Vocal FX to hide a wobbly voice - updated with new pedal day info!

thecolourbox

I appear to have just won a mic mechanic and microphone on ebay...

thecolourbox

So my mic and mic mechanic has turned up and I've had chance to use it but only listening to myself through headphones off a mixer, so not sure what difference that makes. 

Not sure whether I like it, the auto tune seemed to sound a bit chorus-ey so turned that right down. The tone button seemed better on than off I think, though I still had to EQ on the mixer adding bass and taking away treble. Seems too much like what I'd expect of an auto setting, ie too much of a thing like what you get with presets on the guitar multi fx units but without any way whatsoever to turn them down. The echoes were too much and again you can't make the echo time less (I don't think I can anyway) so again you have to turn the level of the effect right down if not off completely.

On an unexpected flip side, with the additional EQ I did on the mixer, using the hall reverb with tone button on actually did sound nice when I was singing softer, when I tried a Jeff Buckley song. So maybe that's more what it's for than the upbeat louder singing.

All in all, kind of wishing I'd paid the extra for the full voice live gtx (which seemingly ships with a White Stripes preset!!!), though I wouldn't have had the mic then as well. Hopefully when I try it through an amp it might sound better than through my headphones! Definitely better than nothing at all between mic and pa, though I'm not sure it's £60 worth of better...

Bidley

Pedals and effects won't make you a better singer, unfortunately. It'll only go so far. All you need is a bit of confidence and breath control and you'll improve ten-fold.

thecolourbox

Oh yes i know that, and i don't want to be a singer particularly, i just get bullied into doing stuff for family and friends and i just wanted to hide the voice a bit for those occasions. My breathing and note hitting is fine, i used to do classical choirs when i was younger. I just wanted something to tidy the edges on my tone. Sadly the more i used it the more it sounded like the cheesy effects you get on karaoke amps!

joeyowen

Shame it didn't work out for you, hope you can at least break even selling it in!

ChrisMusic

thecolourbox said:   Sadly the more i used it the more it sounded like the cheesy effects you get on karaoke amps!

Surely thats what they are used for in karaoke, to thicken up someones voice so it sounds fuller and half decent.

Seems like a bit of pitch shift / doubling and short delay, EQ, compression, & maybe short reverb would be the answer to your initial question ?

fretmeister

Boss have a new product to challenge the TC Helicon

Unlike the TC it also allows manual key selection as well as the guitar input.

Doesn't say a lot about the compression - just says "evens it out" and doesn't mention exactly what the "Enhance" button does. But I bet it's very close to the 'Tone' button on the TC.