Is it OK to slow a song down after it's finished? Then release it?

[mitchiemasha]

When producing, in the zone, everything is pure hypermode. My current track is way too fast and it needs slowing down.

Can I just finish the track and slow it down after?

All the drums are bounced to loops. Normally, I'd leave the original drum rack triggered via midi in the project but I haven't here. The loops can then be bounced out again at the slower BPM. Also, there's some vocal chops that have pitch modulation which mean they wont line up the same adjusting the BPM.

Currently at 149, thinking of 146 or 144, slowing down via DJ software in traditional vinyl mode. The musical key will drop down too, like slowing down a tape. This means the track will likely be a few decimals out of a pure BPM and also technically not exactly on key but still in tune to itself. DJ's would change the speed anyways mixing it but it's not an extended DJ friendly track version.

Slowing the track down as normal via the project tempo means the drum loops will be time stretched, I don't want this so would need to chop them up or hunt for the original hits in the kit. Then there's the pitch shifting on the vocal chop that would need retweaking as to flow as intended. Surely slowing it down after would be the easiest option. The lowest bass note is quite high up as well, room for it to go lower.

I know in the old days radios used to speed up tracks for that extra edge, competing and to fit more tunes in. I vaguely remember reading that PWL or Stock Aitken and Waterman (along those lines) used to pitch up tunes at mastering too, why not do the same but opposite?

I suppose producing this fast is also an excuse not to come up with extra notes needed to fill out the spaces. It's a trance tune, ideally should of been 138-142.

What are your thoughts on this?

[jamcat]

It’s your song. Do whatever you want with it.

And if it’s not something that’s commonly done, that’s all the more reason to do it.

[vurt]

149 ~ 146

ive used paulstretch before, to stretch a cymbal hit to 3 days

[CinningBao]

There are various polyphonic pitch&time adjusters you could use but they will mostly introduce artifacts of some kind. Time Factory is the ultimate one-of-these, but almost £400 worth of DSP has gotta do something half-decent, right?

Think about the end product, and maybe test different things as all the techniques will alter the end result.

Doing last century's technique of turning the speed up or down on the master tape will change the perceived quality of the instrumentation. Slowing it down and things will sound lower, the transients might not kick as hard as intended, and some instruments will sound slightly bigger. Speeding it up might end up taking the 'weight' from your instruments, and will possibly introduce a mild chipmunk effect on voices.

Depending on your host, much of the work to slow it down could be completely invisible. Eg, if Melodyne is integrated into your host (like Studio One) and you have your voices on it, then I believe slowing down the tempo would really have very little effect on them and they would sound indistinguishable from the original. Logic's FlexTime might not be so clean in this regard.

It might be worthwhile spending a bit of time trying the different solutions and seeing if/how you like the end result. You might prefer the "slow-down the final master like a record" solution instead of using expensive tools to do crazy maths on it or going into the project and spending time extracting your drums, stretching the vocals a touch (perhaps the artifacts actually add something you like?) - you can never tell until you've tried it

Or you could just use Paulstretch like vurt says and turn it into a lovely ambient piece

[mitchiemasha]

I've tried slowing it down in Virtual DJ (VDJ), vinyl/tape style... this sounds okay to me, the lower pitch is fine. I really don't like what any of the elastique algo's do to the drum loops when time stretched (i'm in Cubase 13). The kick I suppose is easy to chop up and regrid but the rest of the hats etc not so. I'm thinking I'm too higher pitch too, in this hyper mode state when producing, so a slightly lower key here isn't an issue choosing the VDJ slow down option. The main problem would be the lead as if i go to far down, this sounds as though it needs extra notes, with the notes dragged, unlike the big Hypersaws that blast in after the soft pad.

I don't mind time stretch (shrink) on vocals but drum loops just never sound as good.

I'm thinking if I go with VDJ, it'll need to go back into Cubase to be remastered as the output will likely be reduced, with the headroom within VDJ.

[StudioBeginner]

That's an awful lot of work to do to avoid doing an awful lot of work but I'm a beginner so make of this what you will:

If you are committed to doing this I would probably export the project to two .wav files (or a Wav and an MP3, philistine). One of the audio files being the drums only and the other being all other parts, then stretch "allotherparts.wav" and "drumpart.wav" as a unit to the desired length. and now the grind: remake "drumparts.wav" or rather make an identical copy to this bounce that is not an exported audio file. *can't really avoid re-hunting for samples...

