Skip to main content
MusicRadar MusicRadar The No.1 website for musicians
Sign in
  • View Profile
  • Sign out
  • Artist news
  • Guitars
  • Guitar Pedals
  • Synths
  • Keyboards & Pianos
  • Controllers
  • Guitar Amps
  • Drums
  • Software & Apps
  • More
    • Recording
    • DJ Gear
    • Acoustic Guitars
    • Bass Guitars
    • Tech
    • Tutorials
    • Reviews
    • Buying Guides
    • About Us
More
  • Radiohead theory
  • Steely Dan's drum machine
  • Deep Purple in the dungeon
  • Prince's drummers
  • 95k+ free music samples
Don't miss these
Plugins
Plugins How to get famous sounds and effects using only Logic’s stock plugins
bon iver
Music Production Tutorials "It’s simple enough to create the perfect hard-tuned and harmonised effects within our DAW, providing you have the right software": How to harness hard-tuned vocals
Native Instruments Raum
Music Production Tutorials How to use reverb to build impressive-sounding filters, reverses, risers and pads
Ableton Live Tutorial
Tech 5 creative ways to use distortion in Ableton Live: From punchier drums to dub techno delays
MIDI
Digital Audio Workstation How to humanise your virtual acoustic instruments in your DAW projects
Plugins
Plugins Our go-to plugins for adding flavour to our sounds
Guitarists
Digital Audio Workstation How to record virtual and live instruments more smoothly by taking stock of your sample buffer
ablaze
Tech "Take your pig squeals to the next level": Ablaze's Screamer is a vocal production plugin "crafted for metalheads, by metalheads"
Logic Drums
Music Production Tutorials How to think like a human drummer when building software beats
Pluginweek logo
Plugins Plugin Week 2025: Exhibitor A-Z
Uvi Phasor
Music Production Tutorials How modulation effects work and how to use them
autechre laptop
Samples SampleRadar: 205 free glitchy texture samples
loukeman
Artists Loukeman reveals his favourite plugins and unusual production techniques
sonible
Tech 6 drum processing techniques to help you program state-of-the-art beats
Plugins Future owns
Plugins Our resident platinum award-winning mixer and producer shares 10 of his go-to plugins
  1. Tutorials
  2. Music Production Tutorials

How to make vocal stutter effects in your DAW

Tuition
By Computer Music Specials published 8 March 2011

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Do It Yourself

Do It Yourself

Step 1: Plug-ins such as Live’s Beat Repeat can make creating stutter effects almost too easy. Sometimes it’s better to take a little more time and personalise your vocal glitch effects. Here’s a basic backing track which we’ll use to create some interesting vocal stutters.

As these tend to work best when there’s room for them, we’ve kept the backing track simple.

For more vocal production tricks, check out Computer Music Special: Vocals (CMS46) which is available now from selected newsagents and www.myfavouritemagazines.co.uk.

Page 1 of 9
Page 1 of 9
EQ and tremolo tweaks

EQ and tremolo tweaks

Step 2: We separate the sound of the two vocal parts into distinct ‘lead vocal’ and ‘answer’ phrases. The answers are treated to the same telephone EQ and tremolo treatments and dropped in volume so that they’re thinner, harsher and quieter. This will give our stutter edits different tonal characteristics.

Page 2 of 9
Page 2 of 9
Chop and repeat

Chop and repeat

Step 3: We create our first stutter edit by chopping the start of the first word, ‘get’, and copying this to beat 3 of the previous bar. We then shorten the region further and copy it 16 times so it plays 32nd-notes between this point and the down beat where the main track starts. This doesn’t work as hoped, as this short region contains silence before the vocal starts.

Page 3 of 9
Page 3 of 9
Positioning tweaks

Positioning tweaks

Step 4: We take the first stutter region and move its end point back, creating a longer region. We then move the start point to later before moving the whole region back to its original location at beat 3 of the bar before the track starts, and copy this new region to the other 15 locations as before. This works better.

