Basic Importing

Let’s take a look at the basics of importing your tracks from one project to another.

Open the Media Inspector and go to the “Browser” tab.

Navigate to your project folder. Double click on the project file — it should be the only file in the project folder apart from the subfolders (unless you’ve saved a Reason file or something else in there). If you’ve got a few files in there, it’s the one with an icon like the selected file in this image:

This is what the media inspector will look like once you open a project file:

Select the tracks you want to import, and then choose which data you want to import. There are five columns with checkboxes:

• Content (this means the audio itself)
• Plug-ins (all inserts and their settings)
• Sends (all sends and their corresponding aux channels with replicated inserts and settings)
• I/O (the track’s input and output routing)
• Automation (all automation data you’ve saved on the track)

Logic will only import the data you’ve checked off. If you just want the audio, ensure that Content is the only checked box.

If you’ve selected a group of tracks, ticking a box in one column will check the same box for all selected tracks. If you want all boxes across all columns checked, make your selection and then Alt+click one box. This will happen:

You’ll rarely want everything but it is handy to be able to bring in a whole swab of tracks including all their data.

Now, press the “Add” button in the lower right corner of the Media Inspector. Your tracks will appear in the Arrange and Mixer views!

We could end this tutorial here if we just wanted the most basic uses of Selective Track Import, but there’s a couple of more advanced issues to cover.

Importing Mixer Settings

Maybe you don’t want any audio, but you know you’ve got the perfect vocal channel settings for this song in one of your other projects. Selective Track Import doesn’t simply allow you to import tracks. It allows you to import settings and content onto existing tracks.

In this case, I’m going to import plug-ins and sends from the “Tape Echo Guitar” in one of my other projects and replace the “Beefy Rock Guitar” settings.

Select the track you want to import mixer settings onto. Make sure it’s got that light gray highlight in the Arrange and Mixer views so it’s definitely the selected track. You don’t want to replace other settings you’ve slaved away to perfect!

Open the Media Inspector again and click on the “Browser” tab. Navigate to the source project and double-click on the project file. In my case, I’ve gone to the same project.

This time, however, I’m only selecting one of the tracks. Tick “Plug-ins” and “Sends” only. Ensure everything else is left unchecked. I don’t have any sends on this track, so Logic will gray-out the checkbox and make it unclickable.

Click the “Replace” button at the bottom of the Browser:

The audio and automation will all stay intact, but the Inserts will change, and they’ll have identical settings to our other project’s inserts. Here’s a before and after:

If you do have sends to import, bear in mind that Logic will create the necessary aux channels and replicate the inserts and their settings. You may need to mix their levels in appropriately with the track.

Snapping Imported Audio in Time

What do you do if the audio you’ve imported is out of time with the track? There’s a good chance that it will be! Flex mode comes to the rescue again.

Select the tracks that need to be quantized in the Mixer so that you can create a group. To create a group, click and hold on the empty box just below the I/O settings on the channel strip (if you can’t find it, check the screenshot below with the yellow “1” in each of the boxes — that’s where you want to click). Select an unused group number — in this case number 1.

Enable Flex View by clicking on the button in the toolbar at the top of the Arrange window (it’s between Automation and Set Locators by default). Your tracks will probably get bigger and you’ll see a new menu in the track headers that says by default “Off”.

Click and hold where it says Off until a menu comes up, and select Slicing. Logic will process for a moment, and apply this setting to all tracks within the group. They’ll look a bit different afterwards:

If you play the project back, everything should sit nicely with the new tempo!

Although Logic’s Environment is reputed to be its ‘dreaded’ window, after some understanding and use it can quickly become an inseparable part of your productions. In this tutorial, we will take an introductory look into Logic’s Environment to create a multi-instrument that will help streamline your productions as well as begin to dispel any myths about this extremely useful and often overlooked aspect of Logic.

Step 1

Let’s say you have found a combination of three bass sounds that you want to play in unison to form the main bass element of a current project. You have mapped out your MIDI pattern and decide to copy and paste the region into your remaining bass tracks to get everything playing together. Everything is fine, until you realize there are a few tweaks you want to make to the MIDI.

At this point, you have to derail your creative flow by making edits in one region, deleting all corresponding regions in the other tracks and then pasting the new region in the now empty tracks. All of this is necessary before you can hear an accurate update across all three sounds of even the smallest change. This process quickly becomes tiresome and monotonous at every stage of the creative process, from experimenting with ideas to finalizing the event data. To get around this, we need to employ the following trick.

To start, I have set up a layered bass sound consisting of three basic bass instruments responding to copies of the same MIDI region; all of which I pulled from Logic’s library.

It is not very interesting, but more than suitable for this demonstration.

Here is what it sounds like.

Download audio file (MIDI1.mp3)

Step 2

After listening a few times, I’ve decided that I want to change the pattern around by making some MIDI adjustments. I want to hear those adjustments as I make them and not have to go through the multiple steps necessary to update each individual region each time I change a note. To do this I need to create a fourth MIDI instrument/channel that I will use to control the existing bass instruments.

The beginning of this process requires me to open Logic’s Environment (Window>Environment or ⌘8) where I will then go to the ‘New’ menu located at the top of the Environment window and select ‘Instrument’.

Step 3

Once I have the instrument object, I need to click/drag the top-right patch node of the instrument (the triangle sticking out of the instrument icon) to one of the bass instrument channels within the Environment that I want to control. As I drag the node over the instrument channels, they will become highlighted to let me know that a connection will be made between the channel and the MIDI instrument object when I release the mouse button.

As soon as I make the first connection, a pop-up dialogue will appear and I will have to choose ‘Remove’ from the dialogue box to remove the channel port that Logic assigns by default.

