Ableton Forum

should i record my records into live as big wav files? i want to get them digital for longevity as well as eventually trying to use live for djing. i tried to download the movie about warping a whole song and get nothing.

i thought of pitching the record to the live metronome at 120 bpm, (to try and get close) then checking out the markers...good way?

i appreciate any help...the thing is, i just use live for composing and probably don't use nearly enough of it's features. i am just now trying something new and need some advice.

thank you...a humble househead

househead:
if u want to digitize your records (ive done it for years) u can record them onto a Live track.

An editor like wavelab or soundfoge would work just as well if not better as far as just digitizing them - recording, trimming starts and ends/ noise, naming/ saving them on hard drive.

then just drop em in live and start practicing the art of warping.

for most house tunes, with no tempo variation - u can ideally get to where you dont "freeze" any markers. just move the one to the first beat, and look at the end. move a marker there to where it needs to be, but u dont have to freeze it, or warp it. then your tempo readout should read the correct tempo - these days, almost always a rounded number - 130, 125, etc.

of course the vinyl will flutter a bit, so you may have to warp a few here and there. depends on what table you got.

persoannly, id record em all with pitch at zero.

if you change the tempo in live the pitch is going to be constant (unless you use repitch mode). if you were to pitch the records while recording them, they're going to sound... repitched. would you really want that?

thank you for the help...i am gonna have to do some "warp practice" but between the forum and the manual...yeah, i do read it...i will get it done.

Your best bet for quality is to record from vinyl into a WAV editor like SoundForge or WaveLab.

Once recorded, you can normalize the audio in the software before saving your WAV file.

Then you'll need to drag that WAV into Live and set your warp markers.

You will find that setting warp markers for vinyl that's been recorded to WAV can be tricky at first. But once you learn a solid technique, you'll be able to breeze through.

You will also find that vinyl recorded to WAV will not have a perfectly constant tempo. There will be variations throughout, so you'll need a few warp markers for each track. I use 1 warp marker for every 16 bars.... just to be safe and consistent. I find that I also use my warp markers for a visual reference of my potential cue points for DJing.