Hello! And welcome to another episode of Inside the Recording Studio. I am Jody Whitesides, and with me as always is Mr. Chris Hellstrom. Oh my goodness, I thought I was hosting with Mrs. Doubtfire there for a second. How are you today, Chris? Yeah, no, I'm good. I'm all right. How are you doing? Or Julia Child, for that matter. Well, that's good. I'm doing a little bit better than last week. Yeah. Bonus. Yeah. Hopefully you got a little bit more rest. Yeah, bonus, bonus. Yes.
So that's good. Today we're talking about What are we talking about today, sir? the pros and cons of layering similar instruments. (imitates drum roll) That's a bit of a mouthful, (imitates drum roll) but I suppose we should mention what we mean It is. This particular version of layering, when we say that layering. So how would you define this what we're gonna talk about today?
similar instruments we're talking about when a similar instrument is playing the exact same part as another instrument of the same type. (laughs) Crystal clear. (laughs) Yes, like go off on a brain fartage there.
(laughs) What I mean by that is like if you're playing a guitar and you have an electric guitar and you use the same electric guitar and you play the same part twice, or if you have a keyboard and you're using some sort of synthesizer sound and then you play the exact same part with the exact same keyboard sound, does that help you? No, that's a con. I'm going along those lines in terms of similar instruments playing similar parts.
Right. Okay. So we're not talking about mix layering and frequencies and stuff in that Right, because otherwise it would be arrangement. sense. We're talking about actual parts of playing the same thing on similar instruments today. Yeah, and we'll tackle that down the line perhaps. But today we're talking about similar instruments. [BLANK_AUDIO] So the first thing I'm thinking about why would you do that? Why would exactly?
Play the same part with the same instrument to give yourself a headache? Why would I do it? Well, it's to make up the sound that I want in my head. I don't know. Why would you do it? Why would you do it? Yeah, right, but you wouldn't use the same guitar and And yeah, so let the same part and the same sound to do that. No, I'm just giving an example of like, it seems kind of silly that I would use Well, yes and no. Yes and no. Should we tackle the guitars first then?
Well, it's because to me, it's the performance is always going to be slightly different. the exact same sound with the exact same instrument and then double it. That just doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Is that a pro or a con? Well, that depends on your situation, right? So we're going to try to break It's a calm to me. this down. Well you're wrong and I'll prove it within the next half hour here. All right.
But let's start with the most common thing that I think about when we're Well, you would being a keyboard player. layering. I'm thinking keyboards. I'm thinking synths. That type of a thing. Yeah well I'm not sure I have balls big enough to call myself a keyboard player So yeah. Sure. but I do play keyboard. Yeah now somebody like CJ Vanston is a keyboard player. I own a keyboard. That's about the difference, right? So, but here's an [LAUGHTER] (laughs) [SNIFF]
example where we might layer things, right? And sometimes even within the same [ Pause ] patch, right? So we can have a certain sound that takes care of possibly the low end. Let's say we're dealing with a pad, right? We have the low end of something and we might layer that with another sound that might still hold down that big beautiful A flat 13 chord that we're playing, right? But now you have this little
sparkly thing laid with another sound just to make it sound bigger. Yeah, the sonic juiciness Juicy. Yeah. we keep referring to back again. But so that would be the first thing. Now, if I get the sound that I And in the demo presets. want, that's a good thing. So that's very firmly in the sort of like the pro category, right?
Now another thing that I keep mentioning a lot when we're talking about keyboard hearing keyboard sound and especially multi-layered stuff is that it can be exactly yeah it can be very hard to use these in the mix so you can potentially go too far with 80s.
Sure. I'm going to do a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a these but if you have certain things where you want let's say that you have a typical keyboard little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a part and you add maybe a soft bell or something to take you firmly back into the late 80s ballad little bit of a little bit of a little bit of a little bit
top of a thing, right? But that would be a sound that you would want. So then the layering is a good of a little bit of a little bit of a thing. If you sound like the proverbial Vegas casino, when you hold down a chord, that might not be little bit of a little bit of a [no audio] useful in so many ways. So that would be a con, I would say when, when you started like layers, or just overdoing it, really. Do you have a thought on that? Yeah.