Step 4

Now I will repeat the connection sequence by click dragging the new instrument patch nodes that appear on the instrument icon to whatever instrument channels I want to control (in this case the two other bass instruments).

Once these steps are done, your Environment should look something like this (I took the extra step of naming the new instrument ‘Multi-Bass’ which you can do by selecting the instrument object and then changing the name field in the inspector, located in the upper left).

Step 5

Now I have to go back to the Arrange page and create a new track. It does not matter what type of track it is as I will be converting it in the next step. The only important thing is that it is there.

Step 6

Now I need to drag the MIDI instrument object icon from the Environment to the new track header in the Arrange page. To do this I need both the Arrange page and Environment open and then it is just a matter of dragging the instrument object icon to the track header and dropping it. Logic will update the track header and all associated parameters automatically.

Step 7

Now I can move one of the MIDI regions down to the new MIDI track and delete all the others and still have the same output as when I had three regions. Logic will now read the MIDI within the new multi-bass track and route that MIDI information according to the patch in the Environment.

Here is how it sounds with some slight MIDI editing within just the one region.

Download audio file (MIDI2.mp3)

Although it sounds pretty much the same, the key here is that it only took editing a single region to change the pattern and subsequent output of all three instruments.

Step 8

Now I can hide the instrument tracks and edit the MIDI within the single region and all of my bass tracks will correspond to those edits instantaneously without my having to update other tracks or regions. This greatly increases my productivity, and allows me to preview multiple creative ideas without having to change gears to constantly update MIDI in other tracks.

Of course you are not limited to just three instruments, but generally 3-4 is a good number for sake of clarity. Try experimenting around with different numbers and different types and see what happens.

In the next tutorial, we will take things a bit further in the Environment by looking at the transformer object and programming it to control various parameters (cutoff across all three instruments, etc.) of our multi-instrument by using just a single parameter.

1. Different Types of Desks

In big recording studios, you usually
come across big mixing desks that have two types of faders on the
same track. These mixers are called In-Line mixers.

The SSL 4000 G+ In-line Mixing Desk

Photo by Pablo Albacete

This is the SSL 4000 G+ In-line mixing
desk. Without going into full detail of its complexities, notice how it has two faders per channel. It has a large fader
at the bottom, and then a small fader above. You use the different
faders for different things, depending on which stage you are in,
whether it be recording, mixing or overdubbing. When recording, this
desk jumps into a different position than when mixing.

The basic signal flow when recording on
the SSL is as follows:

• Signal gets picked up by the
  microphone and goes into the microphone input of the desk.
  
• It then Goes down the channel path to the
  large fader first.
  
• After that the signal shoots up to
  the routing matrix, which is the assortment of gray buttons at the
  top of each channel.
  
• From there it goes to the
  recorder, or multitrack. Now the large
  fader controls the amount of signal that gets sent into the DAW.
  
• Now we have to listen back to
  signal as it comes back to the desk from the multitrack. As you send
  the signal back into the desk it goes into the routing matrix again,
  down the monitor path to the small fader. The small fader are the
  tape return faders, where you listen to what’s coming from the DAW.
  

It’s important to listen to the signal
after it goes through all of the equipment as it might be changed
by the equipment. So listen how the signal is going to sound on tape, not
how it’s coming in. By being able to control both the level of the
signal going into the desk with the normal gain knobs, and then the
level going into the multitrack (DAW, Pro Tools, etc.), you get a higher
degree of control using an In-Line desk than a normal one.

Not a lot of people have the
pleasure of working with an SSL everyday. And some don’t even like
working on an analog desk. I find it tiring to work on the SSL
because if you are mixing and you want to come back another day to
finish, you have to take down the position of every fader, every knob
and every setting so you can recall it again when you come back. And
that sometimes doesn’t work because you find that you can never put
it back exactly as it was.

Digital Studio Desks

Because digital audio has gotten better
and better over the last decades, digital mixing desks are often
used instead of the old analog mixers. In a digital mixing desk you
can save all your settings when you leave, and recall them exactly as they
was before. This is a huge advantage when you aren’t the only one
using the desk.

There are two types of digital mixing desks out
there: one has built in EQ, compression and effects processors,
effectively working like a normal mixing desk; and the other is
only a control surface. A control surface looks like a mixing desk,
but it only controls the DAW you’re working in.

The Control 24 Pro Tools Controller

Photo by Pablo Albacete

This is the Control 24 Pro Tools
controller. Although it has pre-amps, it isn’t actually a mixing
desk. It’s hooked to Pro Tools in a way that whatever you do on the
desk, moving faders, panning etc, happens directly inside Pro Tools.
So in a way, it’s just a really cool and powerful mouse. These types
of controllers come in handy when you like mixing inside the box, but
want to be able to push faders and twist knobs for a more human feel.
I prefer moving faders on a console than moving them inside a DAW
with a mouse and I imagine most of you like that too.

When you only want your audio program
to act as a big playlist, and like using built-in EQ or compression
of a digital desk, there are a few options out there for you too.
Normal digital mixing desks are hooked up to an audio program and
each channel inside the program linked to a dedicated fader. You
don’t have to use the audio program more than you want to, as you
have built-in processors on the desk, but by using both things at the
same time you can get best of both worlds. For instance, you can save
the processing power of your computer by using the EQ and compression
of the mixing desk, and then using more dedicated effects, or
automation inside the program.

The Tascam DM-4800 Digital Mixing Console

Photo by Pablo Albacete

This is the Tascam DM-4800 digital
mixing console. It has built-in EQ and compression and two
multi-effects processors. This one is hooked up to Logic and can work
as a controller, like the Control 24. But it is more powerful than
the Control 24 which only controls Pro Tools, and doesn’t have any
internal processors. As said before, many people like working in
digital because it allows them total recall of every setting they had
the day before. On the Control 24 you just save the Pro Tools file
and the desk recalls it exactly as you save the file.

