Huggy and the Bears Posted June 3, 2008 Share Posted June 3, 2008 Hi heard a band using one of these (Digitech Vocalist Live 4) on Sunday night for vocals and it blew me away! It's the future... Anyway, I have ordered one today as I want to get a better harmony sound. Has anyone got any tips or tricks on setting it up? Cheers, Simon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Galilee Posted June 3, 2008 Share Posted June 3, 2008 You made me curious, what does it do then? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 3, 2008 Author Share Posted June 3, 2008 (edited) [quote name='Galilee' post='211938' date='Jun 3 2008, 05:03 PM']You made me curious, what does it do then?[/quote] Its a vocal harmoniser. Basically you can make it sound like you have the Eagles or the Beachboys on stage singing with you (sort of thing). It is amazing beyond belief. Check out the link for the Vocalist '2', the Vocalist '4' which is what I saw and have ordered does 4 part harmonys and does not need a guitar going through it. Cool as!: [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH4s-1OwsOc&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH4s-1OwsOc...feature=related[/url] Simon. Edited June 3, 2008 by Huggy and the Bears Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silent Fly Posted June 4, 2008 Share Posted June 4, 2008 [quote name='Huggy and the Bears' post='211942' date='Jun 3 2008, 05:08 PM']Its a vocal harmoniser. Basically you can make it sound like you have the Eagles or the Beachboys on stage singing with you (sort of thing). It is amazing beyond belief. Check out the link for the Vocalist '2', the Vocalist '4' which is what I saw and have ordered does 4 part harmonys and does not need a guitar going through it. Cool as!: [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH4s-1OwsOc&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH4s-1OwsOc...feature=related[/url] Simon.[/quote] Very cool product. I am not sure you don't need a guitar (or keyboard) though. It should work fine without guitar as far as you harmonise using just unison, octave (up or down). I am not sure how it would guess that the harmony involves a 3rd minor instead or a 3rd major without a guitar. [url="http://www.digitech.com/products/Vocalist_Live4/Vocalist_LIVE4_Video.php"]This[/url] is also interesting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thisnameistaken Posted June 4, 2008 Share Posted June 4, 2008 Has that thing got witches in it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tauzero Posted June 9, 2008 Share Posted June 9, 2008 [quote name='Huggy and the Bears' post='211930' date='Jun 3 2008, 04:56 PM']Hi heard a band using one of these (Digitech Vocalist Live 4) on Sunday night for vocals and it blew me away! It's the future... Anyway, I have ordered one today as I want to get a better harmony sound. Has anyone got any tips or tricks on setting it up?[/quote] Experiment, experiment, experiment... We're still in the early days of using ours and Kaz went through each song, working out what harmonies would sound best on each part of the song. Don't go mad with harmonies, set two adjacent patches up with possible harmonies and A-B them. What instrument will be driving it? They're jolly clever about working out the key, even from an arpeggiated guitar, but a bass might not be the optimum source and you can't (IIRC) pre-program the key along with all the other parameters if you're using preset key and not detected key. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 16, 2008 Author Share Posted June 16, 2008 (edited) [quote name='tauzero' post='215398' date='Jun 9 2008, 01:11 PM']Experiment, experiment, experiment... We're still in the early days of using ours and Kaz went through each song, working out what harmonies would sound best on each part of the song. Don't go mad with harmonies, set two adjacent patches up with possible harmonies and A-B them. What instrument will be driving it? They're jolly clever about working out the key, even from an arpeggiated guitar, but a bass might not be the optimum source and you can't (IIRC) pre-program the key along with all the other parameters if you're using preset key and not detected key.[/quote] Well I've done a few gigs now and have nailed it (I think!). I'm just using a pre set (3rd up and 3rd down) and that is enough for me. The biggest issue I have had with it though are the pedal locations. Fancy putting the harmony pedal in the middle. I play bass and am the lead singer so I'm kind of busy on stage, I accidentally repeatedly hit the up/down pedals throughout the night which was pretty funny as in the middle of 'Fire' - Jimi Hendrix, the vocals went onto Chipmonk and then Borg!!! Everyone thought it was part of the act but I was playing, singing and screaming at one of the band members to get me back to my setting. She had never seen the pedal before and started dancing the wrong direction on the pedals and I think I finished off on Gospel! You can confuse it so it stays on harmony and can't turn it off - hence the problem. Additionally I hit the tuner pedal once which cut the rhytham guitar (which is going through the VL4) and put the harmony out of key. What a night. I have now had metal covers made and attached to the unit that cover the up/down pedals and then one for the tuner pedal. They are hinged so you can lift them up for pedal access but during world war 3, you can only hit the harmony pedal. The metal covers have also given me a degree of 'feel' with my foot with out looking down. Top tip if ever there was one. Highly recommended as a serious piece of kit. I play on a Sunday night and get quite a few off-duty local muso's come down for a chat and sometimes a jam and all are blown away with it so far Edited June 16, 2008 by Huggy and the Bears Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 16, 2008 Author Share Posted June 16, 2008 Also, you do get a slight hiss through the PA. Anyone else sorted this yet??