Removing vocals from a song?

[ZDGZD]

What is the most effective way to remove vocals from a song?

[Accensus]

Make a cover. Or find an instrumental version. There is no easy way (if at all) to remove the vocals from any song.

[Nevander]

There is no easy way (if at all) to remove the vocals from any song.

There is one way, but it makes the song sound like total crap, like a poorly recorded garage band song. It doesn't catch ALL of the vocals but a good majority of it will be gone. In Audacity, open up the song and then split the stereo track. Select only the bottom track and invert (Effect > Invert) it. Then change both tracks to Mono. Works better with certain songs over others. Some you might not even notice a difference and still hear the vocals in the background.

[leileilol]

if it's there, you could hunt for the multitracked Guitar Hero/Rock Band/DJ Hero version.

The center cut plugin for the older Foobar2000 versions is a little useful at times.

[Viscra Maelstrom]

There is no easy way (if at all) to remove the vocals from any song.

There is one way, but it makes the song sound like total crap, like a poorly recorded garage band song. It doesn't catch ALL of the vocals but a good majority of it will be gone. In Audacity, open up the song and then split the stereo track. Select only the bottom track and invert (Effect > Invert) it. Then change both tracks to Mono. Works better with certain songs over others. Some you might not even notice a difference and still hear the vocals in the background.

the last time i tried phase inversion myself, the result was basically total shit and absolutely unusable, unless you use some kind of vocal processing i guess.

[Caligari87]

The latest version of audacity actually has a "vocal removal" feature that will do the whole phase inversion thing for you automatically, along with fancy stuff like trying to only cut a certain freq. range occupied by vocals so you don't lose kick drums as much. Try that out, it's probably the best you're gonna get without EQ'ing every individual note (which is how some instrumentals/acapellas are made)

[BFG]

I remember in GOM player you could mess around with the audio to remove voices in movies, and just the background music would play, and I remember when my headphones broke and sound only came out of one ear, I could only hear the music from a song and not the singer, so I think it is possible with some songs that are setup like that.

[Hellser]

I remember in GOM player you could mess around with the audio to remove voices in movies, and just the background music would play

Movies tend to have 5.1/7.1 channel setup. In those cases, voices come out the center channel. Music, effects and what not come out of the other channels.

and I remember when my headphones broke and sound only came out of one ear, I could only hear the music from a song and not the singer, so I think it is possible with some songs that are setup like that.

Technically, I believe this is the same thing as inverting a channel in a song. Two wires touching when they shouldn't have, an example.