On the Tascam
you save your session inside the mixing desk itself, and when you
come back it will recall every setting from it’s memory. With digital
there comes convenience, and although many people still argue over
the sound quality of digital versus analog, you can’t argue that
digital mixing desks are way more convenient than the analog ones.

Mixing Desks in a Live Situation

In live sound situations you don’t need
all that excess baggage of an extra pair of faders like on the SSL,
or the need to control Pro Tools remotely. You aren’t recording
anything and you only need the sound to go straight into the desk and
out again to the PA (public address system). So live sound mixing desks have
a more simplified look and signal flow.

The Soundcraft GB2 Live Mixing Desk

Taken from Soundcraft.com

This is the Soundcraft GB2 live mixing
desk. Notice how much simpler it looks. It only has one set of
faders, the control room to the right is a simple affair with only a
master fader and two sets of group faders. This mixer is much easier
to handle compared to the SSL with it’s various modes, routing
matrixes, faders and groups.

The signal flow is as easy as it gets
as well:

• The signal goes from the microphone to
  the mic input of the desk.
  
• The signal goes down to the fader at
  the end.
  
• The signal goes to the master fader
  and out to the PA.
  

That’s as easy as it gets.

There are digital mixers available for
live sound as well. These work in a similar way to the Tascam DM-4800
as they have built in processing such as EQ and compression. With
normal analog live mixing desks like the GB2 we need dedicated
outboard processors and effects to enhance the sound, but that’s
built-in to the digital mixers. So in a way, as the sound industry
becomes more digital every day, our lives become easier. At least we
have to lug less stuff around in a live sound situation.

2. Different Types of Sound Engineers

There is also a difference between live sound engineers and mixing engineers, and the way they work. Some
studio mixers need their rack of effects and a lot of time to mix
their music, while the live sound engineer has to make do with what he
has.

Even if the studio mixer only mixes inside the box with his DAW, the result is bound to sound much better than some of the garbage sound systems the live engineer needs to work
with.

Do you prefer this?

Or this?

Photo by Pablo Albacete

3. Difference in Time and Creativity

There is a benefit involved with being
able to take your time in the recording studio that you also don’t
have when you are trying your best to make a live band
sound tight. In the live venue, you only get one shot, and there’s
only one performance by the band. So you’d better make sure that
performance sounds great because there’s no undo button, no punching
in for a better take and certainly no editing.

Being able to get the best performance
out of the artist is a great thing in the studio, and editing
together the perfect take is a joy to mix afterwards. Studio and live
performances are a pleasure to mix, but if you get an insecure
vocalist for example, you can’t edit his good takes together in a
live venue. At least in the studio, you can end up with a convincing
performance after heavy editing.

Time for creativity is also more
available when you are working in the studio. A live sound
performance only has the members of the band playing their
instrument, so the general sound of the concert is dependent on how
tight and good the band plays. But in the mixing studio you have room
to play around with delay, reverb, overdubs and layers. You have
more tracks to choose from, more time to tweak parameters and
generally more creative freedom. There are no mixing engineering
secrets in the live venue, it’s all dependent on the band.

Conclusion

Although the field of studio sound and live sound encompasses the
same basic principles, the approaches needed for each one is
different. Whether it be different attitudes or equipment there is a
certain uniqueness to each situation.

Live sound is based on fast
paced decision making where the music in going on right in front of
your eyes while a studio mixer might be able to take his time,
fine-tuning his mix to perfection. The same applies to the equipment,
where a live sound desk needs to be easy to navigate and control,
while the studio mixing console has more complexities in it’s signal
flow.

In my opinion there is no better job. There is joy to be had with mixing a great performance coming
out of a great sound system, and there is also satisfaction to be had
with creating a great take out of many mediocre ones. It’s all a
matter of taste. Sometimes live sound can rule the world, and
other times studio mixing is the calm comfort zone you want.

For all you Mac users, this tutorial will show you how to use Apple’s Waveburner to get that finished project on to a CD with individual track markers and a professional polished sound. If you are a Windows user and would like to see the equivalent in an application like Wavelab please let me know in the comments section.

Step 1 – Your Finished Mix

Whether you are creating an artist album, a DJ mix or compilation you can use Waveburner to consolidate the whole project. Obviously before we get into the basics of the application we have get the project out of the DAW it was mixed in.

Regardless of which DAW you are using there are few things to think about before you start exporting. Any sections of your project that are to be mixed seamlessly, or just played consecutively without gaps can be mixed in the DAW at this stage. These sections can then be exported and track markers can be inserted in Waveburner. If you are working on a DJ mix, or mixed compilation all your tracks will be exported as one large file.

With your consecutive sections and any single tracks mixed, you can start exporting. As we are technically mastering here you will want to export anything you intend to use at the highest resolution possible. 24 bit is preferable and everything can be converted to 16 bit at the end of the process.

Exporting the mix from Ableton

If this section still seems a little convoluted let me go through what I have done here… I have mixed a ‘mini’ DJ set in Ableton Live using three tracks, these tracks are obviously seamlessly mixed so they were then exported as one long file.

Mini mix in Ableton Live

Our CD will contain three tracks and these will be made using only the single file produced in Ableton. If you wanted to use unmixed tracks you could add these at a later stage. If this is a little confusing I apologise, it should all become clear by the end of this tutorial!

Step 2 – The Waveburner Interface

Waveburner is bundled with Logic Pro and has been for the last few versions. At version 1.0 Waveburner was a little buggy to be honest, but it has really come of age recently, and after a few updates at version 1.6.0 it’s now stable.

