Getting to grips with Pitchloop89

This Max For Live pitch and glitch machine, inspired by a rare hardware unit, was developed with Ableton co-founder Robert Henke

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Amongst the totally new devices in Live 11 is a new Max for Live device called Pitchloop89, which uses a pitch and loop engine to transform incoming audio into something previously unrecognisable. For this walkthrough, we’ve loaded Pitchloop89 onto a MIDI track with a Basic Wurli preset loaded.

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Pitchloop89 has separate controls for the Left and Right channels, though it’s possible to link the two together. To the far left of the plugin interface is the Bandwidth selection; changing the Bandwidth will vary the total delay time available and create unique harmonic artifacts.

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Looping the audio using the large Freeze buttons on either channel captures a snippet of audio that can then be manipulated by the controls to the right of the Position Modulation. The LFO moves through the audio at the rate and depth according to the knobs below; this can either be set to slow speeds or chaotic speeds, depending on the effect desired.

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The Segment knob shortens or lengthens the amount of audio frozen; changing this in conjunction with the Position switch can create some granular effects. Finally, each side of the stereo signal has both low and high cut filters, which are useful for taming any frequencies that might get out of hand.

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Pitchloop89 is great not just for granular effects but also for creating woozy, slow-moving delay sounds that would be hard to replicate with other plugins. Use the Left side with audio captured and ‘frozen’ and the Right side as a normal delay to create even more of an idiosyncratic sound.