The Tremolo I Don't Want

topic posted Tue, July 1, 2008 - 8:32 PM by  Ember
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I just made a mix with Live, going between the laptop and cdjs, and realized all the tracks I played through live have a tremolo sound to them. Its not super pronounced but its definitely audible and unwanted. I'm running Live through a newer Macbook and an M-Audio Firewire 410. Anybody else had the tremolo they didn't want?
posted by:
Ember
Alaska
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  • Re: The Tremolo I Don't Want

    Tue, July 1, 2008 - 11:32 PM
    I would recommend checking the settings that you have your tunes in live in as. You will want to use Tone (mostly) or Complex (less often but useful) when playing tracks through live. I suspect you may have it on Beats which will give that wobble sound that I think you are describing. It won't happen at true tempo in Beats mode, but once you shift the BPM and the warping goes into effect, you get "teh wobble", no?
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      Re: The Tremolo I Don't Want

      Wed, July 2, 2008 - 12:29 PM
      as sAro mentioned, warping is probably the most likely offender. The wobble becomes more pronounced as you increase the tempo gap - for example, if you have a 130BPM track or sample and it's warped to a master tempo of 133 or 134 (or the other direction or whatever) and the warp mode is "beat" that tremolo-ish thing is really apparent. One other thing that you can try is setting your sample to "Hi-Qual" in the sample window of clip view (right next to the warp settings). It won't make the wobble go away but it allows Live to do higher quality dithering of the sample. "Tone" or "complex" are your best bets to mask that wobble. Unfortunately though the math and technology isn't quite there yet to be able to warp too far off true tempo without noticing some kind of wobbly/tremolo as an unwanted effect.

      If you're mixing trax - another thing you can do is assign a controller (like pitch bend or an assignable knob) to master tempo and adjust the range in the midi assign window - that way you can have control over the master tempo and fluidly move through the mix. It's a little more work but it helps. It is also possible to assign BPM changes in the master scene launch column.
      • Re: The Tremolo I Don't Want

        Wed, July 2, 2008 - 4:05 PM
        If you look in your clip window there is an "Original BPM" slot that can be adjusted up or down by clicking on the +2 or -2 (half or double) window which can get your loop to run a little closer to the desired BPM without that weird vibrato effect. I found this out by tracking some acoustic guitar at 35BPM and was able to put some drum loops originally recorded at 60 BPM to it......the things you learn by accident.


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    Re: The Tremolo I Don't Want

    Sat, July 5, 2008 - 8:44 PM
    Use repitch warp mode.
    Beats mode causes warble on anything that has any kind of sustained sounds going on in it (even at original tempo).
    Ecspecially for mixes repitch is the beast cuz it makes the tracks operate similar to vinyl. SLow tempo down= Pitch shifts down and vice versa.
    If you have specific tracks in your mix that are in key with each other then just use beats mode for those only (or complex mode, but I swear that complex mode just sounds mp3-like).

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