3 Steps to Cutting Cleaner Vocals At Home:

1.) Get your gear right. If you use a $100 microphone, its gonna pretty much sound like garbage no matter what you do. Remember, you are using the mic to capture the a voice… so the better the microphone you capture it with, the better it is going to sound in the long run. I’m not going to get into which microphones are the best, because that depends on what your budget is and what sound you are trying to get. Go online and do some research before you buy anything. On that note, buy a decent pre-amp, too. It’s the same principle. Everything that is in the chain before the signal gets recorded has an effect on the sound. That includes cables.

2.) Isolate. If you don’t have some sort of makeshift vocal booth, put the microphone in a different room from the computer. Especially if you are using a desktop computer. Computers tend to make noise. External hard drives make noise too, and this noise, while it might not seem like a lot to you, will be picked up by the mic. Also, try not to have your headphones on 11. Keeping headphones at a lower volume will not only save your hearing, thus extending your career, but it will reduce headphone bleed into the mic.

3.) Avoid parallel walls. When two sound waves of equal frequency and amplitude are traveling opposite directions, they interfere with each other, causing standing waves, which sound really harsh and unpleasant. This is likely to happen with parallel walls, and your microphone will pick them up. This includes ceilings that are parallel with the floor, although carpet should help a little bit with this. Also, a lot of people think just because they have a walk-in closet, they can stick a microphone in there and it will sound isolated. That’s a terrible idea. The best thing you can do to treat a parallel wall is put up a screen or lean a mattress against the wall at an angle, something like that.

These tips were based on questions that I received via email. I realize they are quite basic. Do you guys want me to address more complicated issues? Let me know. LEAVE COMMENTS.

I have some other questions to answer, so you will be reading more tips of this nature very soon. I also have a video to post that I am very excited about. It demonstrates a few more ways to get cleaner sounding vocals in a home studio without a recording booth, so keep on the lookout.

-Zach

Why does "crap" still dominate the radio?

WOW! Its been so long since I updated this. I have been terribly negligent, and for that, I apologize. I have so much going on. I have been working at the studio, building www.zsteele.com, and trying to get more freelance work, all at the same time, on top of a few other endeavors. But enough excuses…

I have been receiving some very good questions via email, facebook, etc. I will respond to as many as I can via this blog and Youtube. I am starting with this question:

Why is the radio still dominated by crap?

There are several answers that make sense to me. It is easier to make music with little or no budget. It is easier to promote music to an enormous audience with Internet marketing becoming increasingly important.

There is also the idea that it doesn’t matter what you know, it matters WHO you know. Crappy artists get signed to labels that have a lot of pull on radio stations. Blah.

I think all of those answers are irrelevant in comparison to this one:

The music you think is “crap” is greatly enjoyed by millions.

Everybody has different experiences, and evaluates their music, along with the rest of their life, through a different lens. Some people identify with the energy and style that Soulja Boy presents. Most of these people are teenagers, and I’m sure a great deal of them are girls. So if you don’t like it… you aren’t really supposed to.

Then there are other people who live a completely different lifestyle, and can’t identify with that music at all. Maybe they can identify more with a rock band that is angry at the world.

In addition I think there are a few different things that people like about music, and everyone’s criteria is different. Do you like music with a good beat and could care less about the lyrics? Do you like music with thoughtful or poetic language? Do certain songs just speak to you, and you have no idea why you like them, and feel like you probably shouldn’t tell anyone that you like it because it is someone who you and your friends have a general distaste for?

Long story short, different people like different shit. In fact I think I like a lot of the music I hear on the radio. There, I said it.