For centuries the hammer has been the tool most recognized with carpentry. It’s held up as a symbol of work, of development, of unity and of triumph. To many, a hammer is just for whacking in nails. But to a true master of the tool. It is indespensable as a crowbar, as a lever, as pliers, as a wedge and for dozens of other uses.
As music producers delay is our hammer.
The obvious use of delay is to make an echo like the one on this guitar track. (Play the video below or click here)
You can see the delay time displayed in the video and with protools you can just press one of these buttons to get the delay exactly on the beat (assuming your tempos are all lined up correctly).
But if I pull the delay time back like this, instead of an echo effect, we have a chorus.
By moving it forward a bit you’ve got a phaser effect. And you can automate all of these parameters to make drifting flanger effects.
So at this point we probably saved you a few hundred bucks by eliminating the need for you to buy swanky plug in effects. And it’s the same with any tool… get to know it, and get to really understand what it does. Some of the most creative ideas happen when you start using something in a less than obvious way.
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