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Can you make a guitar feedback in a DAW?


MiltyG565
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As the title says. I want to add a bit of a feedback effect to a certain part of a guitar track, but how do I do it? I've messed about with the "pedals" in Logic, and I can make it feedback, but only at the price of the sound of the track (far dirtier and overdriven than I would like).

What would you guys do? Is it possible? It must be, right?

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[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1376607188' post='2176898']...a feedback effect...[/quote]

Good evening, Milty...

There's a bit of a clue in the term 'feedback'. The signal has to somehow be fed back to the source (the strings and p/u...) in order to re-excite them, and make the loop. The obvious first choice (maybe not feasible, I don't know...) would be to monitor the DAW output loud enough to get the guitar singing. Do you not have a guitar amp..? The signal could be fed into that, and turned up enough to get the effect desired. I know of no simulation which could give that effect without a physical, sonic loop being formed (others may, so hang on before blowing down the walls...).
Why don't you do as everyone else does, and simply use a Hiwatt DR103 half-stack cranked..? Problem solved, no..? :mellow:

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There are also electro-mechanical devices such as the Kramer sustainer (fitted as neck pickup) and the e-Bow (hand-held). Boss used to make a distortion pedal that simulated feedback, but as it was manufactured in Japan it is now only available for silly money off eBay.

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[quote name='Dad3353' timestamp='1376608230' post='2176919']
Good evening, Milty...

There's a bit of a clue in the term 'feedback'. The signal has to somehow be fed back to the source (the strings and p/u...) in order to re-excite them, and make the loop. The obvious first choice (maybe not feasible, I don't know...) would be to monitor the DAW output loud enough to get the guitar singing. Do you not have a guitar amp..? The signal could be fed into that, and turned up enough to get the effect desired. I know of no simulation which could give that effect without a physical, sonic loop being formed (others may, so hang on before blowing down the walls...).
Why don't you do as everyone else does, and simply use a Hiwatt DR103 half-stack cranked..? Problem solved, no..? :mellow:
[/quote]

Haha! :D I know what feedback technically is, I just want the sound of it. I don't care whether it's "true" feedback or not. Although maybe I could make the loop by sending it to a bus, with an amp sim, and sending it back to the original track? I'll have to experiment with that.

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[quote name='MiltyG565' timestamp='1376610147' post='2176954']
maybe I could make the loop by sending it to a bus, with an amp sim, and sending it back to the original track? I'll have to experiment with that.
[/quote] That could simulate acoustic feedback (you might want to put a bit of delay in too) but not guitar feedback, as the energy isn't being fed back through the strings....

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The easiest way to do feedback in a low-volume home recording environment is to use one of those "travel" guitars with a built-in amp and speaker. I have a Tokai Talbo Jnr which does this beautifully. With a new PP3 battery you get gorgeous singing sustain at about three-quarters volume going to all-out feedback at full.

The feedback at the beginning of "StickyPants Trance" was done like that when we realised that the track needed something adding to the intro but we no longer have access to the live room to make some serious noise. You can't tell.

They are pretty good guitars too. I have a friend who's a complete guitar snob, but he went out and bought one for himself after playing mine.

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[quote name='JapanAxe' timestamp='1376609644' post='2176947']
Boss used to make a distortion pedal that simulated feedback, but as it was manufactured in Japan it is now only available for silly money off eBay.
[/quote]

I had one of these which was bought as soon as it was released in the UK. Used on my synth. And then sold it for next to nothing when I switched back to playing guitar and no longer needed an artificial feedback device. TBH it wasn't that good as it was simply an oscillator and a pitch tracker that locked onto the dominant frequency when engaged. Because the output didn't change once it locked on it didn't really sound much like feedback if used for more than half a second.

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I managed to get some pretty nice feedback via Guitar Rig 4 - I pitch-shifted my bass up and octave, slapped on some distortion and when I did some pinched harmonics I was surprised at how much sustain and indeed feedback I was able to achieve - obviously you need to crank the gain up and then play the notes a certain way, like I say pinched harmonics worked great - then it's a case of controlling them via bending notes and or volume of the signal...

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