Rockabilly reverb

[guitardom]

Question for some of you. I have a band I am mixing a demo for. They got a couple Rockabilly style songs (think Stray cats) and I can hear "that" reverb in my head, on the guitar and vocals, but it is one of those things I have never done before. Wondering if anyone has experience with this. I know my metal and hip hop verbs!! this....not so much!!

I was feeding a fairly large bright room with a short tale along with a delay set at the tempo also feeding the verb. It feels close, but not close enough!! I almost feel like I need to insert the verb instead of bussing to it.

[Bill Denton]

The generic term is "slap back echo"...Sam Phillips did it with two tape machines...you might look for a "slap back" preset on some of your favorite 'verbs...

[albee1952]

Yeah, I'm with Bill to a certain degree here. I would actually combine a short room verb with a short slap(90-125ms). Send the slap to the verb as well, and if you're still searching, up the delay to as high as 160ms. Let us know if you find something that works(and what you did)

[guitardom]

UGGHHH, sounds like it would be so simple!! I will have another look at that. I had tried messing with it, but it just felt to dry. Experimentation will continue!!!!!

[Craig F]

Preset names like Elvis or King also have that kind of sound

[Terry Wetzel]

Finally! Something I feel confident about commenting on! You see I just turned 73 and I had the good fortune of being around when Rockabilly hit the music world right between the eyes! This is just my opinion. If your trying for the exact rockabilly slap back sound that was produced at Sun records you will never achieve it digitally! The best advice I can give is, if you own or have access to a tape recorder send the Pro tools mono guitar,(or vocal) track to the recorder input and return the signal to another track in your session. I'll probably get a lot of criticism on this post as to why it won't work, etc. All I know is that it worked for me before my Teac deck stopped working. The end result will be digital but the slap back sound is as close as you will ever get, tape noise and all! I've tried tape plugins and their close but no cigar!

[DMB13KOS]

Exactly - slap back delay and reverb should do it!

[Bob Olhsson]

ReelTape and Kramer Tape both do a decent job. I suspect there's a setting in echo boy that does it too.

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by Bob Olhsson

ReelTape and Kramer Tape both do a decent job. I suspect there's a setting in echo boy that does it too.

Reel tape and echoboy I have, will check them out.

[guitardom]

Originally Posted by Terry Wetzel

Finally! Something I feel confident about commenting on! You see I just turned 73 and I had the good fortune of being around when Rockabilly hit the music world right between the eyes! This is just my opinion. If your trying for the exact rockabilly slap back sound that was produced at Sun records you will never achieve it digitally! The best advice I can give is, if you own or have access to a tape recorder send the Pro tools mono guitar,(or vocal) track to the recorder input and return the signal to another track in your session. I'll probably get a lot of criticism on this post as to why it won't work, etc. All I know is that it worked for me before my Teac deck stopped working. The end result will be digital but the slap back sound is as close as you will ever get, tape noise and all! I've tried tape plugins and their close but no cigar!

I still have an Otari Mx50/50 reel to reel ;-)