How to make instrumental versions?

[TomiT14]

So, simple question.

What program(s) do you guys use to edit the audio track so that the lead vocals get faded, and the instruments and backing vocals come up more clearly?

[Tyler.]

You can't really just do it to a normal track, maybe a tiny bit, but it's pretty much impossible to edit out the vocal track. What you need is the normal version of the song, then an acapella of the song. If you can get those two then you can flip the phase of the acapella in Audacity etc, and when you put it with the full version it will cancel out the vocals (not always 100% cancelled)

Other than that most people just rip it from Rock Band, so if the song you want isn't on Rock Band that makes it harder lol.

[Gregorovich]

Yeah, that's the best way to do it. If both the acapella and original track are high enough quality, you should get a decent instrumental. But yeah, like Tyler said, most of the good instrumentals you find will be from Rock Band or the artis themselves.

I personally really wanna hear instrumental versions of songs on SBM - HIOL for example is more complicated than you might think, and sounds really great as an instrumental (I've only heard low-quality audacity ones so far though).

[182sins]

If I remember well, there are some programs out there that can do that (try to search with the word "karaoke").

But these programs are VERY limited, especially for songs like Sum 41's. I believe some of these programs try to lower the vocals that are at the center of the track, but with songs like Sum 41's, where the vocals are pretty much complicated (some reverb here and there, and so on...) the impact of such software will be limited (please correct me if I'm wrong).

The best way to get those tracks are with the games rock band and so on, like Tyler said.

If you want to actually hear everything that's in the track (or as much instruments as possible) you can as well buy monitoring speakers. Engineers use such speakers in the studio because they are meant to be as neutral as possible, so you will be more likely to hear stuff you couldn't hear using your computer speakers.

Other than that, I'm sorry I can't help you that much. Hope it helped though !

[Jeremy Kill]

I personally really wanna hear instrumental versions of songs on SBM - HIOL for example is more complicated than you might think, and sounds really great as an instrumental (I've only heard low-quality audacity ones so far though).

I wish they put out some "special" version of the album with only the instruments. Happiness Machine seems pretty intricate; lots of stuff going on in that song.

[182sins]

Avril Lavigne did that with "The Best Damn Thing". There's the entire album in instrumental available online. It's very interesting !

[TomiT14]

Avril Lavigne did that with "The Best Damn Thing". There's the entire album in instrumental available online. It's very interesting !

Sure you don't mean Goodbye Lullaby? Didn't know Best Damn had those too.

[182sins]

I'm sure it was TBDT, I remember hearing "Hot" and "Contagious" which were, if I'm not mistaken, mixed by Deryck. I just found a link of the album, I'll pm it to you if you want !
I remember there was also "Under My Skin" or "Let Go" available somewhere (one of these two wasn't really instrumental though, there were still some vocals)

[TomiT14]

I'm sure it was TBDT, I remember hearing "Hot" and "Contagious" which were, if I'm not mistaken, mixed by Deryck. I just found a link of the album, I'll pm it to you if you want !
I remember there was also "Under My Skin" or "Let Go" available somewhere (one of these two wasn't really instrumental though, there were still some vocals)

Hot has nothing to do with Deryck. Deryck produced and played guitar/bass on Contagious and One Of Those Girls.

But you can still send them!

[182sins]

That's weird, I always thought Deryck was somewhat involved in the making of Hot :s

Anyway I sent you the link (only TBDT's instrumentals, I don't have the links for the other albums).