Guess who’s back?
Everyone knows that Youtube is a vast,
boundless source of information and funny video clips of cats. Furthermore,
anyone that’s into metal will have likely encountered the widespread fashion of
vocalists doing videos titled ‘How to scream/death growl/do metal vocals’. They
are a quick and easy way of getting information about performing vocals for all
you budding Corpsegrinders out there.
However, the vast
majority of them are utterly useless.
So, I figured I’d put together a quick
guide telling you what to look for from vocal tutorials and also give an idea
of the things to avoid. I didn't use tutorials when I learnt how to
death growl, so I kinda stumbled onto these kinds of videos after I could
already do it. The amount of videos out there is almost infinite,
so I've just taken the first five I found on a youtube search and
split them into good, average and bad and then given bullet points telling you
why!
(N.B. My analysis of these videos has
nothing to do with musical style, or how good the vocalists actually are- just
with their teaching styles)
Good
Alxxxs (Broadly
death metal, but gives ideas about other styles as well)
-Nice and simple without a one
directional response to vocals, and can actually ask her questions if the need
takes you.
-She says its not step by step, but it
kinda is. The technique breakdown and actually showing you how to craft a sound
is still there.
-She demonstrates an understanding of
style analyses, and the idea that vocals and the tone you choose is very much
genre relative but still remains open minded about applying the ideas.
-Deals with wrong technique and hurting
yourself, as well as people warning you off. Which is something not many people
do deal with, but something you’re going to encounter a lot of.
-We differ on the false chord thing,
inhales and all that jazz. But all the same, at least she deals with it in a
direct and clear way.
Aaron Squires
(Shagrath-y sound)
(Uses a completely
different technique to me, but as a tutorial it’s pretty good)
-Clear and easy to understand.
-Tells you what’s going on inside his
throat a little bit.
-Actually breaks down his technique
into graduated steps and gives you a starting, middle and end point.
Blix (Burzum-y sound)
- There’s technique analysis. I’m not
going to go into this further.
-Again, Blix gives you a step by step
process to achieving his sound and breaks it down a little.
-Has evidence of his regular singing,
and loads of other stuff (always a good sign, as you wouldn't trust
someone to teach you guitar unless they had evidence they were good, why should
vocals be any different?)
Average
Som Pluijmers (Ex-Cerebral
Bore, Slam Death Metal)
(the good)
-Deals with in depth throat biology,
which is always good (what she’s doing is explaining the false chord idea as
using muscles, which is basically is)
-Emphasis on practice and repetition,
starting small and dealing with basics (e.g. breathing and diaphragm).
Rome wasn't built in a day.
-Very realistic view of how people
start (I started in almost exactly the same way she did) along with recordings
of her 13 year old self.
-She addresses maintenance of your
voice in the long term
(the bad)
-Saying hurting yourself at the
beginning is ok. This is not a good attitude to have, as if you start hurting
yourself, you’ll keep hurting yourself.
-She only really deals with Slam
technique and achieving one sound, not necessarily a bad thing but bear in mind
that this doesn't apply to everything!
-No real breakdown of how she actually
does what she does in her throat- just lots of her achieving growls
immediately.
Bad
Dopey
TheDopeSmokenKlown – (Broadly Slam and Deathgrind)
-He talks more about taste, different
genres and how much various bands suck rather than about technique and
performing vocals. Which is never a good sign.
-Advocates hurting throat. Just… no.
What he’s getting at is vocal scarring, which is a thing you can do, but it has
consequences.
- He’s less than accurate in his
go-to-techniques. Like with Som above he tries to teach by just going look and
then growling a ‘finished product’, without going into how he got there.
However, at various points he can’t even hit his default vocal and has to think
about it and re-try. No one who’s any good should have to do this when doing a
style they use regularly.
-“Don’t think you can learn it” – Yes.
Yes, you can. If no one could learn, no one would even be able to do anything.
If it can be done, it can be learnt.
-His style of presenting is arrogant
and stand off-ish. Not a vocal thing, but it’s generally nicer watching videos
where the guy talking to you isn’t really negative.
All in all, the key theme is to look
for teaching of techniques with developed/graduated examples rather than just
growling and saying broad generalised things and avoid videos where
keyboard warriors are talking nonsense about stuff they don’t know. Also,
remember they're not the be all and end all of information on vocals.
-E
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