Playboi Carti-Style Vocals in FL Studio: Thin, Loud and Built for Rage

A Playboi Carti-style vocal isn't trying to sound full or polite. It's thin, bright and loud, like the voice is cutting through a wall of distorted 808s instead of resting on top of them. Less body, more bite, and compression pushed so hard that every word lands at the same level. That's the rage sound.

The problem is that thin and bright sits one bad move away from cheap and harsh. Here's what makes the sound work, how to record for it in FL Studio, and how to keep it aggressive without making people reach for the volume knob.

Thin on purpose

Most vocal mixes fight to keep warmth. This one gives a lot of it away. On Whole Lotta Red, Carti swings between a raspy, almost shouted delivery and the high, childlike voice fans call his baby voice. Both work because the mix trims the heavy low end and lets the edge of the voice carry the track. Play "Stop Breathing" for the short, punchy, staccato side and "Sky" for the lighter, airier side, and listen for this:

  • Edge over chest. The low body is pulled back, so the voice floats above the dark beat instead of fighting the bass for room.
  • Bite and air. Rasp and consonants jump out, even on phone speakers.
  • Pinned to the front. The compression is heavy enough that loud and quiet words end up almost level.
  • Ad-libs as part of the beat. Short shouts and noises fill every gap and carry half the energy.
  • Tuning on the high parts. The sung, baby-voice lines get a synthetic, slightly unreal shine.
Playboi Carti Type · FL Studio

The same dry rap vocal: first without a preset, then with the Playboi Carti Type preset. Turn your sound on.

Record loud, keep the meter out of the red

Carti has said the raspy deliveries on that album came out naturally from recording at high volume, not from a plan to make a punk record. That's the useful lesson here: the energy has to be in the take. A preset can make a voice brighter and harder. It can't turn a sleepy take into a mosh pit.

  • Stand up and perform it. Rap like there's a crowd in front of you. Sitting down and mumbling won't get you there, no matter what's on the mixer.
  • Back off when you yell. Lean away from the mic on the loudest lines, or turn your interface input down before the take. A quieter recording is fine. The input gain knob at the front of the preset brings it back up.
  • Split your voices. Put the low, raw parts and the high baby-voice parts on separate tracks. Then the rap lead preset handles one and the melodic lead handles the other.
  • Give ad-libs their own pass. Record the verse first, then go back and shout the ad-libs on a new track. The adlibs preset gives them a phone-like tone with extra reverb and delay, so they sit around the lead instead of on top of it.
  • Kill the room noise. Heavy compression lifts everything, including the fan, the laptop and the echo off bare walls. Record in a small space with soft stuff around you.

What the chain is doing, roughly

The processing behind a rage vocal follows familiar ideas: clear out the low end and the mud, shape the tone toward bite and air, compress hard, tune the melodic parts and add a little space on a send. In FL Studio Signature you can do all of that with stock plugins. For the baby-voice melodies that means Pitcher, set to the key of your beat. Don't know the key? The free Beat Lab key finder tells you in a few seconds. If Pitcher is new to you, start with our Pitcher guide.

So the list of steps is nothing special. The hard part is the line between aggressive and painful. Push the top too far and the S sounds and the rasp start to sting. Squeeze the wrong way and the vocal pumps, crackles or loses the punch at the start of each word. Getting it thin and loud while it still sounds good on different voices took a lot of testing, and that balance is exactly what's saved in the preset.

Where home versions fall apart

Thinning a voice that's already thin

If your voice is light or nasal to begin with, stripping even more low end leaves nothing but fizz. You want less body, not zero body. Not sure this sound suits you? Read which vocal preset fits your voice before you commit.

Mistaking clipping for rasp

Rasp comes from your throat. Clipping comes from your interface, and it crackles on every loud word. Once it's in the recording, no plugin takes it out. Play back your loudest line before you record the whole song.

Autotune on everything

The tuned shine works on the high, sung parts. On the shouted lines it can make the voice warble and lose its edge. Keep the raw parts on the rap preset and save the tuning for the melodies.

Ad-libs louder than the lead

Ad-libs should hype the line, not bury it. If you can't follow the main words anymore, pull the ad-lib track down until the lead clearly wins again.

Skip the guesswork: the Playboi Carti Type preset

The sound from the video is ready to load, built only with the stock plugins in FL Studio Signature. Record, load the preset and fine-tune it to your own voice.

  • 2 lead presets: one for rap, one for melodic vocals
  • 1 backing vocal preset
  • 1 adlibs preset with a phone effect
  • Input gain knob up front for quiet recordings

Get the Playboi Carti Type preset

The product page also has a melodic before and after.

First time using a preset in FL Studio? Here's how to load a vocal preset in FL Studio, step by step.

More sounds in the same lane

Want to hear them side by side? All Type vocal presets with before and after videos are on one page.

Playboi Carti Type presets are inspired by the vocal mixing style of Playboi Carti. This is not an official product and Playboi Carti is not involved. Results depend on your voice, mic and recording.

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