Zooey Deschanel

You can see her play a Hummingbird in this picture.

As can be seen in this picture Zooey uses to play a K-Wave live.

In her opening monologue for Saturday Night Live in 2013 Deschanel sang and played an soprano-sized Martin Ukulele which seemed vintage.

Zooey Deschanel playing her Danelectro

Used for the vocals on Volume 3, as mentioned in this April 15, 2015 Electronic Musician interview.

Deschanel usually sings into a Neumann U47. “I have done a number of mic shoot-outs to see what we liked best,” she says. “But we don’t always universally stick to [the U47]; I love an RCA 77, too.”

On this project, [producer Pierre] de Reeder placed U47s for Deschanel and Ward; both also went to Neve 1073 mic pre’s, and Deschanel’s vocal took a small amount of 1176 compression. “Nothing’s heavily compressed,” de Reeder points out. “It’s just barely rocking the needle and making sure everything’s in control.”

All of the other inputs went through preamps in Sound Factory’s custom API console, then straight to a Studer A827 24-track tape machine.

Used for the vocals on Volume 3, as mentioned in this April 15, 2015 Electronic Musician interview.

Deschanel usually sings into a Neumann U47. “I have done a number of mic shoot-outs to see what we liked best,” she says. “But we don’t always universally stick to [the U47]; I love an RCA 77, too.”

On this project, [producer Pierre] de Reeder placed U47s for Deschanel and Ward; both also went to Neve 1073 mic pre’s, and Deschanel’s vocal took a small amount of 1176 compression. “Nothing’s heavily compressed,” de Reeder points out. “It’s just barely rocking the needle and making sure everything’s in control.”

All of the other inputs went through preamps in Sound Factory’s custom API console, then straight to a Studer A827 24-track tape machine.

Used for the vocals on Volume 3, as mentioned in this April 15, 2015 Electronic Musician interview.

Deschanel usually sings into a Neumann U47. “I have done a number of mic shoot-outs to see what we liked best,” she says. “But we don’t always universally stick to [the U47]; I love an RCA 77, too.”

On this project, [producer Pierre] de Reeder placed U47s for Deschanel and Ward; both also went to Neve 1073 mic pre’s, and Deschanel’s vocal took a small amount of 1176 compression. “Nothing’s heavily compressed,” de Reeder points out. “It’s just barely rocking the needle and making sure everything’s in control.”

All of the other inputs went through preamps in Sound Factory’s custom API console, then straight to a Studer A827 24-track tape machine.

Used to record Volume 3, as mentioned in this April 15, 2015 Electronic Musician interview.

Deschanel usually sings into a Neumann U47. “I have done a number of mic shoot-outs to see what we liked best,” she says. “But we don’t always universally stick to [the U47]; I love an RCA 77, too.”

On this project, [producer Pierre] de Reeder placed U47s for Deschanel and Ward; both also went to Neve 1073 mic pre’s, and Deschanel’s vocal took a small amount of 1176 compression. “Nothing’s heavily compressed,” de Reeder points out. “It’s just barely rocking the needle and making sure everything’s in control.”

All of the other inputs went through preamps in Sound Factory’s custom API console, then straight to a Studer A827 24-track tape machine.

Used for the vocals on Volume 3, as mentioned by producer Pierre de Reeder in this April 15, 2015 Electronic Musician interview.

Embellishments include Deschanel’s lush vocal harmonies, which she develops to suit each track individually. “She comes in, more often than not, with her own idea for specific harmonies in mind, and depending on the complexity, we’ll either fill out the tracks on tape or, with some of the more complex ones with many parts—and it’s all her, those harmonies—we will create as many as 10 or 15 tracks in Pro Tools to make a big sound.

“There’s also a lot of plate reverb on the tracks,” de Reeder continues. “Sound Factory has three EMT 140s, and we used two, and analog delay, with just a touch of slap.”