Project 1 - Radio Friendly Edit

Project Overview

By now, everyone has seen an album that has the "Parental Advisory" sticker in the corner. The way that most of us know the songs from those albums is markedly different from the biggest hits on that album when we hear them on the radio. Some artists take the time to craft entirely separate radio edits in the studio with alternate lyrics, but we don’t have that luxury for this project.

We’re going to work with tools that will allow us to filter out vocals and replace explicit content with alternate sounds. Whether those sounds are simple (e.g.: the 1kHz “bleep”) or imaginative, there have been countless ways that producers have taken songs like this and cleaned them up for mass consumption. This concept can be applied to slightly tongue-in-cheek purposes. However, we’re putting this skill to practical use in cleaning up a song that is otherwise considered non-radio friendly.

The things to be on the lookout for when it comes to your edit when you’re making your creative decisions boil down to three large categories: explicit language, drug references, and sexual innuendo.

Assignment

Create a “radio friendly” version of a song from its original explicit recording.

Procedure:

Open a new Logic project and save as Project 3.1 LASTNAME.
Import a song of your choosing, with explicit lyrics, into Logic to a new audio track
Right click on one of your imported tracks and scroll to Processing > Stem Splitter…

Ignore in this picture that Stem Splitter is at the top of the menu. It is only there because I had previously used it. If you haven’t used it yet, follow the instructions.

Select all four options (Vocals, Drums, Bass, Other) and then Split
1. - This will create a summing stack with all four stems included
Begin listening through your vocal isolated track and removing content
1. - If you are unsure about whether or not to keep something, err on the side of caution
  - Pro tip: Ues the notepad function in Logic to keep a copy of the original lyrics handy for reference.

CREATING THE STANDARD "CENSOR BEEP"
1. Create a new audio track and keep it clear of any audio regions
  - - MUTE THIS TRACK BEFORE THE NEXT STEP
2. In your audio effects, scroll to Utility > Test Oscillator
  - - This plug-in will constantly play whatever you create in it, and it will automatically turn on once it is created in your track.
3. The default “Sine Wave” is 1000 Hz, the “bleep” you normally hear in censored audio
  - Use either the default Sine Wave, white noise (all equally loud frequencies from 20-20,000 Hz), or pink noise (all frequencies from 20-20,000 Hz with louder low frequencies than highs)
4. Once you are ready to hear what your selection, unmute your track
5. Automate your bypass to turn your signal on or off

OTHER CENSORING METHOD OPTIONS

Make creative choices about how to replace lyrics that you have taken away
Use markers to potentially leave yourself reminders of what you removed
Some ideas for your consideration:
1. - Reversing an audio region
  - Imported sound effects
  - Loops from Logic
  - Silence
Mix and produce your sound effects/add-ins as needed
Check that your final mix is balanced and does not clip
Submit the completed project to Schoology (don't forget to create a .zip of the file before you submit.)

PROJECT MASTERY GUIDELINES:

For this project to be considered complete and receive full credit, it must meet the following minimum criteria:

All explicit language, drug references, and sexual innuendo removed from vocal stem
Must use automated bypass on Test Oscillator for white/pink noise or 1000 Hz Sine Wave at least once
Final mix is balanced

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