The Song Fight Bulletin Board

I'm sure we've all seen it, Sonic Foundry WaveHammer. I've been trying to figure out if it's useful and some guys in our band swear by utilizing the '-6b and maximize' function on some vocals rather than a compressor and on the whole, it's hard for me to find a great basis for argument on the hip-hop portions of our songs. With more even paced and volumed stuff it works, but if you guys know a better way to even out spoken word type vocals, I'm all ears.

Thanks,

Cochise the oft confused

I always use the 'smooth compression' setting on my vocals. Jacks them up without distorting or clipping. I use a hardware compression on the way in but I keep the drive somewhat down so that I don't pick up too much noise. That way when I use the Sound Forge compression, I'm not jacking up too much noise with it.

I do this with acoustic guitar tracks as well. I pretty much have good hardware settings on my other instruments so I don't really have to use it much on them.

Then, after the song is mixed and exported...I pretty much do another instance of 'smooth compression' on the whole track during my mastering phase. Sometimes I turn down up the threshold and turn down the ratio if the song is instrument intensive.

Hope I'm helping.

if all you have is sound forge, wavehammer is fine. it's def the easiest compressor/limiter to use of the bunch.

if you can get a VST capable program, waves rvox is a super-easy, clean, and pleasant-sounding vocal compressor.

If your vocals are so wildly uneven, first talk to your vocalist about it. They could either try to give a more even performance, or work the mic by backing off during the loud parts, and moving closer for the soft parts. If it is the sort of thing where the verse is quiet and the chorus loud, put each part on a separate track and compress individually. If it is just a word of two here and there that is too loud or too soft, cut up the waveform and adjust the volumes of each piece until they are about the same. I think this is a favorite technique of MC Frontalot.

If you've got some cash, the UAD-1 LA2A is the easiest, best sounding vocal compressor I've ever used.


Ken