A techniqe I have at long last perfected...

ok, here is a little sampling trick I have finally got down and it sounds great and costs next to zero.

#1 go out and cop on ebay/yardsale from trash (I got mine from a school that was throwing it out) n old skool reel to reel. not a pro one, but the cheezy ones that they had from the 60's that we all had @ school if we went to public school. It should cost about 15 bux.

the reason? these things have tubes as amps inside em. Cop a working one and a reel to reel tape. Now set the recording volume high, to create a distortion/clipped effect, and record your sample into it. now send the sample out, and into a recorder, then back into the tape deck only this time turn the volume of the sample source waaaaaayyy down. now record the tape into a pc and then normalize the sound, chop and add to the mpc. the drums will have that 50's rock and roll sound, which SOUNDS DOPE when used as the ghost note for hip-hop tracks. if you vary the "normal" sample with this "processed" sample you can get some cool sounds out of it.

The best part is that it costs almost nothin' since these things are available in abundace and if it breaks a new one only costs like 20 bux.
try it out, it'll sound proper.

the way I use this is mainly as ghost notes, if you add a cool reverb on the way in (@ any stage) it will sound like "sonar" pings when really low, and kinda dark, sp1200 ominous style.

get one with seperate read and record heads and you can make a analog tape delay out of it too. if anyone wants more info I will post up some links, it is probably more invloved than most people will want to get into doing.

word, that is true, but I found that the cost of one of those machines (IE more then 20 bucks, but akai makes a nice one to be had on ebay for like 60-70) was not worth it for what I was doing with it. I have yet to try and "murk" up a non drum sample with it so that it sounds proper, but this is a really cool thing to do to your drums. All I can say is try it. if it aint for you all you are out is the 20 dollars for the reel to reel and I'm sure you could integrate the r2r as a recorder for practice sessions or for a sub-rig.

also, alot of them newer (like the late 60's-80's) aint tube driven. alot of these old skool ones just need to have tubes replaced and they work just fine for the purpouses I laid out.

Once I got a cool sound out of it once, I find myself using it more and more for my tracks.

I personally love this stuff, kinda like the radiohead guys who spend the day trying to rewire gear to creatr unique sounds.

yes definately, sonic expermentiation is a must.

people keep in mind you can always get a cheap tube driver for guitar and run drums (or whatever) through that and record them to even cassette tape for tube warmth/lo-fi/tape saturation. run the levels way hot so when you want to gate out the hiss (if you like) there will be a bigger threshold difference.

ps. not as cheap as foo's method though. and reels are cooler anyways.

what if you for example got a drum break programmed into your MPC...you play the sequence (only the drums) and record on tape (like a normal casset or reel-2-reel) and sample it back into the mpc and chop it up..and assign these "new" samples back to the pads they were on..

will it give it something extra or what?

and is like a normal tape-deck good for it?

yep. I used to use a normal tape denk, but I found that "tube hiss/boominess" only came out of sample I pulled off of tape on reel to reel, experimentatiion like dude above said. basically, by clippin the sound, then running it back through (with some efx if you feel like it) then re-recording the new signal at a low level forces the tape hiss to blend into the background of it, almost like hitting a snare with a brush, but not quite. It works w/ regular tape but I found the "nicest" sound came when I did it like this on the reel to reel.

the clipping on analog tape is nothing like digital clipping which sounds like boo-boo.

then, when you get it into the mpc, layer it with the other drums as a ghost note or pump it up and make it the lead, it sounds mad cool, and the drums get that kool lo-fi sound.

basically, its like dude said, its like running it through a guitar tube amp xcept I can record right to analog from it ( a plus since I would assume its best to stay in the analog realm as long as possible to get this effect)
and run lines from the reel to reel to my mixer and use the efx sends to control the levels going in and out. plus you'll be hard pressed to find a tube guitar amp of any kind for 20 bux.
Justr wanted to share a cheap way to get a cool sound for beats without spending mad loot (since my studio budget is limited I often gotta find workarounds like this)
if anyone else tries this, hit me and lemmie know how you liked it.

clearification, I am talking running it through a real guitar tube amp, tube pre, tube compressor, tube warmer, anything, just im talkin real tube hardware. not 'tube' plugins. as such you would stay in the analog realm but i think foo didnt get my drift. the make guitar pedals that are basically just an input, an out, a gain stage hooked up to a tube and thats about it.

the difference between reels and cassette is the reels offer a higher sound quality with less hiss. both will saturate at high levels though.

some site, I think it was the old samplenet used to have alot of good tips and tricks articles for 'home' producers. their site is long gone (I think). it is a shame because I remember reading alot of interesting techniques on there a few years ago. maybe there should be a tips and tricks forum on this board? i have alot I would post, but they would get drowned out with all the other random posts ya know. maybe a forum where tutor would have to approve them, and then he could sticky them and it would make it a really good resource for the site.

For this can i use like a tube microphone pre-amp? on many of them are 48 volt switch and beside the trs inputs line inputs..

if i hook this baby up between my mixer outs en MPC ins (with the 48 volt on off!!) will it work (with other words will the tube do his work?)

hmmm. I dunno. As long as the signal is passsing through it, it should work (I assume so). I would turn phantom power off though.

its a really cool "effect". I love ghetto/guerilla mixing.

It has helped me develop my skills on so many levels, taught me so many tricks to use.
I love to record the backup track of vocals (they yeah, and uh-huh stuff) through a headphones, it gives it a grimey distorted sound that sounds cool in the background.

sometimes it dont just sond ghetto, It WAS recorded ghetto.

hmm..me neither haha... I post this Q on a dutch forum (where I live) there are some experts with tube stuff on it, Ill post the answer as soon as they tell me..!!


Ghetto recording is nice...!! keeps the creativity level up!!