In terms of layering keyboards, when I tend to do it, and being that logic is my primary writing tool, Ah. Mm-hmm. I will set up a keyboard sound in a folder so that when I'm playing the folder, Like a track stack. the folder, it actually will trigger multiple sounds at once, like a track stack. And I will set up each sound inside that folder to represent a certain space needed in the sound so that each sound is Mm-hmm. Yeah, I know where you're getting at.
contributing to the overall team vibe of the sound and not being the arrogant stepping all over everything else sound. Does that make sense? Sure. Let's say, for example, you have, I'll use a pad again as an example here. Where you're holding down a pad and it could be just a beautiful filtered saw wave being one of them, right? They're just sort of like the meat and potatoes and you could have another morphing sound Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. that goes on on top of that, Mm-hmm.
that has like a little bit more of a modulation thing KendraFL and maybe some white noise or whatever. Something else has a third level, but altogether they make this pleasant mix that comes up with the big sound without being overbearing. But now with the track stack that you have set up there, you can adjust how hot the white noise is or tweak them all individually as needed. In this case, the sum is greater that were, there you go. The sum has made the whole. That's what I'm thinking of.
Right. And generally speaking, when I do that, Compared to the rest of your mix each piece does its own part rather than multiple pieces doing the same thing all at once and stepping all over each other's toes. Over that sound. or just over that sound, are you talking now? Yeah. Yeah. And how do you determine that? My ears. Okay, well that wasn't easy enough. No, but I mean, but if you coming from it I mean, how else would you determine it?
I mean, you could pull up an EQ and look at how the various frequencies of a sound, if you want to look at it via your eyeballs instead of your ears. But essentially, I would layer things to hopefully compliment each other, not to overbear one another. Okay, so what you're saying is that if I understand you correctly here is like if you have let's say just two Mm-hmm. Yep. That is a huge possibility, yes.
Sounds on top of each other right to make up one keyboard patch you would then possibly low cut one of them up to 500 or something just to make room for the other part so that they're not necessarily building up all over the frequency range Mm-hmm. That is a huge possibility, yes. Mm-hmm. Okay, all right fair enough But I mean the keyboard of the synth thing it sounds like an obvious example because we tend to do it because we're layering Mm-hmm.
oscillators together in synth so we take for granted that we're either like stacking things on top of each other but what you're saying is in I echo as well as that you have to Be a little careful with how much of the stuff that you're adding on to it because it might be too many bells and whistles and all of a sudden you lose the plot because you can't use that anymore. Right.
Sure, it also has a lot to do with the arrangement, but we're not really talking arrangement today in that if it's a very sparse arrangement Yeah. Well, yeah, I can fill up a lot more holes by layering a bunch of different scents But if it's a dense arrangement, I need to be very careful about how I fill up space Yeah, I would agree with that. Absolutely. So then, yeah. Good let's move on then are we moving on to guitars now? Yep, now we're moving on to guitars.
What we kind of hinted out at the beginning now, we're gonna really get there Yeah, right, we're gonna get there Okay, thank you very much 'cause I'm gonna tell you how you're wrong now. Well, coming from a rock world, Yes we layer stuff a lot when it comes to guitars. Mm-hmm And to me, that is still making something huge, even if you have the same sound, not necessarily tweaking settings on the amp or anything, why do you just doubling it?
that will be done. And we'll talk about that point in a second here. Imagine like a Rammstein record, [BLANK_AUDIO] where it's just giant wall of sound, right? And the guitars are these big, chunky things, right? Right, okay. That's not just one guitar, you have the same part being played multiple times to add to [BLANK_AUDIO] the overall impact. So I'm sure they do.
Right, but are you familiar with their recording techniques that you would be able to legitimately say that they use the exact same guitar, the same amp, I'm not necessarily saying anything of the sort because I can't prove that but that same settings and then track it multiple times and pan it. Sure. is a common technique where we do. It doesn't have to be.
