live and studio vocal distortion: how to?

Superuser · #1 10-16-2002, 04:34 PM

what are some tricks to getting good vocal distortion or overdriven vocals(ala NIN, Powerman 5000, Marilyn Manson) for live and studio without degrading the signal and/or causing feedback problems.

I'm mostly interested in using it for a live situation. The only things I can think of are using a pedal or using a tube preamp and cranking the gain.

anybody with experience?

Robbie

darren wilson · #2 10-16-2002, 07:00 PM

Get a cheap electronic megaphone from Radio Shack and sing through that into the mic.

Polaris20 · #3 10-16-2002, 08:53 PM

Studio you could just use a distortion plug-in. A lot easier to deal with. Live, I'd agree with Darren.

Zeek · #4 10-17-2002, 12:30 AM

I use a guitar distortion plug... Revalver, I think. You can hear it on the first 2 songs at www.mp3.com/SilentImplosion . It's fairly subtle, i used it mainly to add some edge to the vocal without being too overpowering. Don't know if that's anything like the sound you're after. Live, yeah... the cheap megaphone... tho i s'pose you could pipe your mic into a stomp box before it hits the PA.

babahi · #5 10-29-2002, 11:56 AM

I've done this, it's really pretty easy. Plug a mic into a regular distortion pedal and that's it. You only have to pay attention to the settings: the distortion does NOT need to be set high. Usually anything up to 10% on the drive knob is enough. Don't forget that you need to make the lyrics still understandable! Any more distortion and it just sounds like garbage, not to mention the feedback problems.