Hello, all. In case any of the programmers, etc., frequent these great forums, I feel that any new guy’s post should begin with a very loud and uncompressed THANK YOU for making your software available free of charge. It’s phenomenal and efficient, and you have this new user’s deepest gratitude.
I’ve been recording my own music for twenty-odd years, overdubbing all of the instruments and vocals myself, as well as mixing the stuff. I come from the analogue days, and my first transition to digital recording a few years back involved Nero Wave Editor.
I learned to use it so well, and got so accustomed to its effects, that I find myself struggling with the various settings in the only Audacity reverb plug-in that it evidently comes installed with, GVerb, as the relative values are of course quite different from NWE’s.
I’m running Audacity 2.0.3 on WinXP, using a PC with plenty of RAM and disk space. I’ve had no technical problems, and Audacity gets along perfectly with my sound card, USB mic, etc. My question has more to do aesthetics, your opinions on GVerb, and…well, it’s about a fun discussion topic rather than seeking precise assistance, I suppose!
I’ve always been in love with the non-harsh but certainly quite “present” reverb on Pet Sounds, which is strikingly similar to the smooth reverb on Zeppelin’s debut, Love’s Forever Changes, and in fact most of the rock music recorded around that time, which is, I suppose, how I could have begun this sentence.
I’m aware that Brian Wilson used the echo chambers at Western, Gold Star, etc., and that many of the others used massive processing units, as everything was necessarily mechanical in those days. But I’m wondering if anyone has achieved a similar reverb sound to the chambers/processors of old using Audacity without having to mess around downloading extra plug-ins.
If nobody knows what I’m talking about, then if anyone feels like sharing his GVerb settings concerning a smooth vocal reverb that he likes, that would be helpful on its own.
I can always get the reverb types that I want in NWE like the back of my hand, but Audacity’s effects are generally of much higher quality, and I’m hoping to eventually phase out NWE altogether and make the complete transition to Audacity. I’m already overdubbing all of my parts in Audacity as it is.
There are two other effects in 2.0.3 – Echo and Delay – but these seem to do the same thing. This is actually accurate, as they actually mean the same thing, but I know that reverb, which is a different effect, was mistakenly called “echo” on many of the old boards. It appears that GVerb is the only effect that actually allows for true reverb, as opposed to a mere repetition of the signal (i.e. a delay/echo).
The difficult thing about applying anything at all is, of course, Audacity’s inability to allow the user to adjust a particular effect’s settings while listening to the track and hearing the differences as the settings are played with. That’s the main reason I’m having such difficulty even figuring out what the various settings in GVerb “do.” The manual’s explanation of the settings is all very well, but one doesn’t really know what each setting alters until he can actually hear it, which is an obvious thing about mixing audio, of course.
Thanks very much for any tips or opinions that might be forthcoming!
)