TW12: Metronome click heard faintly on rendered project... but how?

[Ally007]

I noticed I can hear the metronome (faintly) at the very end of my project, where the sound fades out. How can this happen, and how can I make sure it doesn't happen in future? I was not using microphones anywhere in the recording process. Everything was either plugged direct into an audio interface, or done with MIDI.
Thank you all.

[pough]

I don't know of any way that it could happen. I think people have requested it as a feature, but I don't recall it being added.

You will probably need to go through the steps of removing (muting) tracks and rendering until you find out where the wrong thing is.

[Watchful]

I don't believe there's even a way to insert the metronome: it's not routable. My understanding was it goes in parallel to the master bus to the output, but doesn't interact at all.

Ways you could record the metronome:

1. Headphone bleed being picked up by an open mic
2. Studio monitors or speakers picked up by an open mic
3. Create a metronome track and forget to mute it
4. Create a metronome track and accidentally bounce it

Obviously, none of these seem to be your culprit.

Is it all projects or just one? Ultimately, Pough is right that you need to determine which track is causing the issue my muting them out one-by-one and just rendering the last few seconds of the project repeatedly until you find which one it is. A fast way to do this is to mute half the tracks and see if it goes away--if not, your problem is likely in the other half.

If it's a systemic issue, though, you should hear the metronome no matter which tracks you mute.

Finally, are we sure it's the metronome? Or some click track or time clock that's playing at the same time in Waveform, a hardware synth, or the audio interface?

[Ally007]

You will probably need to go through the steps of removing (muting) tracks and rendering until you find out where the wrong thing is.

Thank you @pough. The click becomes audible when I have a limiter (LoudMax) enabled on the track. I'm still surprised that there is a metronome click there, even if only becomes audible at the fade-out, when using a limiter.

[Watchful]

That's really strange--because as far as I know, there's NO WAY to get the metronome routed into the audio chain, unless you've got a cable between a system audio out (like a headphone jack) routed back into your audio interface.

[Ally007]

I don't believe there's even a way to insert the metronome: it's not routable. My understanding was it goes in parallel to the master bus to the output, but doesn't interact at all.

Ways you could record the metronome:

1. Headphone bleed being picked up by an open mic
2. Studio monitors or speakers picked up by an open mic
3. Create a metronome track and forget to mute it
4. Create a metronome track and accidentally bounce it

Obviously, none of these seem to be your culprit.

Is it all projects or just one? Ultimately, Pough is right that you need to determine which track is causing the issue my muting them out one-by-one and just rendering the last few seconds of the project repeatedly until you find which one it is. A fast way to do this is to mute half the tracks and see if it goes away--if not, your problem is likely in the other half.

If it's a systemic issue, though, you should hear the metronome no matter which tracks you mute.

Finally, are we sure it's the metronome? Or some click track or time clock that's playing at the same time in Waveform, a hardware synth, or the audio interface?

Thanks for the input, @Watchful - I've only noticed the phenomenon in one project so far, and it was only audible with a limiter enabled on the offending track, and only at the fade-out. It's a mystery how the metronome sound got into the track. Yes, I am sure it is the sound of the TW metronome; there's nothing else that it could be, that I can think of, and it was in perfect time with the BPM. As mentioned, I haven't had any microphones plugged in while recording that project. It happened on an electric guitar track, so I'm wondering if the metronome sound coming from my studio monitors could have vibrated the guitar strings and got into the recording that way! It was pretty faint, because when I disabled the limiter on that track, the metronome clicks became inaudible during the fade-out.

[Watchful]

That's highly possible...although you must have had the metronome cranked up to have created sympathetic resonance on the guitar pickups. The limiter was doing its job by amplifying that sound as much as possible. Wow! That's pretty cool, actually.

[Ally007]

That's highly possible...although you must have had the metronome cranked up to have created sympathetic resonance on the guitar pickups. The limiter was doing its job by amplifying that sound as much as possible. Wow! That's pretty cool, actually.

Yes, I often have the metronome cranked up to max while recording electronic instruments. One of my guitars might have a microphonic pickup; I'll have to look out for that.

[Peter Widdicombe]

You also have to watch signal path in your mixer or audio interface to make sure when recording that ONLY the instrument you want is being added when you record. Sometimes this is easier on a mixer with sends, although smaller ones you can only get mono that way for recording an individual track. 16+ track mixers often have a second stereo bus that makes it more convenient. (This so you can play mix through whatever room system you have, but just record the one track you are adding).

I had a Soundcraft with second bus, that recently developed either power supply issue or ground problem; and reverting back to my old mixer now forces me back into mono - fine for most things, but my Digitech pedal had some stereo effects I can't use any more. (Or, now that I think of it, the Digitech actually HAS a USB interface built in which probably IS stereo...)

[Ally007]

You also have to watch signal path in your mixer or audio interface to make sure when recording that ONLY the instrument you want is being added when you record. Sometimes this is easier on a mixer with sends, although smaller ones you can only get mono that way for recording an individual track. 16+ track mixers often have a second stereo bus that makes it more convenient. (This so you can play mix through whatever room system you have, but just record the one track you are adding).

I had a Soundcraft with second bus, that recently developed either power supply issue or ground problem; and reverting back to my old mixer now forces me back into mono - fine for most things, but my Digitech pedal had some stereo effects I can't use any more. (Or, now that I think of it, the Digitech actually HAS a USB interface built in which probably IS stereo...)

Thanks, Peter; that's worth knowing. I can't find any routing settings for my Behringer UMC202HD audio interface. However, I don't think this applies to my current setup, as the UMC202HD has only two inputs and two outputs. I always use the two inputs as follows: Either: (a) inputting one stereo instrument, using both inputs. Or: (b) inputting two microphones together.

So I never have a microphone and an electronic instrument plugged in at the same time.

Had I been using microphones to record the errant clip, I'd have suspected that the culprit was the metronome sound leaking from my headphones and into the microphones, but in this case the errant clip was an electric guitar recording (guitar going into audio interface in stereo, using both inputs).

[Peter Widdicombe]

Ah, but HOW do you listen to your click track when recording?

And this is amusing... You've got a click track bleeding through from SOMEWHERE... And on another thread someone is TRYING to record the click track

[Watchful]

In Ally's case, it sounds like the guitar pickups are resonating with the click track, and it's the guitar's signal path that's recording it.

[Ally007]

Ah, but HOW do you listen to your click track when recording?

Sometimes through speakers, admittedly. I hadn't anticipated a microphonic guitar pickup though! I'll probably use cans by default in future.