So I'm just saying that for that kind of sound, but there are tricks that we can do when we Well, we've done whole episodes on layering guitars, but are layering and that's kind of what we're getting to next. I'm just saying that don't be afraid of doing the same thing without changing anything. a very viable thing to do. Getting to the layering of the guitars. This is
something that I know I did a Tuesday tip on well over a year ago. Right, but what you're kind of hinting at there is to either have a different amp and just [silence] go left and right with that. That is all very very effective to do that because you get a little bit more of a separation there. Right. While you're getting a different character and more separation, which to me improves the layering of a part when you're using guitars.
It can. Right, it can. And that's very valid, but it's not [silence] always the case. So that that's, again, that's why you're wrong. But, but another frequent thing that we do is, if we have [laughs] Mm-hmm. especially like really fuzzed out guitars, it can be very easy Oh, yeah. lose definition in those performances, right? So layering those with a guitar that is much cleaner Or even clean, for that matter.
in its tone and tucking that in completely clean, yeah, or any version of there that can [ add to the huge, it just makes that bigger again. So So Right. You know, we could take this outside the studio for a moment when we're talking about guitars in that regard because a lot of the times in a live concert, and you see these guitar players that have these giant stacks of sounds that you think are coming from all these different amps. And generally they could be.
And the reality is, is that if they've got a lot of different switching going on, it's quite possible quite often that they're layering a distorted amp with a clean amp live, just as you would in a studio situation. could be, yeah. Now there are guitar players that would poo-poo that and say, "Hell no, I ain't doing that. It's all gonna be crunch, crunch, crunch, man. Or it's all gonna be clean, clean, clean." It really comes down to taste. And for me, I like a variety.
And even when I create sounds for live outside the studio, I like to layer different sounds. So I will layer clean with dirty in my live sound Yeah. Okay. and I will do it in my recorded sound. Now, when I first started out, if we go back to the Stone Age, I did use the same guitar with the same amp and the same pedal to layer things and do exactly what you're saying. Did it get me a bigger sound? (vocalizing) (silence) I don't know if it necessarily did.
However, I've since learned for me personally to layer with different guitars playing through different amps in order to get the splits and the ultra built up sounds. And I think that came from just reading a lot of different interviews with guitar players. And I think I've mentioned him in the past, the first guy that I really heard about doing this to a wide extent, Zach Wilde, Yeah. He quadrupled track that first album he did with Ozzy. Right. I mean, it was gigantic sounding.
I have no idea if he used different amps Yeah, no, it's certain. Well, yeah, again, I think that's an assumption, but either whether that's right or not, it doesn't really matter. and different guitars, but I'm going to assume that he did. Character, sonic juiciness. But we can certainly get a sound with more interest, perhaps. good or by doing that yeah character in depth. There we go. Maybe that's a new drinking game. (laughs) Sonic juiciness, yeah.
Every time we say sonic juiciness you have to take a drink. Yeah it is easy to go overboard Of course. here as well though. So a con would be the first thing is that now you mentioned like Zach Wildin Yep. in that that first Aussie record that he did. Super tight performances right. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure that wasn't single takes. I'm sure he spent a lot of time doing take after take Oh, I'm sure it was. Of course, he's a tremendous guitar player and was back then as well, for that. Yep. Right.
or else you don't get that gig, obviously. But so the timing and stuff, I don't know if we're going to say that this is a con, but the performance has to be super tight if you're doing this kind of stuff or else you. Yes, exactly. And. Otherwise it becomes a giant mess. That's for really for everything, yeah. That's not just for guitars. That's for all instruments in general. But if it is a guitar driven track, which presumably would be if you're working on a bunch of layers like this, Yeah.
Yep. it becomes really, really obvious quickly if you don't do that. Yeah. Right. Well, and if we're going on a similar path with guitars, we're going to mention kind Now, the slight changes that can be just your pick attack or anything like that can add to the interest of the character of it. But if your timing is all over the place, it's just a mess. And that kind of goes without saying with anything, but that's something that we really have to pay attention to when we're doing these things.
Yeah. of the same thing with bass. Generally, you don't see bass players layering multiple electric basses together. I'm sure Stu Hammers done that at some point, right? Not that it can't be done. It can. I've done it. But you can also like, sure, I wouldn't doubt Tony Franklin's probably done it too, or at Yeah. least Glarr for that matter. [Silence]
I would throw out though that most people, if they're going to layer a bass guitar with another bass type sound, it's going to be with a bass synth of some sort. And Geddy Lee would be a primary example of that. guy even does it live with his feet and his hands all at the same time. No. Oh, it's disgusting, isn't it? Oh, I mean, yeah, I remember I first saw it. I'm going off on the (laughs) tangent here. I'm sorry, but I was watching a Rush live performance. And this was probably, Mm-hmm.
