The lead vocal is so important in a mix. We do all kinds of things to try and get it to sound clear, polished, and larger than life. But sometimes even the right EQ and compression isn’t enough to get vocals standing where you want them in the mix.
The Secret Presence Track
One little tip that many people use is something called a harmonic exciter. It adds harmonic content to the track and gives it a bit of life that wasn’t there. One way to do this in your DAW without that type of effect is to create a vocal presence track that no one will ever know is there, but it makes all the difference.
Comments
Graham, I have very much enjoyed your series to start the year and find myself looking forward to the next one. Today tip was very helpful. Thanks for sharing the knowledge and talent.
Nice trick =) I have something similiar to this one, but I add distortion to a overdubbed backing vocal. I think in this song the vocal sounds better without excitement. It’s more smooth and natural) But this trick should help in mixing parts where there are a lot of stuff going on.
awesome tip! this is exactly what the track im working on needed!
Very clever. Thanks for the quality of your videos!