Yeah you should definitely aim for the most natural sounding vocal recording as possible. The quality of the final vocal product has more to do with the vocalist than it does with post production. You can't improve upon the vocal no matter how good the effects or EQ you use. When you do a vocal track, one of the most important things is to make sure you sing at a constant volume level at all times. Don't rely on compression, the more compression you use the more you take away from the vocals authenticity. It flattens it (not in pitch) in over-all frequencies (over-tones), which is what makes your voice what it is. No EQ can bring it back so don't rely on that either. Use EQ to help stir the vocals into the mix, not so much on the initial recording. You want to capture it in it's natural form, and if needed fix it later. Add some compression (1 or 2 db) to level out subtle volume fluctuation.

Coping a vocal track and changing it's pitch by a few cents is a cool trick, so is coping it and slightly placing each vocal track slightly out of sync with each other (a few milliseconds). If you are confident in your vocals the best way to thicken the presence is to just sing it again, in tune and in sync. You'll get the best results this way I believe. Note: You want to sing in tune, not harmonizing. A cool trick to add presence to a vocal is to slightly boost the EQ around 15khz.



[Edited by noticingthemistake on 08-28-2003 at 11:06 AM]