Help me make this vocal sound less tinny and horrible?

ijonty

Hi folks

I'm absolutely not a producer but am trying to improve the audio on a vocal a mate has recorded on his iPhone. Has anyone got any advice to make it half-decent? I know ideally he should just get a proper mic and do it properly but I've ran out of time and wonder if there are any pros out there who could help me weave some magic on it. Here's a clip:

https://soundcloud.com/fade-again/vox-clip-for-fretboard/s-nRvcahcC4qB

I've had a go at playing with EQ and compression but really I had no idea what I was doing and just made it even worse.

Any tips really appreciated!

Thanks

J

Danny1969

Sometimes when the recording is pretty lo fi it's actually better to make a feature of it as an effect,  rather than try and make it sound like a professionally recorded vocal because basically you can't.  Think loud hailer, telephone or compressed and band limited. 
Also size and fidelity comes from contrast so if the backing track is stella, it will highlight how lo fi the vocal is, so need to hear it in context really. 

Stuckfast

Yeah I tend to agree, that's never going to be hi-fi unfortunately. It could definitely do with a cut around 200Hz but it's also noisy and has a lot of room sound on it, and there's not much you can do about that.

andy_k

I think I could definitely make it work. Plenty of options these days for de-noising, and some subtle blending of chorusing and  general delay and reverb could add some sparkle and life to it.
Izotope has a free version of some of their denoising stuff, Reaper has a built in effect, it is simple to try different combinations of tracks to build up something usable, easy to overdo it, and it will never rival a well mic'd recording, but anything is possible these days.
I saw a vid a while back, where Michael Brauer ( I think) remixed a track from some very badly recorded stems by using duplicates for specific things.

thecolourbox

I'd do like what Danny says, I'd make it deliberately "worse" sounding rather than trying to make it sound "better". Adding some distortion on that, maybe eq cuts outside of the midrange, that could sound pretty cool I reckon

ijonty

andy_k said:

I think I could definitely make it work. Plenty of options these days for de-noising, and some subtle blending of chorusing and  general delay and reverb could add some sparkle and life to it.
Izotope has a free version of some of their denoising stuff, Reaper has a built in effect, it is simple to try different combinations of tracks to build up something usable, easy to overdo it, and it will never rival a well mic'd recording, but anything is possible these days.
I saw a vid a while back, where Michael Brauer ( I think) remixed a track from some very badly recorded stems by using duplicates for specific things.

Thanks all! I agree that it'd be best to embrace the lo-fi quality and I had tried that but my mate wants to hear a version where I've done my best to improve it.

Andy_k, would it take a lot of time to do? Could I hire your services? I think I have such a bad ear for this sort of thing that I'd really love to hear what someone else could potentially do with it, and how it was done of course, so I could learn. As I mentioned, I did try following loads of tutorials but often it seemed to come down to 'feel' and judging what needed boosting or cutting, and I really struggled. I tried reverb, slapback, layering more than one, messing with EQs and stuff like that but no luck. Just not sure I have the ear for it. The fact that Stuckfast can tell just by listening to it that it needs a cut around 200hz boggles my mind!

Stuckfast

@ijonty I have iZotope RX and I'd be happy to try to clean it up for you if you like. It could certainly be improved though it'll never sound like a studio vocal. PM me if you want me to have a go.

andy_k

Sure, ping me a link to download the file and I will have a look, nothing to lose.

Stuckfast

@ijonty see what you reckon to this. You might have to right-click to download.

That's a combination of noise reduction, reverb reduction and EQ.

crosstownvamp

IM (very) HO.. he should redo it and get some welly  in there.

He needs to sing it as if he means it, it sounds like he's holding back, or singing quiet so he can't be overheard.

A louder voice will also create more high end.

ijonty

Stuckfast said:

@ijonty see what you reckon to this. You might have to right-click to download.

That's a combination of noise reduction, reverb reduction and EQ.

Thanks, will take a listen when I get a work break. Cheers for looking at it so quickly!

ijonty

crosstownvamp said:

IM (very) HO.. he should redo it and get some welly  in there.

He needs to sing it as if he means it, it sounds like he's holding back, or singing quiet so he can't be overheard.

A louder voice will also create more high end.

Yeah, I know what you mean. Will try to re-record if if I get chance but we're running out of time and I wanted to at least have a working demo.

mrkb

Stuckfast said:

@ijonty see what you reckon to this. You might have to right-click to download.

That's a combination of noise reduction, reverb reduction and EQ.

What version of RX did you use for that? RX8 Standard? 

Stuckfast

That was RX5 I think.

Nerine

Oeksound Soothe 2 could have a use here. 

Nerine

ijonty said:

crosstownvamp said:

IM (very) HO.. he should redo it and get some welly  in there.

He needs to sing it as if he means it, it sounds like he's holding back, or singing quiet so he can't be overheard.

A louder voice will also create more high end.

Yeah, I know what you mean. Will try to re-record if if I get chance but we're running out of time and I wanted to at least have a working demo.

Surely it will take approx 3 mins for another take into the iPhone?? At least give yourself a fighting chance? 

Legionreturns

If you want to ping it to me as a stem I'm pretty sure I've got all the tools to get it usable. 

I'll run the Antares stuff over it to repair the noise, then warm and thicken it.