How to EQ Vocals Using a Simple Graphic Equalizer Like EQ Vocals How to use simple graphic eq settings for recording and mixing vocals for professional sounding home recordings by Owen Critchley, LoudThud recording artist/producer and creator of the bestselling Easy Home Recording Blueprint Become a Blueprint recording artist and find out how to simply and affordably get your songs sounding the way they should. Hi everyone. It s been fun putting this special section together for you on simplifying the process of how to eq vocals using a simple graphic equalizer. It s pretty comprehensive because I wanted to take you right from the very beginning of a new project from the moment one decides to create a new recording right to the finish line EQ-ing the vocals and mixing them with the rest of the tracks. This lesson will show you how to be in control of the vocal EQ process so you can concentrate on your creativity and de-mystify EQ so you aren t stuck and slowed down by the technical part of mixing sound. Watch the video version of this lesson but all the info is also included on the rest of this page in case you want to print the info. Page 1 of 20
I always believe it s so important to create good working habits because it breeds true confidence and ultimately, much better recordings. I ve recorded one of my tunes for this section and we ll be looking at the steps that were used in EQ-ing the lead vocal, as well as how the many background vocal layers were EQ-ed and mixed. I think it will be useful for you to have this topic targeted and put all in one section like this. I hope you enjoy it. Ok, here we go When it is time to eq vocals, you ve already got a deep well of knowledge that you may not be aware of. The great news is you can tap into this well of existing knowledge to make learning quicker and to get better results when you are tackling something that you are unfamiliar with or something a little outside your comfort zone. TIP: Your first vocal recording tip (and it has a direct effect on your vocal EQ success) is this: Yes, the mic you choose matters. Because, vocal EQ is a lot quicker and easier if you make sure to use a decent mic that doesn t unpleasantly color the sound of your vocal. BUT, you don t have to spend a ton for a good mic. I use the mic shown in the picture below, and the EQ adjustments once I ve recorded a vocal are pretty minor and straight forward, which saves hours of time during the course of a recording session Page 2 of 20
and mix. TIP: Remember that every vocal for each song you record will be EQ ed a little differently because each song will have a different color, mood and instrumentation that will determine how its lead vocal should sound and how it should best fit in the mix. Pre-Production: Why Mixing A Vocal and Your Song is Like Furnishing a Room: - A little mental trick before we start to take the mystery out of home recording and mixing Here s how this works: Many new tasks are directly relatable to everyday things you already know how to do. So, the trick is to find similarities in the new tasks you are learning with everyday stuff you already understand. Because ultimately, everything you do is connected and comparable to something else you do. When you create the habit of taking a few minutes to find these connections and comparisons, it makes your brain more receptive and learning, improving and mastering the new task much faster. We ll use this technique to create real confidence next time you eq vocals. And very soon, you ll be Page 3 of 20
able to count on making great sounding vocal recordings and mixes every time. What I m trying to say is that, in a way, you already know how to do all of this. I know it s spooky. But really, we re just re-using the mental tools you already have from one everyday task and putting these mental tools to use in your recording and mixing. What everyday task can we compare to EQ-ing vocals that ll make the recording process easier and clearer for our brains? Let s see because any kind of audio recording has to occupy the same size sonic space, let s compare eq-ing and mixing our recorded tracks to furnishing and decorating a room. Because the common sense that goes with placing and arranging your stuff in a room is very similar to choosing, placing and controlling how your tracks will each sound in your recording. A room is a fixed space with a certain amount of floor space, wall space and height. And you have to choose places for each of the things for your room based on the size and shape of each piece. And you know without even thinking that two or more things can t occupy the same place in your room without things becoming messy. In the room scenario, you are used to the pre-planning that goes into imagining and then creating the kind of room you want before starting to fill it, right? Page 4 of 20
You accept that you would start by thinking about your room, then do some measuring, and then decide what can go in there. Want a couch? Get out the measuring tape so we buy the right size. TV? How big? Where will it go? How about another two chairs and a coffee table? What size will they have to be to fit? How tall can the lamp be? A potted plant? Might not be room on the floor for it. Ok, so a hanging plant then. Yes, now the plant will fit. Page 5 of 20
Arranging things in a room isn t a mysterious task. And neither is vocal EQ and mixing. These are the very same steps we should do before starting any new song s recording session. Hey, if we understand the benefits of a little pre-planning for furnishing a room, we should jump at the chance to do some effective pre-production for recording our music. Believe this: With good mental pre-production habits and clear visualization of how the recording should sound when it s done, and then knowing how to actually achieve the results we want, we ll be solving many potential problems before they even have a chance to happen. Headroom The Amount of Space Your Recording Has to Occupy We have to effectively use, but not exceed, the sonic space ( Headroom ) available for a recording. Exceed the headroom and we get distortion. This means we will basically be alotting a certain amount of room for each element of our recording. So we will be placing our parts (i.e mixing ) based on their size (i.e volume ), shape (i.e. EQ ) and position (i.e. panning ). Page 6 of 20
