My post from reddit:

I recorded some dope songs on my usb mic. They're good enough to where I wouldn't mind paying a decent price to get them mixed. My question is could a really good engineer bring them(the songs) to life? If not would a good engineer still make a difference over a mid tier one if the recordings are not up to par? The songs sound decent un mixed but idk what is possible with mixing.

 

if the shot is good... yeah (i mean, as clean as possible)

 

From RedOne (Lady Gaga) to San Holo, vocals recorded straight to the laptop's built-in mic appear all the time in mainstream music for over a decade. So, of course at2020 would be enough. It worked for Billie Eilish' album at least.

 

It could be done done with a 99$ sm57. All I ever ask myself equipment wise is... Could I at least get results as good as Nirvana's "Bleach" album? If the answer is yes then that's good enough for me.


Also if an sm57 without a pop filter is good enough for New Order it's good enough for me. He rips it off at 0:35 lol.

 

I have no idea what a good engineer could do with your tracks, as I am not able to listen to them, also there's a lot of difference between a "good engineer" and a GOOD Engineer, and I immagine if you are using a cheap mic, you probably don't have the money to afford a really good eng. Most likely you will end up paying some dude that advertises himself as a good eng, but is just average.

My advice is, rather use the money to go to a recording studio where they have Mics worth 4000 euros, go there with your music ready, instrumental arranged etc, lyrics fully written, and just record all your songs, in 1 day or 2 you can get all done without spending crazy amounts, and you will have recorded on 4000 euros mics.

That is not to say that 4000 euros Mics are better than 1000 euros Mics. Different people have different voices and each mic has its own characteristics. You might want to try a few expensive mics before you go to a studio, to know exactly what model you'd like to record onto.

You can try Mics in music instruments shops, usually if you go there looking like someone who really has the intention (and the money, yea you gotta fake it a bit) to do the purchase, they will let you try them. Might be all a bit hard during the pandemic though, depends a lot on where you live.

After you'll have all your high quality vocals (multiple takes for each track of course!), you can think of sending the tracks to some dude for mixing, or even cheaper option, you could try to mix them yourself, there's a lot of tutorials online.

 

where can i find an engineer like this.

 

where can i find an engineer like this.

 

Nothing wrong with cheap mics, but there is more work to do with them

Self noise floor is higher, so that means a head foam filter must be used on the mics head.
You need to build a small back wall with foam squares glued to it. This wall gets attached on a tripod
The Mic sits in front of that wall so the sound will not reflect off that back wall.
Use a pop filter in front of the mic a couple inches away.

This should bring the noise level down and also stop the pops and plauses.
It also allows you to get more fire into your singing.

I use an MXL rR40 ribbon mic figure 8 with a Neweer NW700 on top of it in M/S recording.
This is used for Acoustic guitars, but why would we use a $40 Neweer mic?
Electret microphone capsules are much smaller so they can take a bigger volume of air up closer.
The Neweer Nw700 captures the Mid signal and the Mxl r40 the sides. With the MXL990 XL which is the main Mic for Acoustic guitars for me, needs to be further back further so the Stereo Image is not as good as with the electret microphone capsule.


I would advise you to look into M/S recording for vocals, I will never use X/Y ever again on acoustic guitars.
The reason is with M/S you can control the stereo image better when adding your vocal reverb. You get a more traditional Middle centered reverb. Vocals these days sound terrible with either extreme reverb or extreme dry vocal with too much side reverb signal.

I sent my Vocal to Full reverb passing ( goes full to reverb not master bus), so on the Reverb around 15% wet and 85 Dry. This puts the vocal just a small amount outside the reverb, making it sound is if the person is in a room not in a can!!.

 

Certainly hope so with good post and final production.

 

The problem there is that it says in the op that the vocal takes have already been recorded.
Your info would be good to know prior.
Let's hope the member got usable takes if that knowledge wasn't known.