Page 4 of 9
Page 4 of 9
Automation

Automation

Step 5: The stutters are too robotic, though, so we turn to automation to provide a more dynamic initial effect. We start with a volume ramp so that the stutters fade in, then add a pan ramp so that the stutters start on the left and switch to the right before the pan resets to the centre in time for the lead vocal’s start.

Page 5 of 9
Page 5 of 9
Slice editing

Slice editing

Step 6: We copy this stutter so that it precedes the third lead vocal slice but shorten the slices to that they play 48th-notes this time. Lastly, we select four of the original slices and copy these to precede the first three ‘get up’s of the final phrase, all with automation data to bring them to life.

Page 6 of 9
Page 6 of 9
Stutter transpose

Stutter transpose

Step 7: We then stutter edit the final ‘come on’ phrase in our four-bar loop. The beginning of this coincides with the 48th-note stutter we’ve created in the second half of our track, so we chop it into 48th-notes to match the regions of the stutter above. Second time around, we chop the final note into 48ths again but transpose each region down in semitones.

Page 7 of 9
Page 7 of 9
Random slicing

Random slicing

Step 8: Now we solo the main answer phrase and let technology create stutters for us. There are lots of ‘glitch’ effect plug-ins that rearrange, reverse and slow down audio in real time - we’re using the freeware SupaTrigga to create slices randomly. We solo the vocal and bounce it down as a new audio file, then take SupaTrigga out of the main answer track.

Page 8 of 9
Page 8 of 9
Finishing off

Finishing off

Step 9: We import this file onto a new track and use Logic’s Delay Designer, featuring a preset called BackTrack Rhythm, as an insert. The SupaTrigga’d stutters trigger these delays to enhance their effect. We then use Logic’s Autofilter and LFO to control the tone of these echoes.

Liked this? Now read: Essential vocal production tips

Connect with MusicRadar: via Twitter, Facebook and YouTube

Get MusicRadar straight to your inbox: Sign up for the free weekly newsletter

Page 9 of 9
Page 9 of 9
Computer Music Specials
Read more
Plugins
How to get famous sounds and effects using only Logic’s stock plugins
 
 
bon iver
"It’s simple enough to create the perfect hard-tuned and harmonised effects within our DAW, providing you have the right software": How to harness hard-tuned vocals
 
 
Native Instruments Raum
How to use reverb to build impressive-sounding filters, reverses, risers and pads
 
 
Ableton Live Tutorial
5 creative ways to use distortion in Ableton Live: From punchier drums to dub techno delays
 
 
MIDI
How to humanise your virtual acoustic instruments in your DAW projects
 
 
Plugins
Our go-to plugins for adding flavour to our sounds
 
 
Latest in Music Production Tutorials
Frustrated music producer
Why imposing hard limitations could be the secret to finishing more music
 
 
Ableton Live Tutorial
5 creative ways to use distortion in Ableton Live: From punchier drums to dub techno delays
 
 
Logic Drums
How to think like a human drummer when building software beats
 
 
Virtual drums
How to make virtual acoustic drum performances sound like the real thing
 
 
How to program MIDI drums that sound like the real thing
 
 
Drum recording
10 tips for recording perfect drums
 
 
Latest in Tuition
Overhead shot of electronic drum set plugged into a laptop running a VST
“At certain points in music history it became fashionable to place accents on certain beats”: How to score a drum part
 
 
Man in white t-shirt playing a Roland electronic drum set
10 common electronic drum set issues and how to troubleshoot them
 
 
The easy guide to recording drums: kit tips, mic placement and setting up your DAW
 
 
Where to start with a drum kit
 
 
Plugins
How to get famous sounds and effects using only Logic’s stock plugins
 
 
Plugin Chains
How to emulate a classic analogue recording system entirely with plugins
 
 

MusicRadar is part of Future plc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.

  • About Us
  • Contact Future's experts
  • Terms and conditions
  • Privacy policy
  • Cookies policy
  • Advertise with us
  • Accessibility Statement
  • Careers

© Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA. All rights reserved. England and Wales company registration number 2008885.

Please login or signup to comment

Please wait...