lo-fi tape effects?

[movinginslomo]

I didn't know what subforum to ask in.. I am after a z-vex lo-fi junky kind of vibe.. a guitar pedal I own and truly adore.. is there a rack extension or vst that can give that vibe in reason? There are many tape delay effects, chorus effects.. but not quite what I'm after. Could anyone point me in a good direction?

[guitfnky]

if you want to stay in Reason only, you can get somewhat in the ballpark with an Echo. turn down to 1ms of delay, with a single repeat, and set it to fully-wet. then turn up the wobble setting, which will give you a nice warble. you can get a bit closer by adding some of the distortion and playing with the filter in Echo.

you can’t set the wobble rate though, so if that’s important, you’ll have to look elsewhere. if you’re okay using a VST, you can get much more tweakability using the XLN Audio RC-20.

I hear the CRAPRE rack extension is pretty good too, but I’ve never used that.

[guitfnky]

oh, there’s also the Klevgrand rack extension (also available as a VST) that does lo-if tape effects like that. the demo video makes it sound like it gets better results than I was able to get when I demoed it though, so I can’t personally recommend that one.

[ortxedys]

There's 2 that I use consistently. They're pretty crucial to my workflow, so I know them pretty well. One is CRAPRE. Its actually pretty great for the price. It's a little unpredictable though and I find it only works best when you apply it to individual instruments rather than the whole mix. You kind of have to pick and choose with it.

The next one is Wow Control by Goodhertz. This is probably the best one ive used in recent time. (Believe me, ive tried all of them.) You get more control of how "pronounced" you want the effect to be. Its a little bit more expensive than the RE options. Considering you also buy the Goodhertz plugin bundle (Vulf Compressor is another one you might want to look at in that bundle).

I honestly didn't like the Klevgrand Tape RE or whatever its called. It limits you to an actual cassette tape sound. To put it simply, it cuts out the bass of whatever you put it on. In fairmess, akin to an actual cassette tape but I like my music to be a little more bass heavy with that warbled sound intact.

XLN's RC 20 is another great option though I dont own it.


Basically, for me, Wow Control as a master plugin and CRAPRE for individual inserts is what works best. I really wish Peff would make a CRAPRE Plus so i could just stick to the Reason paradigm, but we can all dream...

[diminished]

Hook up your own flavor with a combination of:

* a chorus (plenty of choices - stock, paid and free in the Prop Shop)
* esselfortium's SL.FX Tapedeck (use the forum's search function or google)
* Audiomatic Retro Transformer
* Kong as an effect - use Tape Echo
* free Softube Stauration Knob
* eventually RX950 for a little lofi crunch

You might also want to take a look at the free VST iZotope Vinyl.

[Loque]

Scream4 with lowfi, Audiomatic and The Echo with modulations.

[Boombastix]

You can also use Decimort for lo-fi sound, and add a kHs pitch, that is automated from dual LFO in random mode + triangle.

[Lempface]

Reelbus 4 from Toneboosters is fantastic and very reasonably priced!

[Jackjackdaw]

Scream 4 has some wicked tape compression presets. Then there is D1RT Re. A free noise/hum/crackle generator. I use these two together.

[TritoneAddiction]

I have no idea how "z-vex" sounds. My favorite lo-fi/distortion plugin is Crapre 2. But it's not exactly subtle. Works best on individual channels.
As others have mentioned Klevgrand looks good, but I'm having a hard time to get it to work for me in a mix for some reason.

Make sure you try both REs first before you buy.

[selig]

if you want to stay in Reason only, you can get somewhat in the ballpark with an Echo. turn down to 1ms of delay, with a single repeat, and set it to fully-wet. then turn up the wobble setting, which will give you a nice warble. you can get a bit closer by adding some of the distortion and playing with the filter in Echo.

You don't even have to adjust the delay time with The Echo - you can simply bypass the delay section completely and have a parallel processor with dry/wet control and no delay. This gives you access to all of the useful features of The Echo as a more standard processor.
Here's how:

[guitfnky]

if you want to stay in Reason only, you can get somewhat in the ballpark with an Echo. turn down to 1ms of delay, with a single repeat, and set it to fully-wet. then turn up the wobble setting, which will give you a nice warble. you can get a bit closer by adding some of the distortion and playing with the filter in Echo.

You don't even have to adjust the delay time with The Echo - you can simply bypass the delay section completely and have a parallel processor with dry/wet control and no delay. This gives you access to all of the useful features of The Echo as a more standard processor.
Here's how:

ah, interesting! so you don’t need to use the splitter and main input unless you want to use the wet/dry knob, and the combinator isn’t really necessary at all? or am I misunderstanding?

either way, I’ll need to try that out. thanks for the tip!

