Cheap Advice On Music

When music is played live, each song must have some kind of ending, whether it be a strike-and-hold final chord, a snappy “cha-cha-cha,” or one of those crazy all-out noisefests with everybody in the band going nuts on their instruments for awhile and then suddenly stopping, to tumultuous applause (and possibly some jeering).

With the advent of recording, the need to definitively end each and every song was eliminated. Now, if you couldn’t come up with a proper ending you could just vamp along to some simple chords from the song for 20 or 30 seconds at the end and then gradually fade the level down to zero during the vamp when the song is mastered. Needless to say, this production technique became very popular, and remains so today.

Whether you do your fadeouts “by hand” or use an automatic fadeout function built into your DAW or software, there are certain guidelines you should follow to make sure that the fade sounds natural and that it provides a suitable, if somewhat inconclusive, ending for your song. Here are some tips to keep in mind.

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When we mix a song, there are basically two ways to hear what we are doing as we tweak our faders and spin our knobs: monitor speakers, or headphones. Although each has its advantages and disadvantages, there is general agreement that your mixes will come out better if your listening is done through a pair of high-quality monitor speakers in a sonically appropriate room.

Monitor speakers are designed to give a fair, “colorless” reproduction of your mixes. Over time, and with the use of techniques like listening to CDs you know well through your monitor speakers for reference and EQing the signal the speakers receive from the recorder or DAW to match your room, you will develop a sense of exactly how your mix needs to sound in the mixing studio in order to sound great in a car or a living room, or through an iPod with earbuds.

Having said this, there are reasons to mix using headphones, such as not being able to afford proper monitor speakers or needing to mix late at night when others are asleep. And naturally, you will check each candidate mix by playing it in your car and living room (and through your iPod) to see what final tweaks may be needed anyway. The final evaluation is made through “real world” sound systems, not studio monitors or studio headphones.

These days, with the popularity of portable mp3 players soaring, an awful lot of listening goes on in headphones (or lo-fi earbuds). Given this, you can make the case that it could be more appropriate to use headphones if you are mixing a song that you know will be heard mostly in headphones.

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Sometimes I write a song that comes with an arrangement “included.” That is, specific instrumental and backup-vocal parts “come to me” right along with the chords, melody, and lyrics. (Songs based on riffs or other signature melodic figures are often like this.) In this case, recording the song is simply a matter of laying down the needed parts one by one as they were originally conceived, or as close as I can get to it!

Most often, though, the “song” as written is basically just a melody and lyrics accompanied by chords strummed on an acoustic guitar. All decisions about instrumentation, textures, harmony, and so on are left to be determined when I finally record the song. But when that time comes, how do I decide what to actually play?

I have a standard sequence for recording a typical song that I can always fall back on. First I record a click track (to be erased later) and a strummed guitar to establish the rhythm and the chord pattern. Then I add drums, then bass guitar or a keyboard bass. A pad-type keyboard comes next, followed by a lead part on guitar or keyboard. Finally, I add a couple of backup vocals, one or two lead vocal parts, and maybe a tambourine or maracas. And there’s my typical song!

Assuming that I am making up the arrangement as I go, the various parts always get made up in the same order with this approach: rhythm guitar, then drums, then bass, etc. The later parts tend to be more inspired because more of the song is “there” when I make them up. In contrast, when I’m doing the drums I don’t really know exactly what I’m drumming along with because I haven’t made it up yet!

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Most songs we write and record have instruments and/or vocals, but nothing else. Let’s face it, the most exotic sound on most of our recordings is a tambourine. This is not necessarily a Bad Thing. After all, “instruments and/or vocals” takes in a pretty wide range, from Gregorian Chant to Smooth R&B and everything in between! But every now and then, just for the sheer novelty value, you ought to consider using some kind of sound effects in one of your songs.

Some songs, like “Yellow Submarine” by the Beatles, are positively filled with scene-setting sound effects. Birds twitter throughout “Blackbird” by the same band. More recently, digital mixmeister Beck and others have combined “found sounds” and other effects with musical samples to create audio collages in their songs. Of course, this is a technique where a little bit can go a long way. There’s no need to overdo it!

As a songwriter, you can specify what sound effects will be heard when by adding notations like (alarm clock here) to your lyrics sheet, or at least having a firm idea of what specific effects will be used where as you write the song. In this case, the effects would be considered part of the song. Alternatively, you can wait until you have your Producer hat on and decide whether and where to add sound effects when you mix the song. Here, the effects would be considered part of the arrangement. Read the rest…

Among the many decisions we face when mixing a typical song, one of the most important is what effects, if any, we are going to add to the recorded tracks. In particular, the addition of artificial reverb to one or more of the vocal parts can have a big impact on how that vocal sounds in the final mix. In this article, I will use one of my own songs to demonstrate the result of adding reverb to lead and/or backup vocals.

Let me start with some general advice about using reverb. To begin with, I recommend that you record the vocals “dry,” with no reverb, to give yourself maximum flexibility at mixing time. You don’t want to get locked in to a reverb setting that sounded great during recording but now doesn’t “go” with the rest of the mix. (Note that I would put plenty of reverb on the vocal monitor signal you send to the artist - it’s a real confidence builder. Just don’t record the reverb.)

My second tip is to make your reverb adjustments for individual vocals and instruments while listening to the full mix. When setting reverb, it is always tempting to “solo” the vocal or instrument in question (i.e. listen to it by itself) to see how the reverb sounds. The fact is, it doesn’t matter how it sounds with the instrument alone, since that’s not the way it will be heard! Every reverb adjustment, whether to level, duration, or color, should be made in the context of the full mix. (After you get it perfect, then listen to each source alone if you want, but I’m warning you. Some will sound “wrong.” Don’t you go “fixing” them!)

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When it comes time to mix those 8 or 16 or however many tracks down to stereo, there are three basic factors under your control for each track: (1) volume level; (2) EQ and effects; and (3) stereo position (panning).

In this article, I would like to offer some cheap advice on stereo panning. This may seem rather unimportant compared with the other factors, merely a matter of placing the most important elements in the center and panning secondary guitars and keyboards to the right and left. There. Done! But of course there’s more to it than that.

A lot of today’s listening takes place in headphones, where the placement of sounds to the left or right is very obvious. Stereo drums sound very different from mono drums in headphones. Same with any other stereo signal, like the stereo return from a reverb or chorus unit. Everything seems exaggerated and hyper-clear in headphones, which is not surprising considering that the sounds seem to be coming from inside the listener’s head!

With this in mind, I have found the following practices to be advantageous.

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When we record and mix a new song, we naturally give a lot of thought to handling the primary musical elements: the drums, the vocals, the lead guitar, and so on. We consider relative volume levels and EQ, stereo placement, and the use of reverb or other effects for each track. But to make a great recording, we need to give just as much consideration to the secondary musical elements, like percussion, harmonies, and backup vocals. These elements provide the details and accents that make a good song into something really special.

In this article, I want to focus on the recording and mixing of backup vocals. Now, when I speak of backup vocals, I am not talking about harmony vocals, in which the harmonizing vocal part sings the same lyrics at the same time as the lead vocal. I am talking about vocal parts that just go “oo” or “ah” in the background, or that repeat (or anticipate) lyrics sung elsewhere in the song, or that sing lyrics not sung elsewhere in the song in a call-and-response pattern with the lead vocal.

For me, backup vocals must be sung in at least two-part if not three-part harmony. In general, there is nothing more pathetic than a single voice going “oo, oo” behind the lead singer! Most of the backup vocal parts in the songs I record are in close two-part harmony.

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