I'm guessing recorded late eighties when they were going in much more with with the Taurus pedals and all this kind of stuff that he was using live and Well, if you really wanna go out there, he was singing he's playing a typical rush baseline and he's playing them move Taurus pedals with his feet and I'm like that's just too much talent you know Yeah, I think I've only seen him one time live and it was more of a straight up sort you need to talk about another bass player, Marco Mendoza.
Yeah, if you're gonna go out there in terms of like, just the craziness of a bass player, you gotta throw out Marco Mendoza because that guy can play four different things all at once. It's just ridiculous. Yeah. No, I've seen him like just do his little jazz thing like rock thing but yeah I have no doubt Wow yeah good for him yes so at a place in LA called Lava Lee, and it makes you draw the floor. It's just like, you get out of here. You're too damn good.
Anyway, we're going way off on a tangent, but the idea here with bass guitar Yeah, yeah, I think we mentioned that last week when we kind of like, you know, taking and layering with a bass synth or even just other bass guitars and you're trying to layer things up, unless you're Spinal Tap doing the song, Big Bottom, the big thing that can be a real problem here is maxing out the headroom of your song or your recording. We did.
( up all the hell room because the low end is there and, and it's hard enough to get that ( 2.5 ) right to make it nice and prominent and big and juicy and all of those beautiful adjectives. Mm hmm. ( 2.5 ) But in any of the other thing too is it with bass, the big thing in terms of layering that (sighs) Hmm, yeah. you have to be careful with a lot less than other instruments that are higher up in the range is that you have to be careful with the phase alignment of the sound.
(laughs) If you're not careful with that, you could really do some remarkable damage to either the sound or the speaker. Right. Yeah, I guess the main layering thing I would think about I'm thinking bass would be one of contrast when you're adding something as a spice for, you know, Sure. a synth part that's adding possibly a little bit more grit to a part or if you want a part to stand
out a little bit more, might double that with a synth bass. Bringing up their big bottom I think That was all drums and bass and vocals. with Spinal Tap, I don't think there was much else going on besides drums and that right? So yeah, right. Well backing vocals, I think that's the first thing that we think of vocals. Sure, we, you know, And with that, we'll move on to a little segment from our sponsor. And we're back. going to start talking about layering vocals. What's up with that, Chris?
might double or triple track and lead vocals sometimes, but backing vocals obviously is a a lot more common were used in just about anything that I do at least that has backing vocals in it that it's sung a few more times. Oh I do say that's you know again something You don't say. Well, I'm sure there's others that do it, but he's kind of the originator in a way.
that we do obviously for impact and that's a huge sound whether we're thinking a big Queen or Def Leppard thing but or anything like Matt Lang right now he didn't do Queen But you know, well, that's what I'm thinking about, at least with that huge wall of sound with, Yeah. Yeah. I guess like Phil Spector would probably be the first one maybe to have done this. But again, Yeah. the same thing goes here, right? Where we're building things up to have a huge impact. True.
But also, it can be a tricky one, unless, and this is dependent on the arrangement again, right? Where it can be hard to fit all of this in and it might not be appropriate in all tracks. So go ahead. And when that happens in terms of like you've got a massive layer of backing Right. vocals, say, seventy five tracks. just for a weird round number.
What is a method when you are layering that many vocal tracks together that you would use to make it work in this regard so that it's a pro rather than a con? Yeah, no, from a mixed situation thing. as far as like a mix situation you mean or from a processing thing? Well the first thing that I'll assume here that the timing and pitch and everything is done, Hand it to you on a silver platter. right? So that's all the performance is great. Fantastic. Then I'm gonna start sub mixing. Right?
