Effect Series: How to use Delay

For this post, we've created a project that you can work on while going through the instructions. Click here to open it up in the studio. 

Delay, delay, delay. That’s basically how it works! This effect repeats a sound, while making it quieter for each repetition. The result sounds like an echo in a cave - after you shout, you hear yourself bouncing back off of the walls, slowly fading out. This effect is very useful for creating rhythmic variation in your mix, and a good substitute for reverb. 

Open up the project here, and for this step, play tracks 1-3 as you’re going through the following steps. We’ll get to the other tracks in the following weeks.

Delay is the perfect tool to make your vocals more interesting, and has the perk of taking up less space than reverb in the mix. Apply ‘Delay’ on ‘Track 3 - Vocals’, and then adjust the Mix to 12 o’clock, and the Time to about 2 o’clock. The Time decides the tempo of the delay, and it takes some tweaking to find the right tempo - play back the track, and adjust the Time until it’s in sync with the beat. Voilá - our vocals are a lot cooler!

If you have any questions, leave a comment below and our Audio Producer will reply!

The flexibility of delay is huge. It can be used as a cave-y rhythmic effect, as we experienced in the previous post - however, you can also use delay to create a cool kind of reverb. This effect is also friendlier to your song - reverb can easily can take over a mix, but delay keeps your sound focused and lean.

Open up the project here, and for this step, play tracks 1-4 as you’re going through the following steps. We’ll get to the last track in the next section. 

While our synth sounds pretty good as it is, it deserves some extra glow. Add ‘Stereo Delay’ on ‘Track 4 - Synth’, and make sure to set the Time almost all the way down, to about 5 o’clock - this is what makes it sound more like a reverb than a delay. Then slide up the Mix to your preferred setting. To keep it subtle and nice while still giving the synth character, I prefer a position just over 9 o’clock!

If you have any questions, leave a comment below and our Audio Producer will reply!

As we’ve heard in the last posts, delay can liven up your mix in more ways than one. It can be used creatively on basically every instrument and sound, with different results. For this post, we’ll be using the ‘Slapback’ effect - in other delays, you’ll hear multiple bounces off the cave walls which gets quieter and quieter, in this effect however, you’ll only hear one bounce. This effect is famously used on 50’s rock vocals, but for this exercise, we’ll use it on a guitar track!

Open up the project here, and for this step, play tracks 1-5 as you’re going through the following steps.

We have a guitar track which has a rhythmical function in the song - it pumps 8th notes steadily, and you can really imagine the coolness of the person who’s playing this. However, we can make this rhythm a lot more interesting by adding delay to it. Apply ‘Slapback’ on ‘Track 5 - Guitar’, and set the Delay to just above 8 o’clock. Adjust to the Mix to 1 o’clock, and you’ll have a thicker and more interesting guitar - it now sounds like it’s rhythmically laid-back, which makes it more organic and life-like. 

After all these steps, we have a mix with more interesting rhythms, and more characteristic instruments and vocals. Delay mission accomplished!

Next week we'll add another Effect Series on the Community, so stay tuned! Until then, let us know if you have any questions on this effect below and our Audio Producer will reply!