Waveburner 1.6.0 interface

The application shares its look with Apple’s new generation of professional tools such as Final Cut Pro and Soundtrack Pro. Everything is in a single window interface and its all pretty self-explanatory. The workflow is also pretty fluid and has some nice touches, such as the ability to resize the different work areas and full support for dragging and dropping files into projects.

Step 3 – Adding Tracks to a New Project

When you open Waveburner it automatically presents you with a blank project. To add tracks to our new project we can use several different methods. The central window in the lower part of Waveburner’s display is where our project media is displayed, files can be dragged and dropped into this window. Alternatively you can use the import function in the file menu or the shortcut in the upper toolbar.

The import option in the toolbar

Importing audio from the file menu

Once our file has been imported you will see it in the media list and when this is selected an overview of the file will appear in the display area at the top of the interface. With all the work areas expanded this can be a little fiddly but with the lower windows collapsed things get a little clearer.

Audio in the media list

Collapsed view of new audio file

Either way you get a good overview of your track and with the lower windows expanded you are presented with extra info on your file, such as resolution, loudest section and length. The lower windows on the right also display information on effects and processing, which we’ll look at later.

Expanded view of new audio file

Step 4 – Creating Track Markers

Creating track markers is what Waveburner is good at and it executes this function with relative ease.

Simply find the point in your mix or album where you want the new CD track to appear and use the purple ‘Add CD Track’ tool. Once placed this new marker can be dragged about to any location you desire. It really helps to zoom in pretty heavily at this point as its nice to have the track change on the beat or at an equally appropriate moment.

The new track tool

Adding our first track marker

Once placed you can name the separate tracks and move on to the next one. As this project only contained three tracks is was a pretty fast job! Use the next last buttons in the transport area to test your new track markers, as this is how they will sound on the CD.

Adding and naming more markers

The three markers in place

Step 5 – Automating Levels and Creating Fades

If you find that some areas of the project are significantly louder or quieter than others its possible to change this in Waveburner. The quickest way is to split the files with the dedicated tool in the toolbar. Once split the two new regions are re-located to their own lanes.

Splitting regions to edit levels

You’ll notice that each region has its own level handle and the gain of each region can be easily adjusted. Don’t worry about a small difference in level as a mastering compressor can always be employed to look after subtle changes like this.

You can also perform other tasks using these handles. If you overlap two regions on different lanes they will automatically cross fade, these cross fades can then be adjusted manually to get exactly the right blend between two files. Using a similar technique fades can be added the start and end of files, the curve for these fades can then be edited in the same way. I have added a fade out on the end of the project as the track hadn’t finished.

Performing fades

Step 6 – Adding Processing

Assuming the material that you have imported into Waveburner has not already been treated with mastering processors you can add some basic treatment using the applications included plug-ins.

The plug-ins that are available are exactly the same to those in Logic Pro 9. Waveburner is also audio units compatible so you can use your favourite third party mastering plugs if you like.

Choosing plug-ins

To add plug-ins go to the lower right hand window and use the add plug-in menu. You should be able to see all the Logic plug-ins in the list. I have used Apple-only effects here so that the project can be loaded on any system. I have used a linear phase EQ and a limiter, just to add a little high end and some volume.

Plug-ins used on the project

Step 7 – Saving, Exporting and Burning

When you’re happy with the track markers and processing you can think about burning or saving your finished project. Before you do you have the option to ‘bounce’ the project. I like to do this as it cleans things up. By using the Bounce Project option in the file menu all the split regions and effects are ‘imprinted’ onto a single file. Your track markers however will stay intact and can edited further.

Bouncing the project

The bounced project

When bounced you can either burn directly to CD using the burn function or save the whole thing as a disc image. Saving as an image can be useful as you will have a ‘master’ copy on your hard drive and this can be used to burn multiple copies of your latest masterpiece!

Burning the final project to CD

A Quick Recap on Recording Multiple Takes

Before we learn how to edit take folders, let’s look at recording those multiple takes in the first place in case you haven’t done so before.

1. Loop the Section You’re Recording

Click and drag on the bar meter at the top of the Arrange window to set loop locators. When you press play, Logic will loop that section of the song repeatedly. Make sure you set locators for precisely the section you need to capture multiple takes for. Your bar meter will look something like this:

2. Press Record

Hit the Record button. You’ll get your four beat count-in the first time, scurry over to your instrument or mic really quickly!

3. Repeat Until Done

After the count-in, Logic will just keep playing back the same section and recording on new take tracks. You won’t get a count-in with every repetition; after the first play-through it loops seamlessly as you’d expect. Once you feel you’ve captured enough takes to make a good comp from, hit Stop.

Here’s the audio I’m working with — I’ve played a chord progression a bit behind the drum beat, which gives the progression a relaxed sort of feeling. I’ve done this specifically so I have something to edit into place later.

Download audio file (1.mp3)

Step 1

Once you’ve got a set of takes, the first thing you need to do is turn Quick Swipe Comping on that region off. This can be done by clicking the little button with three rectangles inside it in the top right corner of the region, or by selecting the menu option that will appear when you click the arrow button next to it. Here’s a screenshot that shows both:

Step 2

Double-click on the region or click the small arrow in the top left corner of the region to expand the take folder. You’ll see each of your takes each on their own tracks.

Step 3

Select the tool you wish to use to edit the tracks. Not many of the tools will work at this stage, such as the fade tool, but for now all you really need are the scissor and pointer tools. Split the regions with the scissors where you plan to move the tracks.

Here’s what my tracks look like now — quite a bit of cutting going on:

It’s important to note that splitting regions creates new regions — a fairly obvious point, but you will need to remember you’re also separating the comp groups. This makes it easy to swap one chord out for one from another take, but you can just switch the whole thing over to your fifth take or whatever without going through each region’s comp controls one by one.

