Time-Lag Accumulator

For a while, I’ve been meaning to recreate the ‘Time Lag Accumulator’ used by Brian Eno and Robert Fripp on their early ambient music.  The setup was simple - two tape decks with a single loop of tape, guitar feeding in one.  The output of the second deck was fed back and mixed with more guitar.  A very simple delay, 3-5 seconds in length.

This was pretty easy to do using Ableton Live and 10 ‘Simple Delay’ plugins, although this is cumbersome:

Ableton Live - Time Lag Accumulator

Ableton Live - Time Lag Accumulator

I included to inputs to the loop - a microphone feed (from guitar, mic, whatever) and a MIDI instrument channel.  The MIDI instrument is fun to play with, but I’d love to connect the Rhodes once I’ve finished cleaning it up…

Links:

TimeLagAccumulatorProject.zip - Ableton Live Time Lag Accumulator

Frippertronics - Wikipedia entry on Eno/Fripp’s Time Lag Accumulator

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