Quick Question - How produce rhythmic, pulsating volume change effect?

Hi CW-ers,

A quick question (and possibly stupid simple):  What effect do you typically use to create rhythmic volume changes to a given beat for a given sustained sound?  I'm not sure how to describe it, but an example might be in the Green Day song "Boulevard of Broken Dreams".  It opens with a pulsating electric guitar chord that's sustained, but is pulsating on/off in rapid succession.  Is that flange/delay/what?

Thanks!

-Mike

Gated?

mbouteneff

  the Green Day song "Boulevard of Broken Dreams".  It opens with a pulsating electric guitar chord that's sustained, but is pulsating on/off in rapid succession.

I'm thinking....not having heard the song, but just from the description..... either as Bit says, tremolo..... or a manipulation of the volume knob.

Many years back Norman Breenbaughm did a song called Spirit In The Sky. The guitar did an ON/OFF thing in it too. The guitarist accomplished this by turning the volume on the main pickup up, and the other pickup totally off. then, to get the effect, he simply played the chord or note and switched back and forth on the pickup selector switch in time with the song tempo.  very cool effect.

Now.... up to the modern digital studio and how to get this effect in YOUR song.  

Think ENVELOPES.

You can insert a volume envelope and manually insert the nodes after zooming in to get the faders to rise and fall at the speed you need. Basically the envelope will look like a square-wave for that section where you want the effect..... ON..OFF..ON..OFF... and so on.


yep... just listened to the tune on youtube..... Norman's is slower....but very similar.  Tremolo set to a maximum sweep or intensity is what it sounds like.

Sidechain?

I agree tremolo...... Norman's guitar player used the switch to cut it on and off.....

Sonitus Modulator does tremolo. If that doesn't work for you there are lots of free/cheap amplitude modulators available.

mbouteneff


Hi CW-ers,

A quick question (and possibly stupid simple):  What effect do you typically use to create rhythmic volume changes to a given beat for a given sustained sound?  I'm not sure how to describe it, but an example might be in the Green Day song "Boulevard of Broken Dreams".  It opens with a pulsating electric guitar chord that's sustained, but is pulsating on/off in rapid succession.  Is that flange/delay/what?

Thanks!

-Mike

The 2 most standard ways (and I haven't heard the specific track) are:
1- Gating
2- Side Chaining
 
Each is somewhat complex if one is new to the methods.  However, they are easy once understood.
 
Example:
 
Have a kick playing quarter notes.  Setup a compressor (or gate) on the track "to be affected".   This wil then become the side-chain.
 
So on the kick track, you create a SEND to the compressor (or gate) on the track (let's call it Guitar track).    When setting up this send, you should see the input to the Guitar compressor as an option.   *THIS ASSUMES THE COMPRESSOR OR GATE IS SIDE-CHAIN ENABLED -- NOT ALL ARE*.
 
 
Then, by making adjustments to the compressor (or gate) on the guitar track, it will only 'sound' when the kick plays (ie, the side chain has input signal).
 
SO - if you were holding a long sustatin guitar chord, and if the above is setup correctly, you would hear that sustain chord sound as if it was playing quarter notes as the compressor/gate released the signal.
 
This is just one approach though probably the most employed.
 
Another approach is to use a Filter FX of some sort, but it must have either a gate function or a step sequencer that can affect its various parameters (like volume, etc).
 
And yet another approach is to simply setup a Volume Envelope on the Guitar track and create a series of nodes via the "draw" function for envelopes.  You could then create Sine, Square, or other waveforms via the draw function at the intervals you wish.     This technique probably takes the longest to setup and manage/edit, but still is a viable technique nonetheless.
 
 
 

The effect you are looking for is called vibrato, which is an amplitde modulator. MondoMod is a good and versatile one.
Tremolo is not the same thing, it is frequency modulation, what you do when swing or bend with your fingers of the left hand, or when you use the "tremolo" bar in guitars with floating bridge, or with a tremolo of frequency shifter/modulator plugin.
 

What's used in "boulevard of broken dreams" is amplitude modulation.
For me, in sound ingeniering, guitar and audio effects, vibrato is amplitude modulation and tremolo is pitch modulation.
I'm sorry for the confussion if i'm using different terms meanings: the fact is that you can find everywhere each of these terms used with both meanings, what does not help to know what's the right assignment. Dictionaries often describe both vibrato and tremolo as pitch modulation, so it does not help heither. The application of these terms in classical music is also confussing, where "tremolo" may be closer to amplitude modulation, but doesn't fit exactly either. In guitars, the floating bridge, which is pitch modulation, is called tremolo, and many guitar amps and effect boxes used the term vibrato for amplitude modulation, in these cases matching the definitions i use. Many other guitar effects also use the term tremolo for amplitude modulation. A mess.
Whatever the meaning you give to vibrato and tremolo, what the OP referrend to and what's used in "boulevard of broken dreams" is amplitude modulation.

"That's gotta be real fun trying to mimic that with a sidechained gate."

You would have to trigger it with a click but it can be done pretty easily... I remember when we had to stripe time code to track 24 on the tape reel... splice a tape in half find where you want it to go back together tape it and move on...  How I love computer technology!

To make it more confusing... the faceplate of Fender amps mislabel their tremolo function as Vibrato.

:-)

To the OP -
Hardware: AdrenaLinn 3 Guitar FX Box
Now available as a plug-in: AdrenaLinn Sync

Not too harsh for your first post.

I can't imagine what you'll be like by the time you reach 50