DYNAMIC RE-ENTRY!

[Beer Can]

Yep. I'm back. And this time, less sucky. At least I hope so.

I'm officially ditching the "Aardvark Assault" moniker, probably just going by Ribos for future work. Reason: new style, and slightly less of the "I don't know what I'm doing" factor. I want to remove the stigma that got attached to my previous work. Because it sucked, and we all know it.

So now, here's what I'm going for. I'm going in the direction of the Synth Pop/EBM/Light Industrial sound, similar to VNV Nation, And One, and Assemblage 23. Until I gain more experience with composing, I'm going to keep things somewhat more minimalist, since I've found that by trying to add too many sounds, I just screw things up.

I've got a song in the works now, but unfortunately, it may be delayed a couple weeks, as the end of the school year is coming up. It's also delayed by the fact that I can't get a decent vocal recording going. So for now, I'm torn between two options:
1) Use a speech-synthesizing program to fill in, or
2) Just write another little instrumental melody that the vocals would follow.

Should I go with 1), though, what (free) speech synthesizing programs would work best? I'm fairly satisfied with the one in FL6, but I have trouble not making it sound comical. Maybe that'll clear up with some practice?

Anyways, just letting everyone know I'm not dead, and yes, more music by me will be on the way. And this stuff won't blow like my crap-tastic old stuff.

[helix eternal]

Welcome back! I have no idea what to suggest for the vocals unless you could get someone else to record them for you. I'm terrible with speech synthesis cause I can never get it to sound right either.
Definitely look for the Voxengo Voxformer plugin though, it helps with making vocals sound better.

[Vospi]

Welcome back.

The way to your problem depends on the type of vocal you want to use. I think I'll just recommend not to use any speech synthesis by any means. Good luck!

[Draigun]

I agree with Vospi.. Most of the general vocal hooks you'll hear in popular music were just recorded by someone with a microphone. Find samples of vocals if you'd like to try those, or if you must have a specific phrase.. find a friend with a really awesome voice and have them record it for you.

[Vospi]

I feel like this problem is connected with some technical problems of voice recording and post-processing. Am I right?

[Beer Can]

Originally Posted by Vospi

I feel like this problem is connected with some technical problems of voice recording and post-processing. Am I right?

Voice recording. Right on the money.

My current microphone is pretty crap on recording quality, and I lack money for a good one. So no vocal recording for a while. I agree that real vocals would be the best option, but unfortunately it's not an available one. For now.

So yeah, until then, I'm thinking I'm just going to do little synth melodies in place. Occasionally I might have fun with the FL speech synthesizer, but only for funky effects like Kraftwerk or File Not Found do.

[Vospi]

Do you use recording mixer or you're just pluggin' some office mic in your soundcard?

Anyways, you can still manage eatable quality by doing some post-processing.