Dub Delay Send Rack

This is the one return every dub-leaning set needs: a tape-style delay whose feedback you can push past 100% without blowing the PA, with a spring reverb on a parallel chain and a Throw button that momentarily slams whatever is playing into the loop. It is an Audio Effect Rack with two chains. Delay is Echo with its feedback-path filters doing the darkening, then a Saturator and a Limiter that catch runaway so self-oscillation stays musical. Spring is Hybrid Reverb in Convolution mode with a spring impulse, band-limited and driven, blended with the Spring macro. The six macros — Time, Feedback, Tone, Throw, Spring, Wobble — are the mixing-desk gestures of dub: a time knob you can grab, feedback you can push, a tone you ride, a throw button, a spring you splash in, and a wobble for tape instability. Dub techno, dub reggae, trip-hop, deep house, ambient. BPM assumption: 122 unless noted.

Layout

How it's built

1. Create a Return track (Cmd+Alt+T), name it Dub, and drop an empty Audio Effect Rack. Two chains: Delay and Spring. Chain select zones fully overlapping (both always active); the Spring chain is mixed in by volume.
2. Delay chain, EQ Eight first: low cut 24 dB/oct at 180 Hz, low pass 12 dB/oct at 7 kHz. Whatever a track sends, the return never repeats sub or air. If you throw a kick into it, this is what stops the low end stacking.
3. Echo: mode Stereo, Sync on, Left 3/16, Right 1/4 (the classic dotted-against-straight offset), Stereo link off, Feedback 50%, Input gain 0 dB, Dry/Wet 100% (it is a return). Echo tab filters: HP 250 Hz, LP 3 kHz, filter inside the feedback path (default). Modulation: Rate 0.3 Hz, Delay mod 0, Filter mod 15%. Character: Gate off, Duck 25% (tail dips while the source is playing), Noise 6%, Wobble 8%, Repitch on so time changes smear like tape instead of crossfading. Reverb amount 0 — the spring chain handles that.
4. Saturator: Soft Sine, Drive 5 dB, Soft Clip on, Output −3 dB, Hi-Quality on. This sits after Echo, so it is not in the feedback loop; the loop’s own softening comes from Echo’s filters. The Saturator compresses the overall tail so a runaway pushes into harmonics rather than level.
5. Limiter: Ceiling −3 dB, Gain 0 dB, Release 100 ms, Lookahead 3 ms, Stereo link on. This is the runaway control. At Feedback 100% the loop would grow without bound; after the Limiter it is simply a sustained, saturated drone at −3 dB that you can ride down with the Feedback macro.
6. Utility: Width 120%, Bass Mono at 200 Hz. The tail can be wide; its residual low mids stay centred.
7. Spring chain, EQ Eight: low cut 24 dB/oct at 300 Hz, low pass 12 dB/oct at 5 kHz. Springs have no useful content outside that range, and the cut keeps the drip from muddying the delay.
8. Saturator: Analog Clip, Drive 8 dB, Output −6 dB. Driving a spring before the reverb is what makes the splash “boing” — real spring tanks are overloaded at the input transformer.
9. Hybrid Reverb: Algorithm section set to Convolution (Blend fully to convolution), choose a spring impulse from the built-in IR library (the Spring category), Decay 1.6 s, Size 100%, Dry/Wet 100%, Vintage mode on for the darker, slightly noisy character, Low Cut 250 Hz. If you have your own spring tank IR, drop it in the convolution slot.
10. Auto Filter: Band Pass, 12 dB, 1.2 kHz, Resonance 25%, Drive 0, LFO off. Then a second Limiter at −3 dB so a hot throw into the spring behaves.
11. Chain volumes: Delay 0 dB, Spring −inf.
12. Macro 1 Time: Echo Left time Min 1/32, Max 1/2; Echo Right time Min 1/32, Max 1/2, both with Sync on. Because Repitch is on, turning Time during a tail produces the tape pitch-swoop. The two mappings keep the dotted/straight relationship roughly proportional; for a locked ratio map only Left and set Stereo link on instead.
13. Macro 2 Feedback: Echo Feedback Min 20, Max 100%. Above about 85% the loop sustains; at 100% it grows until the Limiter holds it. This is the knob you push for a dub breakdown and pull to kill the tail.
14. Macro 3 Tone: Echo LP filter Min 900 Hz, Max 8 kHz; Echo HP filter Min 500 Hz, Max 120 Hz (inverted). Turned down, the loop narrows to a telephone band so repeats die quickly in the mids; turned up it opens both ends.
15. Macro 4 Throw: Echo Input gain Min −inf, Max +6 dB. At rest the return hears nothing from its sends — only when Throw is pressed does signal enter the delay line. Map the macro in MIDI Map mode to a pad that sends CC 127 on press and 0 on release (momentary CC, not a note, so it does not toggle). For a return that always echoes, set Min to 0 dB instead and use Throw as a +6 dB overdrive push.
16. Macro 5 Spring: Spring chain volume Min −inf, Max −2 dB; Spring Saturator Drive Min 4, Max 14 dB — louder spring is also a more overdriven spring, as on a real tank.
17. Macro 6 Wobble: Echo Wobble Min 0, Max 40%; Echo Modulation Rate Min 0.2 Hz, Max 2 Hz; Echo Noise Min 0, Max 25%. Tape instability, hiss and flutter in one knob.
18. Exclude Feedback and Throw from randomization. Store Macro Variations: Clean (Time 3/16, FB 35, Tone 60, Throw 0, Spring 20, Wobble 10), Dub techno (3/16, 55, 45, 0, 35, 25), Reggae (1/8 dotted, 60, 50, 0, 70, 15), Runaway (1/4, 100, 30, 0, 40, 60). Save as Dub Delay Send Rack.

