Western University Scholarship@Western Digitized Theses Digitized Special Collections 2011 DELAY AND MODULATION PROCESSING AS MUSICAL TECHNIQUE IN ROCK Mark Collins Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/digitizedtheses Recommended Citation Collins, Mark, "DELAY AND MODULATION PROCESSING AS MUSICAL TECHNIQUE IN ROCK" (2011). Digitized Theses. 3300. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/digitizedtheses/3300 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Digitized Special Collections at Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Digitized Theses by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. DELAY AND MODULATION PROCESSING AS MUSICAL TECHNIQUE IN ROCK (Thesis Format: Monograph) By Mark Collins Graduate Program in Popular Music and Culture o A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of: Master of Arts The School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies The University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, Canada © Mark Collins, 2011 School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies CERTIFICATE OF EXAMINATION Supervisor Examiners Dr. Jay Hodgson Dr. Emily Abrams Ansari Second Reader Dr. Keir Keightley — Dr. Norma Coates Dr. Norma Coates The thesis by Mark Collins entitled: Delay and Modulation Processing as Musical Technique in Rock is accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Date_________________________ _____________________________ __ Chair of the Thesis Examination Board li ABSTRACT This thesis presents an analytic model for investigating the musical functions of delay and modulation signal processing in a pop/rock context. In so doing, it challenges prevalent academic assumptions about what, specifically, constitutes “musical practice,” focusing analytic attention on musical procedures and terms reserved for recordists that, until very recently, have only registered in research as extra-musical technologizations of “live” exchange, if at all. Recordists do not create space via delay and modulation processing. Rather, they use delay and modulation processing, among other techniques, to provide psychoacoustic information which listeners require to infer space. Put differently, recordists use delay and modulation processing, among other techniques, to add psychoacoustic information to tracks and, in the process, to situate them within the broader space represented by a mix. This musical process is what I ultimately intend to elucidate through the model I present in this thesis. KEYWORDS Psychaoustics, Acoustics, Recording Practice, Recording, Recordist, Record Production, Signal Processing, Sound Source, Sound, Amplitude, Frequency, Spectrum, EQ, Wavelength, Sound Pressure Level, Sine Wave, Phase Shift, Phase, Masking, Hearing, Critical Bands, Pitch, Harmony, Reverb, Delay, Modulation, Modulated Delay, Compression, Analytic Model, Tracking, Mixing, Microphone, Preamplifier, ADC, DAC, Slapback, ADT, Multi-tap Delay, Echo, Flanging, Chorusing, Phasing, Tremolo, Amplitude Modulation, Ducked Reverb, Gated Reverb, Aesthetic, Musical Communication, Timbre, Audio, Popular Music, Popular Music Studies, Pop, Rock, Reggae, The Police, Bring On The Night m ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would first like to thank my advisor, Dr. Jay Hodgson, who has offered me invaluable guidance, perspective, encouragement, and support. His faith in my abilities, his willingness to help, and his pragmatism have steered me through the most daunting aspects of this project’s evolution, and for that I can not thank him enough. I would also like to thank Dr. Norma Coates, who has been enthusiastic and supportive of my academic endeavours from the very start, and has stepped in time and time again in the roles of guide, sounding board, counsellor, and constructive critic. This thesis would not have been possible without Jay and Norma’s guidance. Thank-you to those on my defense committee, Dr. Keir Keightley, and Dr. Emily Abrams Ansari, and to all others who have helped along the way. I am also infinitely grateful to my wife Natacha for her unconditional love and support on this long and life-changing road, and to my children Zoe and Zack for patience beyond their years and for their magical healing powers. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS Certificate of Examination.................................................................................................... ii Abstract.................................................................................................................................iii Acknowledgements.............................................................................................................. iv Table of Contents.................................................................................................................. v List of Tables........................................................................................................................ vi List of Figures......................................................................................................................vii Chapter One........................................................................................................................... 1 Introduction Chapter Two.........................................................................................................................23 Psychoacoustics: Assumptions for the Analytic Model Chapter Three.......................................................................................................................57 Psychoacoustics and Recording Practice Chapter Four.........................................................................................................................85 Applying the Analytic Model: Bring On The Night Chapter Five.......................................................................................................................103 Conclusions and Future Research Works Consulted and Cited................................................................................................107 Discography........................................................................................................................113 Curriculum Vitae................................................................................................................114 v LIST OF TABLES Table 3.01. A Table of the Relationships Between the Physical, Perceived, and Aesthetic Elements of Sound..................................................................................................58 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.01. Propagating Sine Wave.................................................................................. 25 Figure 2.02. Pressure, Velocity, and Displacement Components of a Propagating Sine Wave........................................................................................................................ 27 Figure 2.03. Phase Shift...................................................................................................... 31 Figure 2.04. Comb Filter..................................................................................................... 31 Figure 2.05. Peak and RMS Levels................................................................................... 34 Figure 2.06. Addition of Sine Waves of Different Phases.........................;.......................36 Figure 2.07. The Main Structures of the Human Ear Showing the Outer, Middle, and Inner Ears................................................................................................................ 40 Figure 2.08. Waveform and Spectrogram of Note Onset Phase........................................46 Figure 2.09. Summary of the Frequency Domain Properties as Exemplified by the Human Hearing Modeling Spectrograms........................................................................... 47 Figure 2.10. Reverberant Sound in a Room........................................................................49 Figure 2.11. Typical Signal Flow of a Simple Delay Line................................................. 51 Figure 2.12. A Modulated Delay Line With a Delay Time of 10ms, a Depth of 50%, and a rate of 10 Hz............................................................................................................ 54 Figure 2.13. Typical Signal Flow for a Modulated Delay Line.........................................54 Figure 3.01. Examples of Arrangement Elements in Several Popular Recordings............70 Figure 3.02. Signal Routing for a Ducked Reverb on an Auxiliary Bus.......................... 83 vii 1 CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION This thesis presents an analytic model for examining the musical functions of certain signal processing techniques, specifically, delay and modulation processing. In so doing, it challenges prevalent academic assumptions about what, specifically, constitutes “musical practice,” focusing analytic attention on musical procedures and terms reserved for recordists that, until very recently, have only registered in research as extra-musical technologizations of “live” exchange, if at all (Hodgson 2010). Chapter One provides an academic context for this model, and explains its intended broader scholarly significance. Chapter Two elucidates the basic psychoacoustic assumptions on which the model is based, and explains how delay and modulation processing work. Chapter Three examines common ways that the psychoacoustic principles I examine in Chapter Two inhere in the production process, and, thus,