Ok let s start the process Pre-Recording Step 1: Clearly imagine/visualize your finished recording before you even start So important. Hear the finished song in your head before you even start recording. Believe it or not, you already know what your song s recording should sound like, but you have to pause long enough before you leap into its recording to ask yourself for some specifics. What should the tempo (i.e. speed) and what should the feel be like for this song? What should the instrumentation be for this recording? How should the lead vocal sound on this recording? Where should it sit in the recording? In other words, should the lead vocal sound like it s hovering just above the band or should it be part of an overall band sound? Page 7 of 20
These questions will give you most of the answers to how you will eq vocals for this recording before you even start the project. That s a good position to be in at the beginning of a session. It sure beats the feeling of starting a recording project with no sense of direction or feeling like the sound of the completed recording will be beyond your control. Pre- Recording Step 2: Choose an existing recording by another artist you want the sound of your recording to be like. When you decide on an existing song s sound as your goal for your own recording, the existing song s sound becomes a reference point and a sonic model as you eq vocals and mix your own song. All good engineers and producers keep a varied library of other artists releases for references a way of calibrating their ears and focusing their choices before they start the recording and mixing process. This is a huge help in successfully removing thousands of choices and blind alleyways from consideration and you can concentrate on simply achieving, step by step, the exact elements you need for your song s recording and production. A Couple of Quick Listening Tips Before We Begin to EQ Vocals in Our Example Song: Page 8 of 20
It is important to know HOW to listen to other recordings for the purpose of using them as eq and mixing reference models for the recording of one of your songs. The goal when listening to existing music that you ll be using as your EQ and mix model, is to know how to listen like a producer and not like a fan. If you are dancing around the room and playing air guitar as you listen to the songs you will be using for reference, chances are you are listening like a fan and probably aren t absorbing the little mix and eq details and therefore won t be able to recall real specifics and truly incorporate them for your own vocal sound and mix. We all need to create laser-focused listening habits so we know what is really going on and what we are really hearing in other artists mixes regarding eq. Only then can you make a real eq and mix game plan for your own session. Honing listening skills will also improve your own mixing more than almost any other factor. Page 9 of 20
Tip: Stay true to your vision for this recording and version of your song. Don t get put off track chasing alternate visions once the recording and arranging process has begun. Sure, make a note of your alternate ideas and pursue them later in another version, but focus like a laser and finish this version and reach your sonic goal for this version. As you ve probably heard me say before, A song is only finished until its next version. Let s EQ vocals in a real recording I wrote a song to record for you guys that has a bunch of little vocal details so we can see how each sound and each vocal occupies its own comfortable little space in our mix. First thing is to imagine very clearly how I want this recording to sound. So, for this tune I want a bit of the old school sound of Motown but a warmer and more modern eq approach. I m thinking I d like to eq vocals for this recording in the ballpark of someone like Jason Mraz. Second thing is to put a very simple bed track down as a guide for the lead vocal. Why? That way, by getting our vocal down early in the process, we can tailor the rest of the tracks to go well with, and stay out of the way of, the all important lead vocal. This is a good habit to prevent cluttered production, which sounds amateurish. Third, I m going to now record my vocal over the simple bed track I added for this song. (In this case, it s a simple keyboard part). As I said, I ll add the rest of the band later. Before we eq vocals for this song, let s listen to the raw, un-equalized vocal recording over the basic bed track. Page 10 of 20
Pre-Production on Vocal NO EQ for I ve Been Around by Owen Critchley Tip: Make sure to get a good, healthy input volume going to the recorded track. Right now the EQ of this vocal is un-touched. Page 11 of 20
Because of we re using a decent mic like the Rode Microphones NT1-A Condenser Mic Bundle, we have a nicely recorded vocal to work with that shouldn t need much work to sound good in our mix. Let s keep going. NOTE: The Thing About Vocal Frequencies The human vocal has a really surprising amount of ground it covers in the eq spectrum. This means it is almost always going to invade the EQ space of other instruments. For an effective mix we ll have to shape the lead vocal with some EQ tweaking. Page 12 of 20
Although the lead vocal works pretty well with our single keyboard track, as more and more instruments and layers are added, we ll definitely begin to hear that the lead vocal is having to fight for EQ space and it will become less and less clear. So at first, the recorded tracks of a song are like a bunch of furniture thrown into a room. It s no shock that it looks like a mess. It s not a mystery that everything simply needs to be placed in the place you have planned for it. It s the same thing with our tracks. Once we learn the language of EQ we ll have no trouble placing and arranging the pieces to make a mix that is clear, wide and spacious. Let s Eq Vocals Step by Step on the Example Song Here are the frequencies we are going to have to be careful about as we EQ vocals for our recording: STEP 1. The first place we always have to know there will be a crowd fighting for space with the lead vocal is down in the low bass frequencies. But that s ok because the lead vocal really doesn t need to be down there anyway. The frequencies between 20hz 63 hz are not doing anything to enhance our vocal. So we can pretty much roll them all the way down. Page 13 of 20