[guitfnky]

if you want to stay in Reason only, you can get somewhat in the ballpark with an Echo. turn down to 1ms of delay, with a single repeat, and set it to fully-wet. then turn up the wobble setting, which will give you a nice warble. you can get a bit closer by adding some of the distortion and playing with the filter in Echo.

You don't even have to adjust the delay time with The Echo - you can simply bypass the delay section completely and have a parallel processor with dry/wet control and no delay. This gives you access to all of the useful features of The Echo as a more standard processor.
Here's how:

actually, scratch that last question...I ran down to try it out, and I don’t think your steps work for the modulation section...at least they don’t seem to work with the wobble, which sort of makes sense, given that the wobble is basically fluctuating the delay time. so if you’re bypassing the delay, you’re also bypassing the wobble.

of course I may just be doing something wrong.

[raveled]

I have sometimes used Neptune as a send for a whole track/bus, which can yield a lofi-like sound. Pick chromatic scale and try different correction speed and, more importantly, play around with formant (automate/hook up pulsar or similar). Maybe not what you’re looking for, but the result is interesting.

[dvdrtldg]

Reelbus 4 from Toneboosters is fantastic and very reasonably priced!

Yeah that's a goodie alright

[selig]

You don't even have to adjust the delay time with The Echo - you can simply bypass the delay section completely and have a parallel processor with dry/wet control and no delay. This gives you access to all of the useful features of The Echo as a more standard processor.
Here's how:

actually, scratch that last question...I ran down to try it out, and I don’t think your steps work for the modulation section...at least they don’t seem to work with the wobble, which sort of makes sense, given that the wobble is basically fluctuating the delay time. so if you’re bypassing the delay, you’re also bypassing the wobble.

of course I may just be doing something wrong.

"YES" to all your comments. Bypassing the delay will bypass the "wobble". In most cases tape wow/flutter was imperceptible. "Tape" emulations remind me of "tube" emulations that are always coloring the sound. Tube gear can be designed to be very clean, but if you're "selling" a product with "tube" in the name (hardware or software) you want folks to be able to hear what it's doing without listening too deeply. So "tube" gear tends to saturate more than tube gear, and "tape" plugins tend to wobble more than tape does.
FWIW, I like to hook up a Pulsar LFO (or any LFO) to the Pitch Bend input of devices to add "wobble" to patches. The advantages are it works on all oscillators/engines at once and it happens before the FX devices (which I like). It's a "one cable" quick solution to adding a bit of creative wobble to ANY and ALL patches on an instrument that doesn't involve routing in a Mod Matrix and doesn't go away when you switch patches, or even when you switch devices or call up a Combinator patch - very handy!

[movinginslomo]

thanks for all the suggestions guys

[guitfnky]

"YES" to all your comments. Bypassing the delay will bypass the "wobble". In most cases tape wow/flutter was imperceptible. "Tape" emulations remind me of "tube" emulations that are always coloring the sound. Tube gear can be designed to be very clean, but if you're "selling" a product with "tube" in the name (hardware or software) you want folks to be able to hear what it's doing without listening too deeply. So "tube" gear tends to saturate more than tube gear, and "tape" plugins tend to wobble more than tape does.
FWIW, I like to hook up a Pulsar LFO (or any LFO) to the Pitch Bend input of devices to add "wobble" to patches. The advantages are it works on all oscillators/engines at once and it happens before the FX devices (which I like). It's a "one cable" quick solution to adding a bit of creative wobble to ANY and ALL patches on an instrument that doesn't involve routing in a Mod Matrix and doesn't go away when you switch patches, or even when you switch devices or call up a Combinator patch - very handy!

yep, totally agree. I do remember a few crappy tape decks I used to have as a kid though...the wobble was something that was cool even then. even with the ones that worked well, I'd always find a way to mess around with them, slowing down one of the spindles, for example. a good wobbly sound is awesome nostalgia, for me. the ZVex pedal the OP mentioned (I had to look up an example on Youtube) definitely has a pretty pronounced warble to it, so I thought that was a pretty crucial part of what they were asking for.

[movinginslomo]

FWIW, I like to hook up a Pulsar LFO (or any LFO) to the Pitch Bend input of devices to add "wobble" to patches. The advantages are it works on all oscillators/engines at once and it happens before the FX devices (which I like). It's a "one cable" quick solution to adding a bit of creative wobble to ANY and ALL patches on an instrument that doesn't involve routing in a Mod Matrix and doesn't go away when you switch patches, or even when you switch devices or call up a Combinator patch - very handy!

Pulsar yes... didn't even think of that I'll have to experiment. I rack extension I tend to rarely use