Live changing sound when track is warped

[Sonus]

Hi guys,

I have been playing Live out at Fabric London and although i spend a lot of money on Wav's i am still not hearing the quality come through on the clubs sound system, i have finally figured out that when the track isnt on warp it sounds like it should but how do i mix then? Is there anyway to erradicate this as i have heard loads of people using the program and it sounding fine

Kind Regards,
William

[mr.ergonomics]

which warp mode do you use?
what are you doing exactly (I guess ableton dj?)

[robfoster]

Warp in repitch mode if you dont need to change the tempo drastically, i think it sounds the best.

[trevorc]

could be a few different reasons, but if it's definitely warp modes where you're hearing the difference use repitch for the best quality, with the trade off that pitch will change with tempo.

complex preserves the original pitch when you change tempo with some degradation of audio quality, getting worse if you're playing a long way from original tempo - i wouldn't have thought it would be too disastrous with just a few bpm difference though.

best steer clear of beats mode on full tunes, it can have a pretty undesirable effect, especially if you're speeding tunes up a long way.

choose your warp mode to suit your material, repitch for best quality on most sequenced edm, complex if there are tempo variations within the tune (live drummers, older edm etc). warp off will always be best quality, but i doubt you'll find any dance djs playing that way.

[Sonus]

cool man, does that mean that i have to reload all 300 tracks because now when i load one in its not giving me the option of transposing, how can i get around that ? and also does that mean that i cant transpose at all now ?

Thanks,
William

[trevorc]

cool man, does that mean that i have to reload all 300 tracks because now when i load one in its not giving me the option of transposing, how can i get around that ? and also does that mean that i cant transpose at all now ?

ah mate transpose doesn't work in repitch mode - in fact transpose was probably your problem all along now you mention it

it's the key lock/key transpose functionality in complex which degrades your audio quality the further you move from original tempo or key, try it and listen - if you do need to transpose use complex and don't transpose more than one or two semitones from original key, although there is a definite quality trade-off even at this level.

live 8 has a complex pro option, better than old complex but still not as good as repitch

[Sonus]

ill buy 8 today then! haha ive spent all this money on Wav's and im not hearing it!

Thanks guys

[trevorc]

ill buy 8 today then! haha ive spent all this money on Wav's and im not hearing it!

Thanks guys

still, go easy on the transpose. why not save yourself a few hundred knicker and get into repitch?

[Sonus]

well i need to buy it anyway and i never transpose more than a couple of semi tones, tell me, what can i do to make the wav's really shine in a club like Fabric, is there an settings that i can apply to really bring the sound out?

[Sage]

Live 8 has a load of warping options. Transposing will always affect the quality as far as I'm aware regardless of the software as changing the pitch speeds up the frequencies to raise the pitch and the other way if you're transposing down, but then has to be slowed down/sped up to be played at the same tempo, so worst of both worlds really.

If you're used to vinyl, then repitch mode works in the same way as speeding up/slowing down vinyl and complex pro mode seems find when you want to retain as much quality as you can whilst changing the tempo, but wouldn't go changing pitch in any way personally, but then, I'm not a DJ at Fabric.

[trevorc]

well i need to buy it anyway and i never transpose more than a couple of semi tones, tell me, what can i do to make the wav's really shine in a club like Fabric, is there an settings that i can apply to really bring the sound out?

honestly mate next time you're there change this:



to this:



and do a dribbly drool over the difference, then never look back.

some people use plugs like vintage warmer and bbe sonic maximizer to fiddle with dj audio, but there's no substitute for getting your source audio into best shape first.

having said all that i guess if you're using tracks with live drummers etc complex will be your only choice, bbe is supposed to help with the smearing effect you get with complex so that might be worth a look. if you're repitching wavs it's probably not worth the bother

[Sonus]

i know but lets say two tracks go great together with one pitch shifted a semi tone down, how am i then meant to get them harmoniously in pitch with repitch on?

[trevorc]

i know but lets say two tracks go great together with one pitch shifted a semi tone down, how am i then meant to get them harmoniously in pitch with repitch on?

that's just a trade-off you have to judge for yourself i reckon. there's not much you can do to get the wav quality back, but on the other hand if the transitions are awesome i doubt there'll be many people shaking their heads and muttering "if only he'd used repitch..."