Foo Fighters Best of You chorus section problem

[irnbru1982]

Hey People,

I've been having a bit of difficulty in the chorus section of this song now for quite some time and have decided to put it out there to you guys and see what you think?

The big problem for me is a lack of power compared to the original. Any tips on give it more power without blowing out my voice.

Thanks

J

[ElWin]

Good job.

I think apart from the "oh" section the power was fine. That section sounded just a bit too polished really and not sung from the core. Trying to copy Dave Grohl is risky because he can so effortlessly switch between distorted and clean vocals and trying too hard to imitate the distortion can really mess up your throat.

There are quite a few people on here who should be able to offer technical advice - for me, on the whole I liked it but having listened to your cover of With or Without You I think that suited your voice much more and was actually one of the best covers I've heard of that song.

[Owen Korzec]

It's pretty powerful already.

Only tips I could give are:

1. You need to get some grit/vocal distortion in there. Find out how to do it in a healthy manner (easier said than done...you may have to just experiment a lot, training with a contemporary coach also helps) and you won't blow out your voice with it and it will help add power. It's more about that than just pushing more weight up there. Allowing yourself to sing lighter and adding controlled distortion over that is better for the voice than just pulling up more chesty weight until your voice natural distorts. Which is more like what Dave Grohl is doing but the strength of his voice is kind of freak of nature...the former will still sound close and not take as much toll.

2. Tune your vowels for a more "shouty" aesthetic. Hard to explain but try this vowel modification strategy and then dial in the common overtone and I think your perceived power will really increase, and since this is just a resonance adjustment, it's actually healthy for your voice cause it will give you more volume without adding effort.

What you wanna do is print out the lyrics, and any vowel that isn't eh, uh, or oh, modify to the closest vowel out of those three.

For instance:

Ehs someone gettehn the best of yoh

And the specific shade is key. They're not going to be the eh uh and oh that you speak will but a similar singery variant.

An exercise you could do is sing a sustained G#4 on each of those three vowels and tweak the vowel shade around until you hear the note start to get naturally really loud and boomy. Then memorize that exact vowel shade and repeat it a few times. Do this on each vowel, the eh uh and oh. Do the same for the E4 and F#4.

Then sing your vowel modified lyrics with those vowel shades you tuned in.

Now, the end result after this is probably gonna sound like you're shouting random gibberish. You're going to want to maybe scale it back and modify back toward the original vowels SLIGHTLY just to bring some of the intelligibility back. But if you stay close to that shouty overtone throughout it will increase the perceived power without you having to push harder.

Hope that makes sense and helps a bit.

But you're already singing the song way better than I can lol!!! Like Elwin said, the power is there, or maybe 95% there if we are picky...but essentially, you could sing this live as is and I don't think anyone would say you sounded weak...

[irnbru1982]

@ElWin Thanks for the response and even more for taking the time to listen to my other uploads.

You're right about that effortlessly switching he does. I'd love to be able to add that to my voice.

@Owen Korzec Those are some great unique tips thank you. I've got some homework.

I'd love to get a contemporary coach here in London but for now online seems to be my only option so your help and knowledge here is very much appreciated.

[derekreno]

I thought it sounded pretty good dude! I'm still struggling with that Grohl distortion as well. You should hit up danielformica on the forum, he's damn good with that technique.

[Mr Bounce]

You have a great voice man, as you already know. It's a good cover but trying to do Grohl without hurting yourself isn't easy. His vocal folds are made of iron. Owen's advice is pretty much what I would have said, but articulated much better. You want to use some open vowels and get more naturally belty in the lower head voice, rather than strain and pull chest which is the temptation.

Btw I loved your With or Without You Cover. You have a really great voice. In this cover you say "geehve, yoh and wehth" (not give, you and with). Those are great examples of what Owen is talking about. You just need those crazy distortions Grohl is doing that a lot of people try to so easily demonstrate but never do ;)

[ronws]

You changed your login but you are still Jon.

You used to come here with a different login. And guess what? You still remind me of Chris Cornell. And that's not good enough for you? I think you even covered "Like a Stone" and nailed it.

I thought you were going to go off and be a rockstar. My bad.

Quit worrying about trying to sound like Dave Grohl. I condemn you to sounding like Chris Cornell. Sorry about your luck.

There, that's my tough love for the day.

Unless you just like the stomach acid of trying to sound like every singer that ever was and not considering yourself ready until you do.

It's that or sing this like yourself. How dare anyone want something like that, huh?

Or, are you just looking for applause?

I know some others have and will continue to give you advice on how to sound like Dave. Good luck with that but you already have an outstanding voice. I only ask, probably in vain, that you not screw it up.

Nobless Oblige, it is the duty of any human to conserve beauty when it is found. I have done my duty, whether it is effective, or not.