Distortion Effects

You can use Distortion effects to recreate the sound of analog or digital distortion and to radically transform your audio.

Distortion effects simulate the distortion created by vacuum tubes, transistors, or digital circuits. Vacuum tubes were used in audio amplifiers before the development of digital audio technology, and they are still used in musical instrument amplifiers today. When overdriven, they produce a type of distortion that many people find musically pleasing, and which has become a familiar part of the sound of rock and pop music. Analog tube distortion adds a distinctive warmth and bite to the signal.

There are also distortion effects that intentionally cause clipping and digital distortion of the signal. These can be used to modify vocal, music, and other tracks to produce an intense, unnatural effect, or to create sound effects.

Distortion effects include parameters for tone, which let you shape the way the distortion alters the signal (often as a frequency-based filter), and for gain, which let you control how much the distortion alters the output level of the signal.

Warning: When set to high output levels, distortion effects can damage your hearing—and your speakers. When you adjust effect settings, it is recommended that you lower the output level of the track, and raise the level gradually when you are finished.