CVT Distortion

[MB20]

I'm trying to add distortion to my voice and ultimately want to achieve full distortion, without any tone behind it. I'm having trouble starting off finding the sound, without adding some sort of tone. It sounds like a uvula oscillation to me in the example from the sound library, so that hasn't been much help. I can't seem to access the false cords with the configuration in the book.

Here is a clip of my attempts, the first one sounds like a grunt to me and the second one, I don't even know what that is! more like a fry kind of sound? but whatever it is, it sounds terrible!

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/25229848/distortion.mp3

[jonpall]

I think in CVT terms, the first one is a grunt and second one distortion. What many people actually want, is something called creaking, which sounds less "heavy metal" than the ones you did. So perhaps you could give us an example of some guy whos distortion you'd like to imitade (until you find your own sound)?

[MB20]

I am actually looking to get as heavy as possible jonpall! haha I've been trying to learn how to scream for a while, with no real success. The CVT grunt is basically what a lot of metal vocalists would call a false cord scream, the other is a fry scream, but this doesn't seem to be covered in CVT. In terms of screaming on pitch, I would love to get something like the vocalist from the band tesseract at around 1.45 on their song ACCEPTANCE. Really, I am looking to get a full distortion sound, but I'm not sure if distortion is the technique that I need to use for this (false cord and fry screams seem the most common for this), but examples of what I'd like to sound like would be:

Mid Range

High Range

[jonpall]

At 0:19 in your distortion.mp3 clip you do a sound that's very similar to the tesseract vocalist (at 1:45 in Acceptance). Before that, you're using a more closed vowel, kind of "ee" sounding, which isn't as powerful and then you seem to "open the vowel" up a bit, making it fuller. I think you should try to SUSTAIN that type of sound for more than just one second, play with it a LOT and see where it takes you. Also, try recording it with tons of reverb, even delay, AND perhaps on top of some death metal backing track - to see how the sound changes when your voice has been processed a bit and put in with other instruments. I don't claim to be an expert in death metal vocals by any stretch of the imagination but I suggest you give this a try. But there was this split second interval in your clip where I think you got very close to the sound I think you might be after. Now it's a matter of duplicating it and fooling around.

[VideoHere]

Did you ever try a (gentle) supported vocal fry? then swell it with a really open throat?

[jonpall]

Good call from VIDEOHERE. In fact, I think Melissa Cross teaches something similar and I've heard that she's quite good at helping death metal singers. Just note that a sound like that is unlikely to ever become very loud. But the mic could help you amplify it up enough, I suppose.

[MB20]

cheers for the feedback guys. I think fiddling around with the configuration and building stamina is going to be the best way to go.

@VIDEOHERE yes I have been trying this as well. This is the fry type scream I mentioned above.

@jonpall I've watched both melissa cross dvds but they weren't much help. She only gives out a certain amount of info. The fry scream you are talking about isn't very loud, but when amplified sounds really brutal. There is a great example of that HERE. But, it can also be produced at higher volumes if added to a yell or shout and can also be pitched. It does take quite a lot of finesse though, which I haven't achieved!

[MB20]

Ok, here's an attempt at adding some fry. The last one probably came out the best. It's not as distorted as the example I gave though. The only problem with this is I have trouble keeping the consistency of my fry; sometimes it's really shallow and fast, other times is slow and deep..

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/25229848/high%20fry%20distortion.mp3