Step 4

At this stage, delete unneeded regions and shift them into place. I’ve decided that my guitar track feels too relaxed and I’m putting everything back on the accented beats where the average person would expect them to be.

Because of the simplicity of my edit I can remove the silent sections to create a cleaner track and simply move all the regions over half a bar:

Step 5

Comp the edited tracks. At its simplest, this is basically a matter of using the drop down menu to select the take you’d like to use in each of your segmented regions. For a more detailed look at comping, refer to this tutorial, but bear in mind that there may be some changes between Logic Pro 8 and 9 when following the instructions.

Move on to the next step once you’ve turned the best part of each take into one track and you’re happy with it.

Step 6

Are you sure you’re happy with it? Because we’re about to flatten the takes down into your one comp, and once the Undo history runs out you won’t be able to change your mind easily.

Click on the arrow button in the top right corner of the window to bring up the comping dropdown, and select Flatten. Repeat this process for each region.

Step 7

My flattened but separated comps sound pretty choppy:

Download audio file (2.mp3)

Now that the comp is flattened we can use our tools again, so I’m going to fade the regions in and out to take that sharp edge off them.

I had to fade in pretty heavily to make the chords smoother. If I was working on a proper project I would’ve edited much more carefully but since this is a tutorial I just made cuts right on the beat. So how far you need to fade will depend on the type of audio you’re working with (these are quite percussive chord hits so they come in loud and hard) and how well you’ve edited the regions.

Download audio file (3.mp3)

(I am of course aware that the guitar is in desperate need of some reverb, but that’s for another tutorial!)

Step 8

Merge the regions together if you’d like to have a solid block for that chord progression just like when we started. This is simply a matter of selecting all the regions you wish to include, then going to the Region > Merge menu and clicking on Regions.

And there you have it: one comped, flattened, edited and merged region.

This style of programming is really addictive and can be used with pretty much any form of electronic music. Once you have put a sequence together using your synth of choice why don’t you upload the result for us all to hear?

Step 1 – The Tools Needed

All you really need to get this sound is a DAW capable of MIDI sequencing (which is pretty much all of them!) and a synth with glide or portamento and a legato voicing mode. If your not sure what these are just yet, don’t worry I’ll explain as we go.

I have chosen Disco DSP’s Discovery synth, which is a software emulation of the classic Nord Lead 2. Of course you don’t have to use exactly the same synth, I just happen to know this particular instrument handles this sort of sound pretty well. If you want to try a demo of Discovery you can pick one up here.

Disco DSP’s Discovery soft synth

It will prove pretty useful if your chosen synth has some kind of built in distortion or overdrive. A built in delay effect would also be helpful. If your synth doesn’t have these features you can use extra plug-ins for the effects, so it shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

Step 2 – The Sound

The sound we are looking to recreate is that of classic acid machines, namely the Roland TB-303. Obviously the result we’ll get won’t be exactly the same as the magic silver box, in fact it maybe very different but if you get your head around how these sounds are created, the outcome will most certainly have that acid edge.

A Roland TB-303

If we want be authentic the sound should be based on a single saw or square wave oscillator. This will then be fed into a low pass resonant filter and a simple decay based envelope. The classic acid glide is produced by using a mono / legato voicing mode in conjunction with portamento and come overlapped MIDI notes.

Once all these elements are in place we can add some distortion, delay and extra effect such as unison or a phaser for extra depth. So now we know what’s in store lets get started.

Step 3 – Our Oscillator and Basic Sequence

On the original TB-303 there was a choice of either a saw or a square wave oscillator, so to keep things as close to the original as I can I’ll go with a single saw wave here. Although the 303 was only capable of producing one voice we can always double up to create a thicker sound later in the process.

A single oscillator set up on the Discovery

The single saw wave oscillator:

Download audio file (3.mp3)

I have my synth loaded in Logic Pro 9 so this is where I will create my sequence. I have programmed a very simple step based pattern at 127 bpm. This was originally played in, then quantised and finally some extra notes added for pace.

Simple pattern programmed in Logic 9

The basic sequence:

Download audio file (3b.mp3)

With our single oscillator pattern playing back we are about ready to move on to the next step and start spicing things up a little!

Step 4 – Creating the Glide

Adding glide effects is arguably the most important part of creating an acid sequence. It’s this effect that gives acid machines their distinctive character, so we have to make sure things are right at this stage.

In a lot of synth patches that feature portamento the glide effect is on all the time. This is not what we are looking for here as we want only specific notes to glide and these gliding notes should be programmable. To do this we have to use a legato mode. Make sure your chosen synth has this mode available, it should be in the voicing section where you choose the instruments polyphony.

The glide set up in Discovery

When legato mode is engaged and our glide / portamento is turned on the notes should only glide when they overlap. You can test this by playing a note on the keyboard, holding it down and then playing another. This should may the note glide. If, however you simply play the notes with no overlap, no glide should take place.

It’s worth noting at this point that some synths will require ‘auto’ mode to be engaged in the portamento section. On some synths this is the thing that makes notes glide when overlapped. Some experimentation will be needed from synth to synth as they all work in different ways.

Going back to our MIDI sequence, we can now start to choose which notes will glide and which won’t. You can see in my sequence I have just picked a bunch of random notes but of course you may want to be a little more scientific in approach! I tend to find that notes towards the end of bars, or going from low to high work very well here.

The sequence with some notes overlapped for glide effect

The sequence with the glide effect:

Download audio file (4.mp3)

Step 5 – Filters and Envelopes

With our sequence playing nicely we can start to add an extra edge using a resonant low pass filter. The addition of a good dose of resonance is pretty important if we are to achieve that famous acid squelch.

A dedicated filter envelope is also pretty important here and you’ll want to use a fair amount of decay, with a low sustain and release setting. This will clamp down on each note and add real dynamics and movement to the patch. This filter can then be added when needed and even automated for sections of the sequence.