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted June 16, 2008 Share Posted June 16, 2008 So is the rythm guitar going through the PA as well? Couldn't you have the guitar sending an line to the digitech that isn't heard? I.e a send before the guitarist's amp? Maybe that explains the hiss? It sounds very interesting. If I had gigs to play, i'd get one! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 16, 2008 Author Share Posted June 16, 2008 [quote name='cheddatom' post='219895' date='Jun 16 2008, 02:43 PM']So is the rythm guitar going through the PA as well? Couldn't you have the guitar sending an line to the digitech that isn't heard? I.e a send before the guitarist's amp? Maybe that explains the hiss? It sounds very interesting. If I had gigs to play, i'd get one![/quote] No, the guitar just feeds a signal to the pedal and does not run through it in terms of sound. Even with the guitar unplugged you get a hiss. It is definitely the pedal but I wondered if anyone had sussed how to cure it. You don't hear it when there is a bit of noise going on people chatting but I know it's there and it's bugging me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted June 16, 2008 Share Posted June 16, 2008 Doesn't it have a built in gate? If it's ok when there's sound coming out of it, get a gate IMO. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 16, 2008 Author Share Posted June 16, 2008 What do you mean by a gate? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted June 16, 2008 Share Posted June 16, 2008 Sorry, it's commonly known as a noise gate. It's a device that will silence a it's output after the input of the gate drops below a specified threshold. So if you have 60 dB of background noise, and you set the gate to shut off at anywhere below 61dB, then there will be no noise out of the unit until the input reaches 61dB. I use a BOSS NS-2 but some people think they're crap. I would have thought the Digitech had a gate built in, like the zoom units. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 16, 2008 Author Share Posted June 16, 2008 [quote name='cheddatom' post='219915' date='Jun 16 2008, 03:05 PM']Sorry, it's commonly known as a noise gate. It's a device that will silence a it's output after the input of the gate drops below a specified threshold. So if you have 60 dB of background noise, and you set the gate to shut off at anywhere below 61dB, then there will be no noise out of the unit until the input reaches 61dB. I use a BOSS NS-2 but some people think they're crap. I would have thought the Digitech had a gate built in, like the zoom units.[/quote] I see. I'll have a read of the book and see what it says. if not, ill see about getting a gate. i assume it just goes in line somewhere? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheddatom Posted June 16, 2008 Share Posted June 16, 2008 most gates would just go in line after the effects unit, yeh. The boss one has a send/return loop thing set up, and I assumed that this meant it would also have some advanced noise reduction i.e. it can hear what goes in, and compare it to the sound in the loop, but, I don't think this is what actually happens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KennysFord Posted June 16, 2008 Share Posted June 16, 2008 (edited) Thats pretty cool,i can see us having a use for one. heres a video of a pitch corrector.you have to wait till half way through to see the results but its very impressive to say the least. [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk0Ug8VMaqY&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk0Ug8VMaqY...feature=related[/url] there's mention of the hiss or noise on one of the youtube vids,its the demo one thats split into Pt1 and Pt2 edit,its here somewhere [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS6RchEst7U&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS6RchEst7U...feature=related[/url] Edited June 16, 2008 by kennyrodg Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huggy and the Bears Posted June 17, 2008 Author Share Posted June 17, 2008 [quote name='kennyrodg' post='220313' date='Jun 17 2008, 12:13 AM']Thats pretty cool,i can see us having a use for one. heres a video of a pitch corrector.you have to wait till half way through to see the results but its very impressive to say the least. [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk0Ug8VMaqY&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk0Ug8VMaqY...feature=related[/url] there's mention of the hiss or noise on one of the youtube vids,its the demo one thats split into Pt1 and Pt2 edit,its here somewhere [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS6RchEst7U&feature=related"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LS6RchEst7U...feature=related[/url][/quote] Great shout - good tips here. The pedal is cool as and bang-for-buck is worth the slight hiss. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KennysFord Posted June 17, 2008 Share Posted June 17, 2008 I soooooooooooo want one Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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