Make Your Vocals Stand Out Using Multiple Reverb Effects

Vocal mixing generally involves lots of processing, and varying techniques can achieve different results. Regarding reverb, using multiple instances of the effect in small amounts and with specific routing is a great approach that gives fantastic results. The next tutorial will show you how to make your vocals sound great with this technique.

We will start by listening to a track we made in our SoundBridge: DAW. The way contains all of the elements of the whole mix, including vocals. They haven't been processed yet.

Here is how the vocal line sounds solo.

Room Simulation

In order to process our vocals, we will first create three return tracks in our project. You can do that by clicking on the + icon on the top of the SoundBridge: DAW interface and choosing the "Return" track type. We will name the first return track "Room Reverb" and click Create.

Now, we have a new return channel on our sequencer and mixer windows. We chose the MannyM Reverb plugin by Waves Audio. We want a concise reverb effect that simulates a room for our room effect. On the MannyM Reverb interface, we will choose "Room" and "Small" as our base settings, with some additional pre-delay and boosting of mid frequencies with the built-in EQ. We will set the send amount from our vocal track to the room reverb to around 35 %. Let's have a listen.

Vocal Plate

Once satisfied, add another return track and load a Plate-type reverb. For this purpose, we have chosen the Abbey Road Plates plugin by Waves to change the character of the vocals and make them sound brighter. Again, the send amount to our Plate effect will be increased just a bit, around 20%. You will notice a significant difference in the vocals as we do this.

Chamber Reverb

Next, after creating our third return track, we will add a Chamber type of reverb to it. Chamber reverbs are similar to halls - delivering a lush, ambiance-soaked sound. However, they also give you an extra dose of clarity, which prevents the washed-out effect inherent in many hall reverbs. Our choice for this task is the Abbey Road Chambers by Waves Audio. Again, we feed a small amount of our vocals into this effect.

Let's hear how our vocal sounds are processed with the three different reverbs.

Finally, let's hear how our processed vocal sounds in the context of the whole mix.