The filter and envelope set up

Your amp envelope will also have to be reasonably close to the filter envelope settings. Of course they don’t have to be matched exactly but a decay based signature does tend to work best here.

Step 6 – Adding Extra Effects

Once you are happy with the way the sequence is firing you can start to add extra effects to add a little spice. Distortion does tend to work very well with resonant sounds and will add new harmonics, making the whole thing richer and fatter. As I said earlier, many synths have distortion built in and many even feature it at the filter stage. If yours doesn’t, pick up your favourite overdrive plug-in … tube emulations can work wonders here.

The sequence with distortion and delay:

Download audio file (6.mp3)

Delay is another effect that can really add to sequence like this. Try something that has a high pass filter so the bottom end remains unaffected. This was all your lovely glides and squelches will be repeated but those all important lows will remain untouched and clear.

The final patch with effects playing back with some drums

The sequence in action with some drums:

Download audio file (6b.mp3)

Why Use Varispeed?

Varispeed isn’t the sort of tool you’ll need to use every day, but it’s the sort of tool that you like to know is available to you. Every now and then you’re halfway through a project when you decide that the tempo just isn’t right and the song should be slower or faster. Varispeed allows you to determine which tempo suits the song better, quickly and easily.

Alternatively, you may be having trouble recording a difficult part in the song. While Varispeed may not be your first port of call, after struggling with the part for too long it’s convenient to be able to slow the whole project down, record your part, and snap it back to normal speed afterwards. Your new part will be in time with everything else.

If you feel like a cheater recording the part slower, at least you can practice at a slower tempo before working your way back up.

And, for maximum fun, Varispeed can be used as an effect as well.

Step 1

Varispeed isn’t instantly available from the transport bar on a default installation of Logic Pro 9. If you right click anywhere on the transport bar you’ll get a menu option that says “Customize Transport Bar…” — click this.

This is what you’ll see:

Tick the box that says Varispeed in the second column, and then click OK.

Step 2

You should now see this button among the group of buttons on the right hand side of your transport bar:

If you click this button, Varispeed is enabled, and you’ll see a section of the transport bar’s information panel go orange.

Step 3

Your project still sounds the same at this point. Varispeed is on, but the change in speed hasn’t been specified yet.

Before we start tempo-shifting, let’s listen to the original piece. I didn’t want to record a bunch of music for this tutorial so I’ve just arranged a little tune from stock loops. It’s a bit busy because I wanted to demonstrate how well Varispeed tempo-shifts multiple audio and MIDI tracks all at the same time.

Download audio file (Original.mp3)

Go back to the orange panel on the information bar. If you drag the bottom section with the numbers in it up or down, you’ll change the tempo. The default view measures the change in percentage, and that change can be between -50% and +100%.

I have to say that I’m pretty impressed with how well Logic retains the tune’s cohesion at the most extreme ends of the spectrum. Here are the -50% and +100% versions, respectively:

Download audio file (Minus50.mp3)
Download audio file (Plus100.mp3)

Step 4

That’s cool, but modifying the tempo by percentages doesn’t quite give us control that’s fine tuned enough for a real song. We need to be able to modify the number of beats per minute directly.

In the top half of the orange section of the transport bar’s information area, there’s usually text such as “Speed Only”. Click and hold here to bring up a menu, and select “Resulting Tempo”. The percentage is gone, and now you can set a specific tempo, which gives you much less comedic and more useful results.

Here’s our song at 130 BPM, up from a base of 120 BPM:

Download audio file (130BPM.mp3)

Step 5

I mentioned that Varispeed could be used as an effect. Most features that allow you to speed up or slow down entire songs try to retain the original pitch of the track, which is what makes using Varispeed to record difficult parts possible.

But Logic gives you the option to change the tempo and the pitch in parallel. If you lower the tempo, you lower the pitch. If you increase the tempo, you increase the pitch.

This allows you to crank the tempo and create one of those silly chipmunk songs that I always see in American movies or create a dark, warped effect by bringing the tempo and pitch down low.

Here’s an example of each, at 66 BPM and 178 BPM respectively:

Download audio file (Pitch66BPM.mp3)
Download audio file (Pitch178BPM.mp3)

To do this, hold down on the top row of the Varispeed information section on the transport bar. This brings up the menu again. Now, switch from “Speed Only” to “Varispeed (Speed and Pitch)”.

At this point you can change the tempo or speed change percentage and laugh at the results.

What you might not realize though is that it’s a surprisingly easy effect to achieve. All you need is a source track and an Auto-tune plug in (or an Auto-tune clone, in this case we’ll use Logic Studio’s built in Pitch Correction).

First I’ll explain the parts of Pitch Correction that we’re going to use. Next I’ll walk through two different examples of how to put the effect to use. In this tutorial I’ll use the term Pitch Correction to mean the same thing as Auto-tune.

Pitch Correction

Pitch correction is mainly described as a way to “correct intonation”. If a singer is a little off pitch it can correct this error and make the performance sound better. But the effect can warp the sound of the audio, so for it to go unnoticed it needs to be applied subtly. Eventually someone figured out that the warped sound can actually be pretty cool, and by applying pitch correction heavily you can get some interesting effects. At last, gone are the days when you actually have to be able to sing to be a singer!

When you first instantiate Pitch Correction on an audio track you see the following window:

The only parameters we’re going to work with in this tutorial are Response and the individual pitch keyboard. What we’re essentially going to do is choose which pitches are allowed to pass through (using the keyboard) and then decide how much of the effect to apply (using the Response parameter). The Range on the left side we’ll generally leave on “normal”, unless you happen to be working with a particularly low pitched source.

