LOL... I independantly invented electro funk music 20 years after Zapp &
Roger... Bastards :)
Experimentation is your friend... Quick some-up:
* Compressor
Is used to decrease the dynamic range of music. Given a certain peak
level, the music will sound louder if you compress is. The price is you
will have less dynamic range. Is used heavily on dancefloor tracks to
make the sound more aggressive.
* Limiter
Good for shaving off the five or six peaks in a track that keep you from
making it louder. Similar use than compressor but more radical.
* Chorus
Is used to make one voice sound like several chipmunk voices. (actually
only several voices, the chipmunk effect can be a side effect)
* Phaser
Is used to make guitars and other instruments sound like 60s space movie
sound effects.
* Flanger
A type of phaser that makes the signal sound new-agey... often used to
make guitars sound more fluid (or by ill-timed guitarists to mask where
one note starts and the other ends)
* Bode Frequncy shifting
Hey I'd like to know that one myself!
* Filters
Mutes or severely reduces certain frequencies out of a signal.
Low pass: Mutes the higher frequencies and lets the lower ones pass
High pass: The opposite
Band pass: Takes a given frequency (band) and mutes whats much lower
or much higher
Comb: Like a band pass with lot's of very steep bands
Are often used to make electronic sounds less sterile
* Equalizers
A very weak filter used for fine-tuning the sound of music while
preserving the basic sound
* Vocoding: Translates a signal into mathematical values with which it
can be re-constructed later. Altering the signal while it's mathematical
can change the signal a lot. Extensively used in dance music, especially
by male producers with high squeaky voices.
This is only my own experience that comes from playing with stuff a lot,
nothing authoritative... As for books I'm not aware of anything on-line
but studio engineers want fame too sometimes so there's plenty of books
around on the subject if you don't mind buying one :)
Carlo