So if there is, even if there is the same line but perhaps sung in different harmonies, Right? Okay. so there might be like a low or mid or high. I will tend to group those. So then instead of Mm-hmm. (silence) dealing with perhaps 75 vocals right now, maybe each subgroup of those has 25. So I'm just Okay. dealing with the stereo track of the low harmony in the mids and then the highs. And here I can Right, now you're getting more into the mix things.
also be a little bit more aggressive with compression and things because I kind of want Right. In the mixing situation. Yeah. Well, I think more often than not, it is a pro because I was just trying to think of like how you would deal with it in terms of that. To make it a pro rather than a con. [ Pause ]
it tends to sound glorious, you know, if it's done well. Right. The con would be, I think, more that it's one of those combinations where, like, we have an idea for a track and we want to stack all this stuff, but it's just not appropriate. And then it can be very easy to be too precious with our idea when we come up to that and admitting like, okay, instead of 75, maybe we should have just had two of each, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But you mentioned they're being handed
Sure. I guess that stems from thinking, well, is the performance good? And that relates back to any other instrument. If the performance isn't good, then it's going to just compound the problem of things sounding awful. Right. So in other words, I was implying that everything was beautifully on the silver platter, but that's... Yeah, which it needs to be if you're going to do recorded, beautifully sung in time and pitch.
that, or else it's just, you know... Yeah, I mean, if you do like, there's a Swedish moment, hope unless you're doing a chant. I mean, sometimes you get some chance stuff going on and it doesn't really matter. Oh, there's a new term. saying that when someone, everybody's doing this sort of like the 80s yell, we call that like a hockey choir, where it's basically like how everybody's just yelling and pitch
and stuff is less important. It's more like a big chat, like a crowd thing, right? Then it's a Yeah. Yeah. Sure. different thing. Then you just want it to sound and then you actually have the ability to just go nuts and throw your voice and do all this kind of stuff just to make it sound like more people. Yeah, again, super common here, right? I mean, I don't think... Now, and speaking of nuts, let's move on to drums. I think it's more genre specific to be super common, but sure.
I think it's more common now today in a lot more genres than it used to be too. Maybe, maybe, but I can. Yeah, yeah, again, was it last week when we talked about, you know, difference between like, yeah, it was last week, we talked about kick drums, so like, kick, doing a kick. Yeah. Nope. Pop and rock and metal these days, if yeah. So there's that, of course, here, right? If you're doing that jazz trio, are you gonna like add a lot of samples
to the kick in this now? Probably not. Because it's just to sound goofy, but the layering of drums is obviously like an important one, right, to have the impact that we expect from a lot of, let's say... Yeah, because same thing there, right? I mean, you know, you want that snare to really hit and you're talking that or even country too does it too. Yeah. [BLANK_AUDIO]
crack through, and there's a lot of things that we can do to layer that. So that kind of goes into not just a production thing, but I think when we're layering, again, kind of throw this back to the As you would in hip hop or any things, yeah. keyboard thing that we started with here, that we're sculpting a sound. So let's say that you're dealing with just samples to build your groove or your beat, right? You might have, right, you might >> Sure, mm-cause what you see where every
have a kick that's just taking care of the sub. You might have another sample that is more like the Hurricane looks after it, meet, let's say like 100 and up, and then you might have another that just takes care of the and how it comes toEs it hopes. initial transient. That would just be like a click. So those three samples would make up your kick as You know, that's all that I m a whole. And the same thing would obviously go for snare or any other kit piece that you're dealing
with. So we're sculpting a sound here. I would say using the wrong samples and just throwing stuff What would be a con of layering drums? Mm-hmm. on there. And you know, if you get, I really like this sub, and I really like this sub, Let's blow up that sub. oh, I know, let's use them both. You know, yeah, yeah, there's all of that. And I think Or if the phase is wrong, you're going to completely take it out.
Well, it goes back to your original concept there of like to get the sound that you actually having a plan when you do this, and this, of course, goes with all the other instruments as well. But you have to have a plan of why you're layering something. What are we trying to accomplish here? here. Exactly. Yeah, with drums particularly I think when we choose samples, let's say want. that requires layering similar instruments. Mm-hmm.
go back to that kick sample again. The thing that you might need to have a more impact [ disasters ] of that might be that sort of beater click, that initial transient. And that can be a a really, really ugly sample just by itself. But when you're layering it on top of the sub and sort of like the meat of the kick of the punch, right? It does its job. So it has a big function in there, but the whole product again, what's it saying that it's better than the sum of the parts, right?