The keyboard allows you to choose which pitches the source sound will be tuned to. If you have every note selected (which is the default setting), then the plugin will determine which pitch the incoming signal is closest to and adjust to it accordingly. Sometimes if you’re original signal is especially “pitchy”, the plugin can misinterpret the intended pitch. (For example if you sing a C but it is so flat the plugin thinks you meant B, it will “correct” the pitch to B).

Therefore it’s generally a good idea to only allow the pitches you want to be heard. If you’re original signal only uses Cs, Ds and Gs, then only highlight those three pitches.

The Root and Scale settings allow you to set an entire group of notes with just a few clicks, rather than have to go through and individually select every note that we want to pass through. In this case “Root” is the key you’re working in, so in C major your root is C. Scale is obviously the scale. In almost all cases you’ll want Major Scale or Natural Min Scale, but you have plenty of options available. It can be fun to click through the different choices to see what kind of result you get.

The Response parameter allows us to determine just how much of the effect we want applied. This is determined in milliseconds. The less obvious you want the effect to be, the longer it should take for it to apply which means a higher response setting. For our purposes, since we’re going for a very affected sound, we’re going to set the Response time all the way to 0ms. That way the pitch correction will be applied immediately, giving us the robotic effect we’re looking for.

For Effect

Now that we’ve seen the basic parameters let’s see how they can be applied. For our first example I want to create a downtempo electronica track. I want to use a pitch corrected vocal not as a lead singer, but more like just another sound in the overall texture of the groove. I’ve chosen the following samples from the Deep India library as my base vocal sounds:

Download audio file (1a_DI_Dry1.mp3)
Download audio file (1b_DI_Dry2.mp3)
Download audio file (1c_DI_Dry3.mp3)

The first thing we’ll do is apply Pitch Correction, so I’ll instantiate the Pitch Correction plugin on the audio track. The default setting is a chromatic scale with a Response time of 122ms. As I mentioned earlier, we need the effect to be applied immediately to give us the specific “vocoded” sound we want. I’ll set the Response to 0ms, which gives us the following effect:

Download audio file (2a_DI_Pitch1.mp3)
Download audio file (2b_DI_Pitch2.mp3)
Download audio file (2c_DI_Pitch3.mp3)

I don’t really hear much of the effect, mostly because every pitch from the chromatic scale is being allowed through. Let’s bring them all in towards a cohesive idea by limiting the pitches. In this case I’ll limit them significantly to only 5 notes, a D minor pentatonic scale.

Now listen to how the 0ms Response time and restricted pitch makes the samples sound like they actually belong together:

Download audio file (3a_DI_Pent1.mp3)
Download audio file (3b_DI_Pent2.mp3)
Download audio file (3c_DI_Pent3.mp3)

The Pitch Correction is now where I want to, so I’m going to color up the sound a little. I’ve chosen a Guitar Rig preset called Phase Wurli (Believe me, there was no science behind this decision. I chose Guitar Rig because I figured it would give me a wide range of interesting choices, and then I clicked through presets until I found something I liked). Here are the vocal samples with the Guitar Rig effect applied:

Download audio file (4a_DI_FX1.mp3)
Download audio file (4b_DI_FX2.mp3)
Download audio file (4c_DI_FX3.mp3)

Lastly I’ll apply a touch of reverb and delay. I mentioned that I want this sound to be a part of the overall texture, so the reverb and delay will help make it feel a little more washed out and part of the background.

Download audio file (5a_DI_Dly1.mp3)
Download audio file (5b_DI_Dly2.mp3)
Download audio file (5c_DI_Dly3.mp3)

Here’s how the final result sounds in actual context:

Download audio file (6_DI_Example.mp3)

Lead Vocals

The next example will be more of an upbeat dance track where the vocals are actually the lead, rather than just a background effect. We’ll start with the source track, which is a lead vocal for the song’s chorus. For this song the chorus has actual pitches that need to be matched, so I am going to select those notes individually. Like before, we’re going to set the Response time to 0ms.

To save myself from public humiliation and to save your ears from bleeding, we’re going to skip listening to the “raw” vocal track. Just take my word for it that it needs tuning. Here’s the sample with pitch correction:

Download audio file (7_LIBT_Lead.mp3)

To keep to the conventions of the style I’m going to heavily compress the vocal. I’ll start by instantiating Logic Studio’s Compressor and choosing the “Opto Vocal 01″ preset. I want to take it further though so I’m going to set the Threshold even lower to -18 and the Ratio even higher to 5.4:1. I want it to be so squashed you can taste the compression.

Here’s the compressed lead vocal:

Download audio file (8_LIBT_Compressed.mp3)

Next I want to beef it up a bit more so I’m going to sing the same line an octave down. Again pitch corrected with the same pitches. and with the same compression applied.

Download audio file (9_LIBT_8vb.mp3)

And finally I’ll add a harmony above the top line.

Download audio file (10_LIBT_Harmony.mp3)

Now that there are so many parts going on I don’t feel like the lead is cutting through as well as it could. I’m going to add a Stereo Sample Delay plugin to the lead vocal. The Sample Delay will split the signal to the left and right sides, with one signal delayed just a little. This gives us a “doubling” effect which makes the original sound feel much thicker. I’ll set the right side to delay by 800ms. Too low a setting and you wont notice the thickening, but too high a setting and the split signals wont feel like they still go together.

Here’s how our full Pitch Corrected vocal ensemble now sounds:

Download audio file (11_LIBT_Vox.mp3)

And finally, here it is in a the context of a real song:

Download audio file (12_LIBT_Example.mp3)

One More Time…

Using Pitch Correction for warping vocals doesn’t give you the same level of control and nuance as a traditional vocoder, but it does allow you to get an interesting effect with just a few simple clicks. All you have to do is turn it on, pick out your notes, and viola: you sound just like any other electronica diva.

