We recently released the song “Win Today” and we thought it might be fun to give our readers and fans a little peak behind the curtain, as well as, to give musicians the chance to learn some of the techniques we are using and developing so they can be used to make your own records sound better.
Today we will cover one technique employed in the song, “Win Today“.
The verse section in this piece features a heavily processed vocal that is made to sound amplified and robotic and it serves as a contrast to the melodic and harmonized vocals found in the Pre-Chorus and Chorus.
To achieve this effect we used:
Tube emulation
Distortion
Band pass filters
EQ
Reverb
Delay
Vocal modulation
Click here for a short video of what our FX send looks like:
While all of these settings might be interesting, they are not the feature of what I want to share with you today. You see, the sound we achieved on this vocal was intended to allow the voice to meld with the strong rhythm guitar. The effect is almost as if the vocal is being produced as an extension of the guitar sound.
To do this we started with several layers of guitars playing slightly different performances of the same part. By intentionally varying picking position/direction/and force, on each track we achieved a guitar bed that almost has a vocal quality to it without using “wah” or “talk box” effects.
Then we processed the vocal and use guitar amp models to give the vocal some characteristics of a distorted guitar. Once that was complete, we blended the two together which generates the total effect of this section.
Later we added top level guitars at a higher volume to make the guitar part stronger in the final mix but all of the layers blend together to create a sound that is much bigger than the sum of its parts. This is called the Sound on Sound Production Technique.
Here is a quick video showing the individual components and how they blend together into the final mix.
Thanks for reading!
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