Macro map

Signal flow notes

Delay chain

Spring chain

Variations

• Dub techno (122 BPM): as built; Time 3/16, Feedback 55%, Tone 45%. Add a Hybrid Reverb Dark Hall at 6 s on a second return and send the Dub return’s output to it (enable the return-to-return send in the mixer’s routing) for the endless washed tail. See dub techno and dub chord rack.
• Dub reggae (72 BPM): Time 1/8 dotted, Feedback 60%, Spring 70%, Wobble 15%. Replace Saturator Soft Sine with Analog Clip at 8 dB for the pushed-tape sound; add Vinyl Distortion with Crackle before the Limiter. See dub reggae.
• Trip-hop / downtempo (90 BPM): Time 1/4 dotted, Tone 30%, Wobble 40%, insert Redux (Rate 9 kHz, Bit 10) before Echo so every repeat is already lo-fi. See trip-hop.
• Ambient: Feedback 90%, Tone 70%, Time 1/2, Spring 30%, add Shifter (+12 st, Dry/Wet 30%) inside the Delay chain before the Saturator so the loop climbs an octave per pass through the shifter’s wet portion — a shimmer dub. See ambient.
• Hardware loop: replace Echo with External Audio Effect pointing at a hardware delay or a eurorack delay module; keep the EQ, Saturator and Limiter, map Throw to the External Audio Effect’s Gain. Compensate latency with the device’s Hardware Latency field. See hardware integration.

Performance notes

• Push: Feedback, Tone and Time on encoders 2, 3 and 1 — in that order of importance. Time on an encoder with Repitch on is a tape-swoop effect in itself; do it on the last bar of a phrase. Throw lives on a pad sending momentary CC in User mode or on a footswitch; Spring and Wobble are set per song.
• Send levels: keep track sends at −12 dB or lower and let Throw provide the hit. With Throw’s Min at −inf nothing circulates until you press, which means no accidental tail under a quiet section.
• Automation vs macro: never automate Feedback above 85% in an arrangement without also automating it back down — a session that opens on a 100% loop is a wall of sound. Record macro moves live and edit the automation lane afterwards for the recovery.
• Pre/post send: set the sends from your stab and vocal tracks to pre-fader if you want to mute the dry track and leave only the dub — the classic drop-out move.
• CPU: Hybrid Reverb convolution is the cost; the rest is cheap. One instance per set is enough since it is a return.
• Gain check: at Feedback 100% with Throw held for two bars, the Limiter should show steady 6–10 dB of gain reduction and the return meter should sit at −3 dB. If it clips the master, lower the Saturator Output, not the Limiter ceiling.

Related

• Dub FX and delays · No-input feedback · Chords and stabs
• Dub techno · Dub reggae · Trip-hop
• Delay design · Reverb and space · Performance and live · Feedback rack