You don’t have to restrict your use of Pitch Correction to vocals, of course. What happens when you use it on a guitar solo? Or even a drum loop? These tools are here for fun and there are no rules. Experiment!

I’ll walk through a few examples of how gates can be used this way using various DAWs. Even if your software isn’t featured here don’t worry, these techniques are generic and can be translated to pretty much any gate plug-in.

Step 1 – The Basic Gate

As most of you are probably aware the primary use for a gate is to reduce noise and any unwanted signal that is present in your recordings. For example you may have a vocal take with rumble, computer noise or heavy breathing in between phrases. A gate is the perfect tool for removing these problem areas, often with zero impact on the parts you want to keep.

As a gate is really just an automated level control they use very little to no CPU to run. Most DAWs include one or even two gates as standard and these will often be bundled with a number of pre-sets to get you going.

Propellerheads Record’s built in noise gate

As the process of gating isn’t particularly exciting and is often seen as purely a problem solving exercise, the gate can be somewhat overlooked as a creative effect. Let’s run through a few examples of how we can think out side the box, from a simple alternative use for our gate to something a little more special.

Step 2 – Using Gates as Transient Designers

First up let’s take a look at using our gates in an almost traditional way, but instead of reducing we’ll try using it in a similar way to a transient designer. This basically means that we can actually remove parts of a drum track or loop. This can be really useful for cleaning up our overall sound.

Let’s start by choosing a loop with a fair bit of noise present. Here I have chosen a .rex file for speed but of course this technique can quite easily be applied to a drum group / buss and will work equally well on acoustic drums as it does on electronic sounds.

The untreated loop used

The untreated loop:

Download audio file (2.mp3)

As the loop has been loaded in Cubase 5 I have used the standard, bundled Steinberg Gate plug-in. I have started by initialising the plug-in so that no gating takes place and no signal can be heard, this is a good starting point and is often the best way to go when using dynamics processors in general.

The Cubase Gate

The next step is to bring the gates threshold control down until you can hear the peaks of the loop come through. In this case the first peak to show its head is the top of the kick and snare. Keep pushing the threshold until the majority of these major elements are playing but the other sounds are still gated.

The gates threshold being altered

Although we can filtered out many of the sounds in the loop, to make the remaining sounds a little more realistic we have to alter the release and hold times. When doing this try to mimic the actual release times of the drum sounds themselves. In doing this you may get some ‘bleed’ from the other sounds in the loop but this is to be expected and shouldn’t be too obvious in the mix.

The final gate settings

The gated loop:

Download audio file (2b.mp3)

When comparing the before and after you should hear a dramatic change in the loop and using this technique you can slightly clean up your drum parts or completely transform them depending on the intensity of your settings.

Step 3 – Creating Your Own Gated Reverbs

Most fully featured, modern reverb plug-ins will contain some kind of gated reverb effect and they can work really well on short percussive sounds or drums. Although these presets can work well you can gain much more control over this effect if you can create it using your own processors.

In this example I’ll use a single snare sound. You can hear that in it’s dry form it’s not particularly interesting and is maybe a little too dry. By adding a gated reverb we should be able to make the sound a lot more useable.

The original snare

The untreated snare:

Download audio file (3.mp3)

In this instance I have decided to load the sound up in Live 8 and because of this I am using Live’s bundled gate and reverb plug-ins. Again this technique can be achieved using pretty much any reverb and gate combo.

The first thing I did was to add a pretty standard reverb patch to the snare. The decay is pretty long and although the sound is nice as an effect it would be far to long to use throughout a mix and robs quite a lot of the direct power and snap of the untreated dry version.

Basic Ableton reverb patch

The snare with reverb:

Download audio file (3b.mp3)

So that we can achieve the effect and size of the reverb we need to add a gate to the end of the chain. With a super fast attack dialled in, you should be able to play with the threshold to allow the majority of the sound through. The reverb tail will be cut off and stop the sound from becoming to washed out.

The Ableton gate used

The final gated reverb effect:

Download audio file (3c.mp3)

At this point you’ll want to play with the reverb mix, gate release and gain reduction amount. This will allow you to match the reverb time to the snares release and also ensure there are no unwanted clicks and pops introduced by the gating. You can hear that the result is a lively, stereo snare which will really find its own place in the mix.

Step 4 – Rhythmical Gating and Gated Patterns

One of the most creative ways to use your gate plug-ins is to produce rhythmical patterns with them. As a lot of DAWs now feature native side chaining, you can now feed your gate with just about any signal you like. This allows you to use the gate as a sort of automated tremolo or pattern generator. Some really excellent results can be achieved with a little imagination.

Moving over to Logic 9.02, I have loaded up instrument and percussion loops. I have used the more fully featured of Logic’s two gates here as this will allow us a little more control over the finished sound.

Keyboard loop:

Download audio file (4.mp3)

Percussion loop:

Download audio file (4b.mp3)

Untreated basic mix:

Download audio file (4c.mp3)

The two loops used

The gate is placed on the instrument loop and the percussion loop is set to control the side chain circuit. This will allow us to use the peaks of the percussion pattern to activate the gating effect. Once this configuration is set up start to bring the threshold of the gate down until you hear some gating occur.

The sidechain routing

The mix with gating taking place:

Download audio file (4d.mp3)

Once the gating is taking place try sending the percussion to loop to ‘no output’ or a muted group. You should now hear the instrument loop with only the gated effect. This will allow you to make more exact adjustments to the gates settings. Of course you can always leave the percussion loop out of the mix and just use t as a trigger. if you prefer you can program your own trigger part using midi, this will allow a more personalised pattern to be produced.

The Logic noise gate plug-in

The gated loops in isolation:

Download audio file (4e.mp3)