As you can see, we have started by rolling down the very low bass frequencies entirely. A lead vocal simply doesn t need to be using up space down there. It s really just rumble down there and adding nothing to enhance our vocal. STEP 2. Let s look at the upper bass frequencies between 80 hz 250 hz. This is a busy EQ area with bass and drums sharing space down there and low part of guitars and keyboard parts, so there are a few tweaks we need to make to prevent mud in the low end. We definitely want the lead vocal s eq to retain some presence in this area for warmth and weight but we don t want our lead vocal to get tangled up with the bass and drums and become un-defined and un-clear. In fact, we can actually piggy-back on the frequencies of other instruments and tracks to give the illusion that our vocal has more low end than it actually does. Page 14 of 20
TIP: If you d to learn more about piggy-backing frequencies, as well as everything you need to know to simply and affordably make professional quality recordings at home, download your copy of myeasy Home Recording Blueprint. We have built a great Blueprinter community that is growing bigger every day and new success stories are coming in all the time as more and more great sounding music is getting recorded at home using the simple, perfect method of the Home Recording Blueprint. Or you can even start with my free home recording lesson series. STEP 3. Now let s look at the low mid-range frequencies between approximately 250 hz 800 hz. Depending on the mic used and even the tone of the voice of the singer, a recorded vocal can have a certain boxy sound that can rob the vocal of clarity and/or sound muffled. Page 15 of 20
To deal with this we ll always have a look in the low mid-range frequencies from approximately 200 hz to around 800 hz. As you can see from the image above, a well recorded vocal normally requires only small adjustments in the various EQ frequency band, so make sure to have a light touch and listen carefully to your vocal by itself (solo-ed) and with the rest of the tracks. STEP 4. Ok, moving on to the mid- range, high mid-range and high frequencies as we continue to eq vocals for our example song. The mid-range, high mid-range and high frequencies are what help a vocal recording cut through, but that is exactly why they are probably the most mis-used frequencies in self produced and/or home recordings. It s true that mid, high-mid and high can add clarity to a vocal, but they so easily can cause harshness (especially between 2 khz and 4khz) and can add a quacky and definitely amateurish sound to a vocal recording if they are mis-used. TIP: You will find that once you tweak the boxy frequencies (see point #3 above) you may not even have to do much in the high mid-ranges between 2khz 4 khz. In other words, just by EQ-ing the vocal so it is less muffled in the low mid-range, the vocal will suddenly be clearer and seem like you ve given it a high mid-range boost even though you actually didn t touch it. It s really very cool. So, just remember when you EQ vocals, or any track for that matter, the various EQ frequencies affect each other. If you have a well recorded vocal using a decent mic, each EQ adjustment you make on the frequency sliders will normally be quite small. Page 16 of 20
As you can see in the image above, I have rolled down some of these mid and high mid-range frequency areas slightly so our vocal remains clear but still keeps its warmth. A Look at Our Final EQ Settings TIP: Regarding ultra high frequencies (20 khz) on our final lead vocal EQ settings: Remember when I said that down in the ultra-low bass frequencies around 20 hz (hertz) that there is mostly useless rumble on a vocal recording? Well, way up in the ultra-high end frequencies of 20 khz (kilohertz) except, instead of rumble, we have the situation that, although there may be some sonic activity up there, human ears can t really hear anything up there so we can roll down this frequency range as well. Accentuating that area can just use up valuable space in our sonic Page 17 of 20
space (i.e headroom ) Actually, I probably could have rolled down that 20 khz slider on the far right even more than I did. But things are sounding pretty good, so I ll leave it only partially rolled back for now. If things sound a bit too crispy after I ve lived with the mix for a few days, I ll bring it down further, which is often what I end up doing. Let s Hear the First Finished Mix Ok, I ve done a mix for you of our example song. Let s have a listen. You ll notice in the song that I ve got some background vocal activity and there are some simple but very cool tips for how to EQ vocals that are going to used in a supporting role to the lead vocal. So after you listen to the mix, we ll have a quick chat about the backup vocal layers on the song. Motown Style I ve Been Around Owen Critchley by Owen Critchley A Note about EQ-ing Background Vocals Because the lead vocal is now establishing and occupying its correct portion of the frequency range, any background vocals added don t necessarily have to be as thick or bright as the lead vocal. The listener s ears will give the backup vocals a kind of sonic credit. In a sense, the background vocals are piggybacking on the full rich tone of the lead and therefore the backups can actually afford to be a little duller and/or thinner than the lead vocal so they can avoid crowding the lead vocal s EQ space. With the panning tool, we can further separate the backup vocals from the lead vocal. By being aware of this as we EQ vocals, we create a situation where all the various vocal tracks remain clear and distinct to the listener. It makes their listening experience far richer and more enjoyable as they hear all the facets and little details of your song s recording. Page 18 of 20
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