duplicating vocal tracks for pop

im sure youve all heard of the trick, where supposedly pop producers double up the vocal tracks and slide one of them over a few milliseconds or something. well, i sat on that knowledge like an arrogant bastard for years, until i tried it out with some of my own vocal tracks, and now im completely not understanding things. when i do it, it just sounds like ive applied a phaser to the vocal track, and it sounds like shit. ive learned that around the 10 millisecond area, is when the ear can pick up on subtle nuances of sounds, but im finding that even a few milliseconds of track sliding creates this phasing effect. im not going to open up the file and look, but i think im having best success moving tracks around just a couple milliseconds or so. i dont know, maybe because im not moving around kylie minogue tracks, its just always going to suck

anyone know whats up?

It sounds like a phaser because you're putting them in and out of phase. Like a phaser.

maybe try panning them hard left and right??

I think they record the vocal twice

  On 2/11/2012 at 5:02 PM, zkreso said:

I think they record the vocal twice

yeah, doubling doesn't work so well. Pro's re-record the vocals many times to create that effect. Phasing will be an issue if you just duplicate a track.

  On 2/11/2012 at 5:02 PM, zkreso said:

I think they record the vocal twice

This - or if you don't want to do that, there's always this:

http://www.waves.com/Content.aspx?id=246

You either gotta do a lot of editing or the vocalist needs to be good at repeating themselves really well. It's quite easy for vocal double taking to sound really sloppy and make it hard to understand. I've been double, triple, quadruple, octuple tracking etc. vocal parts for like 8 years and if I want vocals to sound really pop, clear and powerful I always get better results by just tracking one lead vocal.

I'm pretty sure their is quite a few techniques to achieve these besides tracking two leads or using a doubler VST.

I will leave it up to you to google it.

thanks guys

  On 2/11/2012 at 10:17 PM, Blanket Fort Collapse said:

You either gotta do a lot of editing or the vocalist needs to be good at repeating themselves really well. It's quite easy for vocal double taking to sound really sloppy and make it hard to understand. I've been double, triple, quadruple, octuple tracking etc. vocal parts for like 8 years and if I want vocals to sound really pop, clear and powerful I always get better results by just tracking one lead vocal.

 

I'm pretty sure their is quite a few techniques to achieve these besides tracking two leads or using a doubler VST.

 

I will leave it up to you to google it.

BAH I DISAGREE WAHHHHHHHHHH

Subtle differences in takes is what makes it sound fuller. Don't go the lazy way! It doesn't sound as good!

Haha calm down Sneaky Sneaks, I've never used a doubler VST, or duplicated one lead with a millisecond gap or anything. I meant that I really only like to use one vocal track to get the most thick, punchy, easy to understand lead vocal I know how to get (with no fake doubling) I am really really good at improvising a line and then going back and going instant robot repeating the vocal with harmony or slight changes but people complain that they can't understand me as well unless I do just one vocal track (with no fake doubling)

People can rightfully call me a procrastinator but you can't call me lazy when it comes to making music. If I can find a way to make things 5,000,000 times more difficult to things possibly sound 0.00312321356 times better, I will for some reason gladly make my life a pain in the dick.