What was the most popular delay of the 90s?

[keyman_sam]

Asking as I’m trying to recreate some 90s style music. I’ve got the uad224 for verb, looking for that 90s slapback delay.

Specifically in Ableton live.

[MogwaiBoy]

Then you probably want to be emulating a hardware unit like Lexicon/Boss/Roland/Alesis or the coveted TC Electronic 2290.

https://www.tcelectronic.com/product.ht ... Code=P0D3X
https://www.pspaudioware.com/products/lexicon-psp-42
https://d16.pl/repeater


+ Analog bucket brigade / tape echo are good for classic vocal/guitar/drum slapback - you have lots of choices there. Valhalla Delay can do it all.

[metalifuxx]

Boss DD-3 pedal

[Iva]

As a person born in early 80-s, I would say Waves Supertap, Logic Delay and Cubase stereo delay plugins. Don't remember anybody was using hardware delay back then.

[osiris]

I think people still used Echoplex and there was Roland Space Echo.

[Ah_Dziz]

Any clean digital delay with between 16 bits or more should do the trick. I was using a boss digital delay pedal, a very cheap TC electronics single rack reverb and delay thing, a "cheap" Roland digital mixer with onboard processing, and then some onboard FX in my samplers. Not much of it had lots in the way of "mojo" or even a noticeable color. It was quite simple to effect the sends and returns with EQs and distortion which made some great noises. Not much you couldn't get pretty easily with stock plugins that allow for feedback processing.

[drsyncenstein]

As a person born in early 80-s, I would say Waves Supertap, Logic Delay and Cubase stereo delay plugins. Don't remember anybody was using hardware delay back then.

Maybe you we're a bit too young then to talk from experience.
But let me be clear: for the most part of the 90ies only top studio's and rich artists had the money to buy a computer with enough dsp cards to run multiple tracks AND fx on it. And have the cash for those expensive wave plugins.
Logic audio 3 was released at the end of the decade, in 1998. If you had the money to also buy a digidesign session 8 card you could run 8 tracks on it. Computers in general did not have enough power to run native fx in workable numbers until the next century. People that did mostly used pro tools or Studiovision. With a TDM farm for running the dsp plugins.

Everyone else used hardware. An analog mixing desk and a few effects. If you we're lucky Lexicon PCM, AMS, TC. Independent artists and hobbyiest used Alesis midiverbs\quadraverbs, Ensoniq DP's, Boss SE 50\70, Roland SDE, tape delays.

[egbert101]

First VST plugin didn't exist until 1996.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Studio_Technology

[Iva]

As a person born in early 80-s, I would say Waves Supertap, Logic Delay and Cubase stereo delay plugins. Don't remember anybody was using hardware delay back then.

Maybe you we're a bit too young then to talk from experience.
But let me be clear: for the most part of the 90ies only top studio's and rich artists had the money to buy a computer with enough dsp cards to run multiple tracks AND fx on it. And have the cash for those expensive wave plugins.
Logic audio 3 was released at the end of the decade, in 1998. If you had the money to also buy a digidesign session 8 card you could run 8 tracks on it. Computers in general did not have enough power to run native fx in workable numbers until the next century. People that did mostly used pro tools or Studiovision. With a TDM farm for running the dsp plugins.

Everyone else used hardware. An analog mixing desk and a few effects. If you we're lucky Lexicon PCM, AMS, TC. Independent artists and hobbyiest used Alesis midiverbs\quadraverbs, Ensoniq DP's, Boss SE 50\70, Roland SDE, tape delays.

Yeah, you are right. I just realised I must have spoken about 2000-s ))) My teenage times, PC, cracked Cubase SX and Waves plgins )))

[mothra]

As a person born in early 80-s, I would say Waves Supertap, Logic Delay and Cubase stereo delay plugins. Don't remember anybody was using hardware delay back then.

In 'the 90s' no one was using software delays until right around the END of the 90s, and even then that was mostly home studio nobodies. A lot of studios were not even close to digital, those handful that were had $10K+ TDM systems. Hell I had just finished my engineering courses in 1997, we were using two 'brand new' ADAT's and a BRC with a 32 channel Trident and racks full of outboard gear (the 1" 8 track was over in the corner collecting dust for a year at that point). The computers were across the hall in the 'electronic music studio' and were for sequencing the synths with Vision. I think Cubase Audio XT at the time was what 4 tracks of audio at most?

[thecontrolcentre]

I was using a Vestax Dig-410 & an Aria ADS-1 (guitar pedal) in the early 90's. Picked up a Yamaha FX500 multi-fx in '98. I was also using the delay in my Yamaha A3000 sampler a lot at that time.

[Mr Arkadin]

We used cheap shit back in the day. Yamaha R100, MIDIVERB II (both reverb units with delay settings), Boss SE-70, Guyatone delay pedal, or the built-in delays in synths if they had them.

[jamcat]

The '90s were all about digital rack units for everything. Even guitarists were using rack processors instead of pedals. In a respectable studio, you would have a couple Eventide H3000s, Lexicon PCM-80/81 and PCM-90/91, TC Electronic M5000. There would probably be older gear too, like Lexicon PCM-60s and 70s, and perhaps a few budget units from Alesis or DigiTech for backing duties, though these were mostly used by home recordists on their Mackie 1604s and Tascam 16 track recorders. Also, every studio seemed to have the truly terrible Delta Lab Effectron II from the 1980s.

For reverb, it's going to be the Lexicon 480L in the '90s.

[sqigls]

Boss DD-3 pedal

this

[keyman_sam]

Great info here! I think the Roland fantom has an emulation of boss dd-3 and the delay sounds pretty much like what I was expecting for a 90s sound.

Now the question is what plugin emulates this delay? The modern delay plugins sound quite different. Maybe supertap?