Regenerating Tape Delay

Stephen B. · Post by **Stephen B.** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 5:30 am

In Larry's review of the new Paul McCartney record he mentioned that regenerating tape delay is used only once by Nigel Godrich, implying that it is used a lot with Radiohead. Is that the vocal effect that is on Thom Yorke's voice a whole lot (even live)? If so, how do you do it and can it be faked with a digital delay? Thank you.

joelpatterson · Post by **joelpatterson** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 6:09 am

This sounds like a question for...

inverseroom · Post by **inverseroom** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 6:51 am

...ENIAC!

Stephen B. · Post by **Stephen B.** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 6:54 am

Well, yeah, but mine's in storage right now...

Fletcher · Post by **Fletcher** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 7:40 am

Regenerating tape delay is sending the return of the delay back though the send to the delay so you get repeats... this is also known as "feedback" on a digital delay... if you really want to get quasi authentic I'd recomend putting a lo pass filter on the send to the delay unit at about 3-4kHz so the regenerated echos pass through the filter multiple times stripping more and more treble as they go.

Stephen B. · Post by **Stephen B.** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 8:21 am

Thanks Fletcher. I didn't realize that that was just another term for such a common thing.
The particular effect on Thom Yorke's voice to which I was referring can be heard in this, along with a lot of other songs. I can see now that is probably how it is done, in this case the delay time is really fast, right? And on one of them the delay time is slowed down (or the tape is stopped in this case)?

I'm working on a project right now that will allow me a lot of experimentation, so I guess I should just figure this stuff out on my own. But why reinvent the wheel?

JGriffin · Post by **JGriffin** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 10:55 am

that slow-down effect is produced by turning the Delay Time knob during the repeats.

apropos of nothing · Post by **apropos of nothing** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 1:54 pm

Some units (digitech among others) have a parameter for frequency variance of delay time. Good stuff. A fair number of delay plug-ins also feature this.

drumsound · Post by **drumsound** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 8:29 pm

The Lexi PCM 41 and 42 have modulation sections that follow the delay output. You can get some cool bending of the delay using those. I'm sure there are other old-school delays that have this too.

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Regenerating Tape Delay

Regenerating Tape Delay

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