Singer with excessive mouth sounds.

[slowcentury]

Hey
I'm recording a singer songwriter who for some reason makes an excessive amount of mouth sounds when he sings. I think part of it is he sings rather quietly. I have gotten him to try and project more but it really doesn't work with his voice. Once i compress the vocals the mouth sounds really come out. I have tried playing with a de esser and it helped a bit but not really. Any suggestions?

[thethingwiththestuff]

give him a glass of water before you re-record it.

[nzkobc]

give him a glass of water before you re-record it.

more or less what I was thinking. Make him stop making mouth sounds. Try a dynamic mic for his vox?


Side note: I adore the phrase "mouth sounds".

[vvv]

You'd have adored my last gurrlfri ...

Anyway, consider altering the monitoring set up for the singer.

Mebbe try adjusting his relative vocal's volume in the monitor mix, mebbe even EQ, to make him project more and be aware of his, eh, "mouth sounds".

[JGriffin]

give him a glass of water before you re-record it.

Or an apple/glass of apple juice. Much better for this than water. Water can actually make the mouth noises worse.

[thethingwiththestuff]

hm, interesting. apple juice makes me kinda phlegmy.. but you do a lot of VO work, right dwlb? is that what you usually suggest to clients?

[Gregg Juke]

Wish I had known about the apple juice a few nights ago... I did a bunch of one and two-take voice-overs (limited time), and heard the mix last night with compression-- I'm smackin' and crackin' all over the place, especially in mono.

GJ

[MoreSpaceEcho]

that stuff is pretty easy to edit out. you can even do it WITH YOUR EYES.

[suppositron]

that stuff is pretty easy to edit out. you can even do it WITH YOUR EYES.

[JGriffin]

hm, interesting. apple juice makes me kinda phlegmy.. but you do a lot of VO work, right dwlb? is that what you usually suggest to clients?

Most of the VO actors I work with are experienced enough that I don't have to tell them what to do; if I'm hearing lipsmack I just tell them over the talkback and they take care of it. Usually they bring their own apples!

[slowcentury]

that stuff is pretty easy to edit out. you can even do it WITH YOUR EYES.

Unfortunately he manages to make some smacks in mid word. I really don't want to encourage him to sing louder, his voice is great the way it is. I'm going to try a dynamic and the apple juice. If only I had an SM7

[MoreSpaceEcho]

Unfortunately he manages to make some smacks in mid word.

you can edit those fuckers too. a pain in the ass but it can be done.

apple juice and an SM7 is a much better way to go though!

[jnTracks]

for another perspective: at a certain point it's just the sound of this particular singer. trying to alter it is, maybe, questionably admirable?

but i'm getting into recording philosophy now.

sound like you've got some good suggestions

[thethingwiththestuff]

for another perspective: at a certain point it's just the sound of this particular singer. trying to alter it is, maybe, questionably admirable?

but i'm getting into recording philosophy now.

sound like you've got some good suggestions

I suppose that's a valid point, but... EW! Just thinking of that dry saliva sound makes me cringe.

[slowcentury]

for another perspective: at a certain point it's just the sound of this particular singer. trying to alter it is, maybe, questionably admirable?

but i'm getting into recording philosophy now.

sound like you've got some good suggestions

Yeah it does add a bit of charm. When his last album went to get mastered they suggested he fixed it before the mastering because the mastering really brought the lip smack to the surface. It was kind of crazy how clear they were after the first master was done. I'm recording him again tomorrow so we'll see what works. Thanks for the suggestions!