So we have to pay attention to that. [silence] So choosing the wrong samples would be a huge con and adding too many of them. That's what I would think. What about you though? What do you think? what we have to think about when we do that. Yes, oh, that's a big one. Whether or not anything you're layering in percussion starts flamming too hard. That's something that drives me nuts unless it's two different drummers playing at the Oh.
Yeah. Yeah. same time on two different kits, then it's not so nutty. Another expression well. But if you've got things that are either layering with samples or you're running and a live drummer with actual loops or something, it can get real messy as well from all the flamming that can occur if you're not paying attention to timing. Yeah. Yeah, there's another expression. Well, well, I just want to finish up on what you And that kind of stuff tends to drive me batty. So let's wind this up.
In terms of like just kind of wrapping a bow on it, what would you say? just said. There's a saying that when you have, when you're layering things, it, it Mm hmm. were having sounds like two drummers at the same time, right? And that's a really important part with all of these things, but especially sort of like live instruments, guitars and Sure. bass and certainly drums, where there's a big difference between playing together as supposed to just playing at the same time. You know what I mean?
So that's the flamming and now you're just taken away from it. So again, the roundup. Big thing is we layer stuff to get the sound that we want. Not just for the sake of layering. Not just for the sake of, know why you do something, right? And also something to be aware of when we're doing all of this stuff is very easy to get precious with your ideas. Right? Yeah. Ego gets in the way. So what do we always say? Like, yeah, oh, I thought of this, but yeah, but it doesn't work.
So you have to let that go, Chris. That click sample that you brought in, it's not going to work. (laughs) I concur. It's not needed here. Let it go. Again, same thing here, whether that's with guitars, or I doubled up this with an acoustic guitar part to hopefully add more impact. Yeah, but now your death metal track sounds like a country track so the acoustic guitar has to go, right?
so don't be precious with your ideas, but That that's kind of like my take on it anyway So I don't know if you want to add anything to that, but that's kind of how I feel about it Now I'll roll with what you've just said. Well last week we were we I don't think I need to add to that. So let's move on to our Friday Fines. What have you got for us this time, Chris? Hmm. we were treated to a bunch of free downloads from Brainworks and included Hmm.
in that was the Brainworks Black Box which is sort of like an analog Oh, yeah. distortion unit and you know how I feel about distortion units when they do a job really well which this does so I've always been really high on Decapitator and I still am, but I've had a week of playing with this and I really like it. I really like the black box and now I have another tool in my toolbox. I don't
have to lean on to Capitator so I'm really happy about that. So black box is I'm going something hardware related for guitar players. my find of the week this or what about you? What do you got for us Jody? Ooh nice! Yes, it is a new pedal from JHS pedals. Cool. You know what? Amazing pedal maker that has a wide variety of pedals. He's got a new one that goes in his $99 line called Screamer. Cool. Screamer is based off of the old Ibanez tube screamer.
It is an overdrive pedal and it's actually kind of a new version of the JHS modded tube screamer circuit. He's apparently re-voiced it so it's a little bit more versatile, a little more balanced as a tube screamer, Oh, that can't be right. but it's just called Screamer. And instead of being green, this one's white. That's racist, isn't it? No, that's just wrong. Right. I have no idea. It's supposed to be green. Will it sound right if it's white? Probably not. No, I'm joking.
Maybe it will affect the sound being white instead of green. Anyway, the screamer by JHS. Very cool. It is the new thing that I'm looking at. Awesome. Yeah. [ Silence ] While we've got your attention, we ask that you go to inside the recording studio.com and sign up for our mailing list. [ Silence ] Doing so. reminders about the Tuesday tips when they come out and we'll make sure you don't miss any future [BLANK_AUDIO]
episodes of the podcast. Send us an email at goldstar@insidetherecordingstudio with the word layering and you'll get something cool back in your inbox. If you have a topic or suggestion Have a good one, Jody. for Chris and I to explain in a future episode, contact us at the contact page and we'll put it into consideration for a future episode. With that, I'll say, see you next week. [ Klingon Thank you for listening, everybody.