Dirtying Up Your Mixes

V

Velcro Buddha

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How do y'all suggest I "dirty up" my mixes, they sound too clean. Are there any Pro Tools plug-ins or external units that sound raw? The "bit-grunger" function on the MPC is nice, but it gives you no control (no parameters to tweak), plus I want to dirty up my whole mix rather than just my drum sequences.

For example: I like the roughness of Automator and Madlib mixes. Not just the harshness of the drums (I can already get that sound) but the whole mix.

I would appreciate any feedback, thanx.
 
keep the samples raw...and resample any synth sounds u use

a bit of distorion can help or somethimes boosting the high end frequencies to bring the grittines in the sound thru

getting panning and levels right can help too...and more importantly sound selection..theres no point in having a dirty piano sample and gritty drums when uve got 808 claps sticking out like a sore thub in the mix, for example
 
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What do you mean by resampling synth sounds? You mean like record the synth part, and then sample what you just recorded?

I would think that the change in sound quality would be too minute to hear, does it lessen the sample rate or something like that?
 
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Velcro Buddha said:
What do you mean by resampling synth sounds? You mean like record the synth part, and then sample what you just recorded?

I would think that the change in sound quality would be too minute to hear, does it lessen the sample rate or something like that?
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it just runs it thru the sampler...adding the warmth that comes with it..it aint science

it takes the harsh edge off synth sounds too...seems to anyway, maybe thats just me
 
I reckon nothing beats real tape saturation. A reel-to-reel would be ideal but you can also catch the effect using an analogue VCR with audio inputs. Just tape the sequence by cranking up the output on your mixer and then sample it back. With that method you have to keep in mind though that there'll be some flutter (tape speed fluctuations), so a longer sequence may drift out of sync. So keep it short and sweet...

easy
B#
 
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lo-phi said:
http://www.izotope.com/products/audio/vinyl/

free plugin from izotope that simulates the sounds of vinyl, including dust, scratches, wear, record warp, electrical hum from the player, the sound of the motor. it might do what you want, but if not, hey, it's free!
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if you can afford it, izotope also offers the "trash" plugin and the "ozone" plugin... trash has some good subtle distortion (emulation of tape saturation, 12 bit, push/pull, harmonic drive, transistor fuzz, tube emulation, etc) that is good for getting "dirt" on samples/drums/etc, as well as amp-modelling and filters that can be cool for running sounds thru. and it runs in 64-bit which is always good. ozone is more of a set of mixing utilities.

sampling from vinyl may get you the sound you are looking for. automator and madlib have both done this, automator used a 12-bit sampler on a lot of his stuff (good for the "dirty" sound) while madlib used the boss sp-303 where he got that sound from resampling with the solid line of fx in that machine (a good but strange sounding filter, a decent lo-fi emulator, and other stuff like eq/reverb etc... good fx). ensoniq samplers are good for the "raw" sound. i often like to sample from live drums with an analog compressor, and sometimes i run that or a vinyl sample thru an analog filter module (electrix filter factory), which has an optional distortion circuit that i can use on low settings for some subtle "dirt".

someone developed a free plugin recently that loads samples and triggers them with sound-coloring that emulates the sp-1200. i havent tried it but it might be worth checking out for what youre trying to do.
 
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any hi end tube preamp can do that, by going a bit to hi in the gain, so the tube ad some soft tube distortion.

an excelent unit for this is a UA M610.

recording on tape is also a good very good solution, but video tape is definitly not as good as a real analogue 1/4 or 1/2 or higher reel to reel tape recorder. It wil destroy the sound qualiity to much
 
there is a bit crusher for pro tools called d-fi that's pretty good,also you could try some distortion type plug ins as well on certain tracks in your mix.
 
someone developed a free plugin recently that loads samples and triggers them with sound-coloring that emulates the sp-1200.
Click to expand...

I have this free plugin/vst, and its really excellent. Gives your sounds a low-fi gritty quality.
 
you are using bitcrusher and at the same time talking about 64bit resolution...


...something is wrong i think...


:) :) :)
 
2nice said:


if you can afford it, izotope also offers the "trash" plugin and the "ozone" plugin... trash has some good subtle distortion (emulation of tape saturation, 12 bit, push/pull, harmonic drive, transistor fuzz, tube emulation, etc) that is good for getting "dirt" on samples/drums/etc, as well as amp-modelling and filters that can be cool for running sounds thru. and it runs in 64-bit which is always good. ozone is more of a set of mixing utilities.

sampling from vinyl may get you the sound you are looking for. automator and madlib have both done this, automator used a 12-bit sampler on a lot of his stuff (good for the "dirty" sound) while madlib used the boss sp-303 where he got that sound from resampling with the solid line of fx in that machine (a good but strange sounding filter, a decent lo-fi emulator, and other stuff like eq/reverb etc... good fx). ensoniq samplers are good for the "raw" sound. i often like to sample from live drums with an analog compressor, and sometimes i run that or a vinyl sample thru an analog filter module (electrix filter factory), which has an optional distortion circuit that i can use on low settings for some subtle "dirt".

someone developed a free plugin recently that loads samples and triggers them with sound-coloring that emulates the sp-1200. i havent tried it but it might be worth checking out for what youre trying to do.
Click to expand...
So many suggestions...So few links
 
These dirty the signal, but they do it 'cleanly'.

Personally, and if you want dirt, either use tape saturation or dump to an old 4 track and resample the piece.

You'll have grime and hiss, altogether. ;)
 
There is an effect called bitcrusher that basically takes your sounds down to a lower sample rate, you could try bouncing your drum track to another track and use the bitcrusher on it and turn the levels down a bit to accentuate your main drum track, maybe add slight reverb on it to phatten it up a bit, experiment a little and you can come up with so many different ways of doing this.
 
chizzbeats said:
There is an effect called bitcrusher that basically takes your sounds down to a lower sample rate, you could try bouncing your drum track to another track and use the bitcrusher on it and turn the levels down a bit to accentuate your main drum track, maybe add slight reverb on it to phatten it up a bit, experiment a little and you can come up with so many different ways of doing this.
Click to expand...

I think you mean 'Takes the sounds to a lower bit rate'..;)
 
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