Cleaning Up Vocal Tracks: Gates, Strip Silence and Breaths
Vocal mixing · 4 min read
Clean a vocal with a gate that attenuates rather than mutes: threshold 6–10 dB below the quietest word, attack 0.5–1 ms, hold 30 ms, release 200 ms, and range set to -12 dB instead of infinite. Keep broadband noise reduction under 6 dB, and turn breaths down 4–8 dB rather than deleting them. Deleted breaths are the main reason a vocal sounds edited.
Gate range
-12 dB
Not infinite · hold 30 ms · release 200 ms
The 60-second answer
Gate: threshold 6–10 dB under the quietest word, attack 0.5–1 ms, hold 20–50 ms, release 100–300 ms, range -12 to -20 dB. Broadband noise reduction 3–6 dB maximum. Strip the long gaps by hand with 10–20 ms crossfades. Clip-gain breaths down 4–8 dB. All of it before the reverb send.
Why a gate at minus infinity always sounds like a gate
The noise under a vocal is not silent air, it is the sound of the room, the preamp and the singer's clothes. When a gate slams that to digital silence, the ear hears the room appear and disappear around every word, which is far more distracting than the noise ever was. A change from one steady level to another steady level is almost invisible; a change from something to nothing is very visible. So do not remove the noise floor — move it down to a level nobody would notice and leave it there.
Why noise reduction over 6 dB starts to hurt
Spectral noise reduction learns a noise profile and subtracts it band by band. A voice has energy in the same bands, especially the breathy 4–8 kHz region, so past a few decibels the algorithm starts subtracting parts of the voice. The symptom is a watery quality on word tails and a hollow S. Three to six decibels is invisible on almost any source. Ten always changes the voice.
Cleaning a vocal, step by step
| # | Do this |
|---|---|
| 01 |
Delete the obvious dead air by hand first Long gaps between sections, the count-in, the chair creak before the take. Manual edits, no plugin needed. Crossfade 10–20 ms |
| 02 |
Denoise gently, or not at all If there is a steady hum or hiss, 3–6 dB of broadband reduction. Learn the profile from a gap with no breathing in it. NR: 3–6 dB max |
| 03 |
Set the gate threshold from the quietest word Solo the quietest line in the song and set the threshold below it. Anything higher and the gate eats word beginnings. Threshold: 6–10 dB under |
| 04 |
Attack fast, hold and release slow Attack 0.5–1 ms so nothing gets chopped off the front. Hold stops chattering on consonants. Release lets it close like a hand. 0.5 ms / 30 ms / 200 ms |
| 05 |
Set range to -12 dB, never infinite This is the setting that decides whether it sounds clean or gated. See the trick below. Range: -12 to -20 dB |
| 06 |
Turn breaths down, then check the order Clip-gain each breath so it sits 12–18 dB under the words, and keep all cleanup before anything that generates a tail. Breaths: -4 to -8 dB |
The trick: set the gate range to -12 dB and stop using infinity
Every gate has a range or floor control and almost nobody touches it. At its default the gate is either fully open or fully closed, and that transition is what your ear latches onto — you hear it as a click, a breathing effect, or a sense that the vocal sits in a hole. Set the range to -12 dB and the plugin stops being a gate and becomes an automatic 12 dB volume rider: while the singer sings, the room sits at its normal level underneath, and in the gaps it drops to a level you would have to solo the track to notice. Because it never reaches silence, there is no on-off edge to find. Add 30 ms of hold so consonants do not make it chatter and 200 ms of release so it closes at the speed of a hand on a fader, and it becomes inaudible. If your gate has hysteresis, set the close threshold 3–6 dB below the open threshold too.
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- Range at minus infinity. The room appears and vanishes around every word. It is more distracting than the noise you removed.
- Too much spectral noise reduction. Past 6 dB you get watery word tails and a hollow S. Fix the room or the mic position instead.
- Deleting every breath. A vocal with no breaths in front of phrases sounds assembled rather than sung. Turn them down instead.
- Cleaning up after the reverb send. The reverb is already carrying the noise and the breaths, so gating the dry track does nothing about it.
Good cleanup is measured by what you do not hear happening. If you can point at the moment the gate closed, the settings are wrong even if the track is technically quieter.
Keep going
FAQ
Should I use a gate or strip silence on vocals?
Both. Cut the long dead sections by hand with short crossfades, then use a gentle gate with a -12 dB range for the small gaps between phrases.
What gate settings work on vocals?
Threshold 6–10 dB below the quietest word, attack 0.5–1 ms, hold 20–50 ms, release 100–300 ms, range -12 to -20 dB.
Does a gate remove room reverb from a vocal?
Only in the gaps. While the singer is singing the room is still there. A gate reduces noise between phrases, it does not make a room sound treated.
Who's behind this
Ivan Meshcheriakov · IvanFromRnD
5+ years ago I moved to LA with zero connections and started building from nothing — 14-hour days, meeting people and interning at studios. It took me 5+ years to meet and interview 100+ Grammy-winning engineers — then I turned it all into the Vocal Chain Bible.
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