So i’d like to make my own samples sound like i sampled them from some old vinyl with the grit and crackling that old vinyl can give. Do you guys have any advice on how to achieve this? Good Plug-in effects? OT tricks? The OT’s lo-fi effect isn’t really doing it for me. Any tips?
Live has a plugin that just adds crackle like a record.
Or you could actually sample the crackle from the start of a record (before the music begins) and loop that over your sample.
But rather than record crackle there are lots of other things you can do to a sample to make it sound old and messed up. You can fake it but its also cheap and easy to do it for real. For example recording to VHS, crappy cassette, running through old crappy mixers etc.
Two LFO’s to control pitch to give you wow and flutter. one at a high frequency for that old warble, then another with a much lower frequency and low depth to give a slow warping feel. Then add the OT Lo Fi effect and you can get some really dirty old warbley messe dup sounds.
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Real easy way to do it is buy an old Boss SP 303
Has an excellent vinyl sim effect that adds adjustable crackle, flutter and vinyl compression. You can run anything straight into the effects and of course it’s also a nifty little sampler too 
Read some reviews, worth getting if you get a good price.
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If you use Live, this may be of interest to you: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciiy5TBoXp8
You could probably do this in another DAW as well, but it would be cooler to run some things to actual tape if that’s a possibility.
Nedavine-are you referring to the vinyl distortion effect? I’ve always found that to be better for creating more textural distortion over actual tape sounds.
Izotope vinyl is another good freebie plugin.
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Make two 7 minute long wavs of individual samples you want to make ‘old’
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Run them through UHe Satin or another plugin for a bit of elusive ‘vibe’ then…
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Send both files to Dubstudio and aske them to press them to 10" double sided vinyl (£29) - http://www.dubstudio.co.uk/dubstudio/dubs/formats/vinyl-dubs/10-inch-vinyl-dubs?page=shop.browse&category_id=44
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When the record arrives in the post then mistreat it until it sounds knackered.
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Resample back into the OT / Ableton etc. Put random nicks in the record for odd looping. Scratch parts and resample. If you put maybe 150 samples on each side then £29 isn’t such a bad investment
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Sweet…nice sharing =)
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Buy this…
http://www.goldbaby.co.nz/dirtandlayers.html
I have it and use it on my MPC for layering and it is in a word “AWESOME!!!”
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that’s brilliant.
part of the reason i haven’t used some of the techniques suggested (recording to tape/vhs etc) is because i don’t have room for cassette decks let alone a turntable right now!
i’m going to check out that izotope plug-in and i think aiki ghost just sold me on that sample pack
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The best way to get vinyl crackle is to use real vinyl crackle. I sample my own records but if you don’t have any vinyl you can find samples of vinyl crackle everywhere on the web. Mix to taste with your original sample and export them as a single wave file. You can’t beat the real thing.
Here’s a Youtube link with crackle.
I can highly recommend UHe’s new Satin plugin for tape related processing - I’m not sure if the introductory sale is still on but the demo is fully usable and just crackles every few minutes.
I get crackle when I assign the scene fader to delay time. You have to do it early in a neighbor so that you can take the nasty parts out later in the chain.
thats actually the best idea i have heard in a long time. im wondering have you done this? or used the company before - i am just wondering what they use to cut to record and how stuff like vocals sound on the records they cut… have gotten a few records printed up …7, 10 and 12" from different companies in germany with very mixed results
additional methods for your consideration:
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try reason’s audiomatic retro transformer. it’s a free plugin you get with reason7. gets the job done as a vinyl sim, tape sim, vhs sim and pretty much anything sim, washing machine included
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layer your sample with actual vinyl crackle from the end of a record’s side. actually even just placing the needle on a record without playing it gives a subtle yet noticable effect. friend of mine likes the latter so much, he even puts his final mixdowns through this.
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get one of the cheaper lo fi unicorns: an akai s950, ensoniq eps+ or better yet a two speed tape or reel-to-reel. then speed up your sample accordingly to record it to tape at the higher speed so when you play it back from tape at the lower speed it has the original pitch/speed. as a result you get a very nifty simplified waveform. that along with tape head warmth makes the method worthwhile
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I’m curious what you mean by “though this”.
Do you mean layering the final mix with this sound over the whole thing?
+1 on vinyl. It’s free and sounds best in a mix. Though cutting your own record sound cool. I might look into that.
I read an interview with Tom Waits once, who apparently liked to sample bacong sizzling in a pan and adding that on top of a recording for a bit of crackling warmth. 
This one, in fact;
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to be more precise the fella i was referring to puts his (already vinyl sample-heavy) tracks together on ableton and once the track is done, he never renders into wav/aif but rather plays back the whole thing (beacuse renders are just too pristine) into an external recorder whilst keeping one channel in ableton in audition of its external audio source which is the turntable. thus as the track is playing and being recorded externally, the artifacts from keeping the needle on a record get recorded as well.
it might sound stupid but playback volume is crucial in this process: you have to put the playback on loudspeakers and, well, go loud so that the needle sitting in the groove will resonate along to your music.
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…LoVe this!
i’ll try for sure!
ThX
to be more precise the fella i was referring to puts his (already vinyl sample-heavy) tracks together on ableton and once the track is done, he never renders into wav/aif but rather plays back the whole thing (beacuse renders are just too pristine) into an external recorder whilst keeping one channel in ableton in audition of its external audio source which is the turntable. thus as the track is playing and being recorded externally, the artifacts from keeping the needle on a record get recorded as well.
it might sound stupid but playback volume is crucial in this process: you have to put the playback on loudspeakers and, well, go loud so that the needle sitting in the groove will resonate along to your music. [/quote]
Haha!!!
Now that’s some ‘secret weapon’ shit there!!!
Awesome…thanks for the detailed explanation!
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