(juice worth the squeeze?) All this to say my beginner mind is stumped

If you are not too committed to this path yet my (practically) philosophical take is perform the magic trick. How it is done matters not. Few (if any) will judge trance music on its technical merit. As long as (a) it bangs, (b) carries the appropriate mood and (c) maintains the high standards you aspire to (judged as a listener, not as a producer). Give your finished product a week without listening to then judge as you would someone else's work.

[mitchiemasha]

If you are not too committed to this path yet my (practically) philosophical take is perform the magic trick. How it is done matters not. Few (if any) will judge trance music on its technical merit. As long as (a) it bangs, (b) carries the appropriate mood and (c) maintains the high standards you aspire to (judged as a listener, not as a producer). Give your finished product a week without listening to then judge as you would someone else's work.

This is what I'm telling myself, overall the quality is going to be way off from the top dogs anyway and no one is going to listen to it enough to care. But, it's definitely too fast. From my Amigo Sampler video (in another thread) a friend has told me that it is too busy, yet there's more layers to add.

I can't export the tracks as 2, (synths & drums), as there's a lot of slight compression and spatial FX sidechained etc. A lot of the sound is very much dependent on how these 2 tracks would interact, which would all need to be redone. My idea to try later today is to make the lead notes slightly too short, this way when it's slowed down vinyl/tape style, it should be able to go further (slower) without these sounding too dragged. The crashes might also be a problem but the hihats and the vocal chop still sound ok.

As for giving it time. My deadline is tomorrow... I'm trying to upload to platforms a new track every month, last 2 have been on the 10th. It's my "get tracks finished" plan to level up this year. The album art needs doing too! I thinks admitting defeat here, adding a few more days. Although a different track was submitted to a competition, so perhaps that can count for this month. It's definitely having an impact though.

[mitchiemasha]

Needing to be told "stop being a wuss and get it done!" It didn't take too long to find the kit again and bounce the loops at new BPM. White is the old, Muted parts, Blue is the new... good to go now! Dropped the key half a semitone too.

[metamorphosis]

I've slowed stuff down in the past, but for the slower/lower sound, not because it was too fast in the first place.
Just changed the samplerate to one which suited, then resampled back up to 44khz using Sox.

[mitchiemasha]

I've slowed stuff down in the past, but for the slower/lower sound, not because it was too fast in the first place.
Just changed the samplerate to one which suited, then resampled back up to 44khz using Sox.

Excellent idea. I will for sure have to experiment with this on a previous save of the project. I wonder if there's any maths available for what the sample rate to bpm to musical pitch would be. For instance, 44 - 38 would be a semi tone and say -5bpm (but I guess that would depend on the original key and bpm so more of a % number)

[soundmodel]

Paulstretch?

Often, if the notes shift more than +-1 semitones though, then you're likely also in need of slight mixing changes, because the pitch shifters will phase out punchy bass drums, snares and such. So you will lose punch in transients, even if melodic stuff would sound artifact-free.

Lesson:

decide the proper tempo earlier in production

Based on http://www.thewhippinpost.co.uk/tools/t ... ulator.htm the shift is < 1 semitone downwards, so it should sound okay if you use a quality stretcher.

[mitchiemasha]

decide the proper tempo earlier in production

Making it at a faster BPM at the start does have the advantage of saving time! Like 1 second off each of the millionth loop round! it soon adds up! Obviously joking!!!

Anyways, it wasn't just the BPM making it sound too fast, I was too high in musical key too. Dropping the key down and the faster BPM didn't sound as bad.

And yeah, I hate the time stretching artefacts on the transients. 1 could argue though, that say a static open hat on the off beat, now occasionally changing due to the TS, previous the exact sound, this could humanise it more, making it interesting... that did occur to me when I first heard it and thought "wait, what's happened there!" But I just don't like it.

[soundmodel]

I once heard some make music at much slower tempos and then speed it up, because that's not destructive like pitching down is.

So you could compose at a much lower BPM and then decide later any higher BPM.

[mitchiemasha]

I once heard some make music at much slower tempos and then speed it up, because that's not destructive like pitching down is.

So you could compose at a much lower BPM and then decide later any higher BPM.

Are you on about TS or Vinyl/Tape style. If 1 direction is destructive so is the other.

[soundmodel]

I once heard some make music at much slower tempos and then speed it up, because that's not destructive like pitching down is.

So you could compose at a much lower BPM and then decide later any higher BPM.

Are you on about TS or Vinyl/Tape style. If 1 direction is destructive so is the other.

It's far easier to remove samples (speed up) than to generate new samples (speed down). Additionally a higher speed will mask imperfections, because there will be other stuff competing for your attention in a full mix. One couldn't necessarily tell that some track was for example not even in rhythm, if there's enough stuff going on top of it.