Sometimes things just don’t sound the way you wanted them to, no matter how many re-takes you did. Perhaps that vocal still doesn’t sit right, or maybe that bass part is just not exciting enough. What do you do?

There are at least four basic approaches at that point – assuming that you didn’t decide to trash the song (which would be the fifth option and one I would generally not recommend – after all the song was good enough to start on, so if you’ve lost your way on it now, perhaps try one of the tricks below first).

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In production, the ends justify the means!

• Re-EQ. Sometimes all it takes to “fix” things is just to remix or re-EQ them. For example, in a very common situation where “for some reason” the vocal just doesn’t seem to “sit” in the track right, it might be that there are some frequencies within the vocal performance – or within the backing instruments – which “quarrel” with each other. This can be quite subtle at times and hard to spot. A possible remedy can be to change the equalizer (EQ) settings on the vocal channel. Does “thinning out” the vocal help? Thinning out means taking the bass frequencies off or reducing them considerably. Playing around with the EQ settings of the vocal can make an enormous difference and can sometimes be all you need to do – at least as far as quick-fixes are concerned. The same sort of thing applies to instruments. Often you’ll find that some guitar parts or synth parts appear to “steal” the frequencies from the vocals. Notch those frequencies out and see what happens.
• Re-arrange the mix. A different approach is to simply change the components of the sound spectrum. Say you had a backing guitar here, but it appears to quarrel with the vocal – why not mute that either all the way or every 2^nd and 4^th beats? Or how about chorusing it or panning it all the way out to the left channel – or right. Sometimes these types of drastic re-arrangements of your final mix can have entirely unexpected and transformative results. This requires that you’re not needlessly “loyal” to any particular performance and simply want the WHOLE thing to sound right.
• Ghost re-do. And here we have a “trick” par excellence. Getting someone else to re-do the given part. This is sometimes called “ghosting” in our trade, because more often than not the original musician is not even aware of it having been done! But sometimes they are, and they’re okay with that too. The most common use of ghosting is in vocals. Maybe that particular high note doesn’t sound quite right, or maybe the low range in this section is just not ringing out the way we want. In comes an experienced session singer who can not only sing, but can also “imitate” the original singer. If all goes well, you can blend the re-done parts into the original performance and… no one is the wiser. Occasionally, you may need to let the cat out of the bag. Many “celebrity” singers (e.g. actors) who decide to cut a record know going in that they will be ghosted. Sometimes EVERYTHING is ghosted – which I would never recommend for an indie artist. But, I worked with a guy who did most of David Hasselhoff’s recordings (more than 90% of each performance), so I know that this kind of approach can sometimes work very well, as unworthy as it appears to most of us. Still, a little reinforcement here or there can indeed be just the trick.
• Weird it up. This is the sort of thing you hear a LOT these days. The biggest culprit is the “Autotune” plugin which can be used not just to subtly fix pitching problems but also to rapidly re-tune any signal to the desired frequency. The result is a robotic-sounding but also (to some) weirdly appealing vocal effect (Cher’s “Believe” kicked off this trend). It seems so many people like it that it’s almost impossible these days to find commercial recordings which don’t use this effect. Personally, I’m sick of it – but there. Other techniques involve massive re-EQ’s (e.g. making “phone” voices) or chorusing, phasing or any array of other effects whose only purpose is to make things sound… unusual.

There is also another approach. And that’s to STRIP DOWN THE PRODUCTION to the bone. More often than not, our productions tend to resemble one another and the only cure for that may sometimes be to take a “negative approach”. This kind of minimalist approach can work beautifully not only on ballads (e.g. Adele’s “Someone Like You”) but also on up-tempo songs (e.g. Prince “When Doves Cry”).

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Book 2 – Chapter 5 Vocal Considerations	Course Overview	Book 2 – Chapter 7 The A&R Process

Book 2: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 14b, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, Overview