How can I get rid of these vocals?

Does anyone know of a program or plugin or something that will remove (or at least lessen) the vocals in songs? I'm looking around and nothing is working well for me.

If it helps, I'm doing all this so I can bring the guitar (or rhythm) track to the front so I can learn some new songs.

 

what have you tried?
do you have a four track you can pipe it through?

 

I have an old home-built electronics kit that did that, but I don't know what software does it. Vocal removal/reduction was done by inverting the phase of one channel. Since vocals are generally "stage center", or mono, the vocal is the same in both channels. Inverting the phase of one channel and mixing to mono eliminated the pure middle. Usually also eliminated the bass and some of the drums. Any reverb/echo/or effects added non-mono content, and THAT still remained to some extent, but it was possible to eliminate most of the vocals, leaving the rest of the song only slightly modified. Not good for making your own karaoke tracks, but great for what you're trying to do.

Goldfish probably knows some recording software capable of phase inversion, but I don't know of any.

 

This from the Audacity FAQ page:
[size=+0][size=+0][size=+1] 2. Can I remove the vocals from a recording? [/size] [/size][/size] [size=+0][size=+0]With some stereo recordings, it is possible to remove the vocals because of the way in which the recording was mixed at the studio. Often, the vocals are placed in the exact center of the recording, while all other instruments are slightly off-center. If you subtract the right channel from the left channel, the vocals get completely canceled out, leaving only the other instruments. [/size][/size]

[size=+0][size=+0]This only works on some recordings! [/size][/size]

[size=+0][size=+0]To attempt this in Audacity, import a stereo recording, then click on the track pop-up menu (the little down-arrow next to the name of the track) and select "Split Stereo Track". Now select the lower track (the right channel) and use the "Invert" effect (from the Effect menu). Finally, use the track pop-up menus to make both channels Mono channels, and then mix them together using Quick Mix. If you're lucky, the vocals will be gone. [/size][/size]

If you don't have it: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Hope this helps.

 

Bingo! That's what I was talking about. That should do it.

 

Thanks Just Playin. I'll give that a try.