all right to back that track all right it kind of gives you a bigger feel a lot of these techniques vocal arranging techniques can give your songs bigger feels and make them feel a lot more musical than just going with a lead okay guys now we'll go over an example right now i'm gonna have this song that i wrote here um this is called the truth just go ahead and listen to this vocal or this song with a lead vocal alone and then this song with harmonies added to the background okay let's go ahead and listen to it lead vocal and music only [Music] because it's me you don't know what to do [Music] now listen to that same song with the lead and all the vocally produced arranged background harmonies and doubles in the background [Music] wow that that's a huge super crazy difference now you're listen we're all entitled to our own opinion but if you ask me i like the second one better for this song all right this song is a r b song and i think that this makes this a lot more musical a lot more emotion evoked with the harmonies in the background guys and these are things that you can implement into your recordings which are going to give you better vocals from home now the last and most overlooked technique guys is vocal editing cleaning up your takes cleaning up your takes is all the difference okay guys there's different things we can do we can clean up our takes we can nudge vocals that are off timing we want to perfect these vocals so nudging vocals are okay get them on time if you're doing doubles if you're doing harmonies nudge those vocals make sure they're on time use automation to get rid of some of those breaths but keep them natural at the same time or cut the breaths if you don't desire breath for song get rid of all those clicks and pops get rid of that space bar when we stop recording at the end that that's what gets me every time to stop when i click that space button it gets me every time so make sure you get rid of that at the end of the vocals guys listen just take the time to do the little things it's going to make all the difference all right now now that you've seen how to record vocals like the pros guys look what you still here for you already know who it is man it's your boy q from the wavemonopoly.com make them hits like now and if you're not going to go make it hit just go watch another video and step the game up you already know who it is man it's your boy cute aruba aka the wave man man man man here with the wavelength.com and hey until next time huh make them hits let's get it done

Channel: TheWavMan

Views: 930,114

Keywords: how to record, thewavman, home recording, Record vocals like a pro, Recording Vocals from your home studio, recording rap vocals, recording techniques, Vocal Prodcution, Mixing and Mastering, Wavmonopoly, recording singing vocals, How to get better sounding vocals, how to record in pro tools

Id: Ly7F8G4S444

Length: 26min 3sec (1563 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 09 2021