Thursday, January 29, 2009
Improv of the day
I did my first stumbling around with the Reaktor-based Delay Array today, and made this. It isn't great or anything, just a guitar flat into the machine, but it does speak of interesting potential. I'll do more.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Delay Array
I've been working on this idea for years, now. I wasn't ever too keen on modern, sampler-based loopers like, well, like all of the current ones: Echoplex Digital Pro, Looperlative, JamMan, the Boss things. I've been through very nearly all of them (a couple of them twice), and what would happen is that, at least with the Echoplex and the Boomerang, I'd end up using them in "delay" mode. What's the difference?
In a sampler-based looper, you tap to get it going, record a phrase, then tap again to loop the phrase which you can then overdub over, or manipulate in other ways. All of the modern loop pedals operate this way.
In a delay-based looper, you set a delay time, play, and when you have what you want in the delay, hit the "latch" or "hold" switch, and the delay then cycles forever. Lots of old delays worked this way, but having a hold fell out of fashion in delays until quite recently. Now, though, some delays have holds again (Pigtronix Echolution), and others can be rigged to act like they do (Eventide Time Factor). Of course (and this is what I have done), a lot of the old two second delays are still around, and they can usually be modded to much longer delay times by rooting around in the various trim-pots inside. My favorite are the PDS delays, which come in several flavors: different amounts of delay, rack or pedal, sometimes with sampling or modulation capabilities.
It still isn't quite what I wanted, by itself. What I wanted to be able to do is get a delay-loop going, latch it, then get another one going against it, and so on. I went so far as to design, using three PDS units, a "delay array" which had the three delays in parallel, a footswitch to allow me to latch them independently, and a control panel for setting levels and delay times, etc. Tim Kaiser took my idea and built it, making this beautiful thing:
It's great. I made a demo track for you, with me improvising with a Telecaster and a ring mod. It has a nice gritty low-fi sound to it, and, of course, looks amazing. The only difference between this unit and what I'd wished for is that the three delays aren't related in any way, so everything ultimately turns into rhythmic mush. Very cool rhythmic mush.
Yesterday, I bumped into my old copy of Reaktor, which, back when I bought it, I found that my computer didn't have enough push to make it go very well. That was about four computers ago, though, so I installed it, purchased the very reasonable upgrade to the current edition, and made a software Delay Array.
This one is much the same as the hardware version, except the delays are all timed according to the master delay time -- one delay can be running at 2/3s the speed of another, with the third one running at 1/8, for instance. The programming isn't particularly clever (except the tap tempo module, which is kind of clever), but it is clean and functional, and draws almost no CPU load. If you have Reaktor 5, you can grab it here. I'll start recording with it in the next couple of days, and maybe have something to show for it soon.
In a sampler-based looper, you tap to get it going, record a phrase, then tap again to loop the phrase which you can then overdub over, or manipulate in other ways. All of the modern loop pedals operate this way.
In a delay-based looper, you set a delay time, play, and when you have what you want in the delay, hit the "latch" or "hold" switch, and the delay then cycles forever. Lots of old delays worked this way, but having a hold fell out of fashion in delays until quite recently. Now, though, some delays have holds again (Pigtronix Echolution), and others can be rigged to act like they do (Eventide Time Factor). Of course (and this is what I have done), a lot of the old two second delays are still around, and they can usually be modded to much longer delay times by rooting around in the various trim-pots inside. My favorite are the PDS delays, which come in several flavors: different amounts of delay, rack or pedal, sometimes with sampling or modulation capabilities.
It still isn't quite what I wanted, by itself. What I wanted to be able to do is get a delay-loop going, latch it, then get another one going against it, and so on. I went so far as to design, using three PDS units, a "delay array" which had the three delays in parallel, a footswitch to allow me to latch them independently, and a control panel for setting levels and delay times, etc. Tim Kaiser took my idea and built it, making this beautiful thing:
It's great. I made a demo track for you, with me improvising with a Telecaster and a ring mod. It has a nice gritty low-fi sound to it, and, of course, looks amazing. The only difference between this unit and what I'd wished for is that the three delays aren't related in any way, so everything ultimately turns into rhythmic mush. Very cool rhythmic mush.
Yesterday, I bumped into my old copy of Reaktor, which, back when I bought it, I found that my computer didn't have enough push to make it go very well. That was about four computers ago, though, so I installed it, purchased the very reasonable upgrade to the current edition, and made a software Delay Array.
This one is much the same as the hardware version, except the delays are all timed according to the master delay time -- one delay can be running at 2/3s the speed of another, with the third one running at 1/8, for instance. The programming isn't particularly clever (except the tap tempo module, which is kind of clever), but it is clean and functional, and draws almost no CPU load. If you have Reaktor 5, you can grab it here. I'll start recording with it in the next couple of days, and maybe have something to show for it soon.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
