popping at one spot in song

[greg54]

I've had a song that I finished a while back but just started to mix it.  At one point of the song, there is a pop.  It's at a place where several instruments begin.  I have gone over it a million times, soloing each instrument, and every soloed track pops at that spot.  

So I tried recording new vocals to see what would happen.  And at that same spot the new vocal pops.  This not a random pop.  It's only at this spot.  I have gone over it and over it and have no clue what's causing it.  Old tracks and new tracks all have that pop in this spot.  Does anyone have suggestions as to what might be causing it?

 

[David Baay]

Wayward extreme volume automation on a bus? Hard to say. Maybe share the project file with no audio/MIDI content.

 

[Max Arwood]

Are they all audio tracks? Like David mentioned  is there any automation on any lanes? Including buses? Are there any master bus effects? Can you see the pops on each track or just hear them?  Have you looked at the master and main outputs to see if the Pop is on those tracks as well?

Edited November 15 by Max Arwood
Added inf

[Chaps]

13 hours ago, greg54 said:

Does anyone have suggestions as to what might be causing it?

 

I've seen pops/spikes like that in a recording when some appliances were turned on but it sounds like you have ruled that out with additional recordings. What I would do would be to look for spikes in tracks and buses by turning on the Playback and Bus Meters' Hold Peaks and Lock Peaks options. Lock Peaks will only work if Hold Peaks is enabled.

In the Track View you can enable them at Options>Meter Options>Playback Meter Options>Hold Peaks. Repeat that and enable Lock Peaks. Do the same with Bus Meter Options.

You can also enable those options by Right-Clicking on the Track Inspector Track and Bus Meters and selecting the relevant Meter Options.

You can also select those options in the Console View at Options>Meters>Playback Meter Options and Bus Meter Options. I would enable them everywhere because I'm not sure how independent they are with respect to each other. Then I would Loop the section with the pop and see if any of the meters were buried in the red where the pop occurs. That might help identify where the pop is occurring.

 

 

Edited November 15 by Chaps

[Terry Kelley]

I’ve seen this multiple times. I can nail down the track but not the cause. I finally just delete that section of the clip and either copy in something or replay it. Not worth the frustration.

[Bass Guitar]

I've only had it happen in one track. If you zoomed in there was nothing odd showing. So I just split the track there and add fade outs and fade ins and it would be gone. 
but your saying it's across multiple tracks and each one makes the sound when soloed? 

Try by passing all effects. 

[sjoens]

Could be audio interface related.  Currently I have a project that's causing audio dropouts without showing the Drop Out flag - it just pops and goes silent.  Closing the DAW and reloading it clears the issue.

Process of elimination.  1. Use a different interface if available.  2. Save-As a TEST copy of the project and play thru the area.  If it still pops, delete every "track" (not just the clips) and create one new track.  Record a new clip in the troubled area.  If it still pops it may be a hiccup between the project and the interface corrupting it.

[greg54]

17 hours ago, Max Arwood said:

Are they all audio tracks? Like David mentioned  is there any automation on any lanes? Including buses? Are there any master bus effects? Can you see the pops on each track or just hear them?  Have you looked at the master and main outputs to see if the Pop is on those tracks as well?

Everything pops except the drums.  Drums, keyboards and bass are MIDI.    The rest are audio.  And they all pop.  I don't see the pops but only hear them.

[greg54]

16 hours ago, Chaps said:

On 11/14/2024 at 11:48 AM, greg54 said:

 

I've seen pops/spikes like that in a recording when some appliances were turned on but it sounds like you have ruled that out with additional recordings. What I would do would be to look for spikes in tracks and buses by turning on the Playback and Bus Meters' Hold Peaks and Lock Peaks options. Lock Peaks will only work if Hold Peaks is enabled.

In the Track View you can enable them at Options>Meter Options>Playback Meter Options>Hold Peaks. Repeat that and enable Lock Peaks. Do the same with Bus Meter Options.

You can also enable those options by Right-Clicking on the Track Inspector Track and Bus Meters and selecting the relevant Meter Options.

You can also select those options in the Console View at Options>Meters>Playback Meter Options and Bus Meter Options. I would enable them everywhere because I'm not sure how independent they are with respect to each other. Then I would Loop the section with the pop and see if any of the meters were buried in the red where the pop occurs. That might help identify where the pop is occurring.

Great.  Thanks!

[greg54]

6 hours ago, Terry Kelley said:

I’ve seen this multiple times. I can nail down the track but not the cause. I finally just delete that section of the clip and either copy in something or replay it. Not worth the frustration.

I've tried that.  I even tried recording it over, and it doesn't work.  It pops in that same place no matter what.  

[greg54]

4 hours ago, Bass Guitar said:

I've only had it happen in one track. If you zoomed in there was nothing odd showing. So I just split the track there and add fade outs and fade ins and it would be gone. 
but your saying it's across multiple tracks and each one makes the sound when soloed? 

Try by passing all effects. 

I just started mixing, so there are only a couple of effects on a couple of tracks.  But the rest don't have anything.  

 

And to answer a question earlier, I don't have any automation on any track yet.

[greg54]

4 hours ago, sjoens said:

Could be audio interface related.  Currently I have a project that's causing audio dropouts without showing the Drop Out flag - it just pops and goes silent.  Closing the DAW and reloading it clears the issue.

Process of elimination.  1. Use a different interface if available.  2. Save-As a TEST copy of the project and play thru the area.  If it still pops, delete every "track" (not just the clips) and create one new track.  Record a new clip in the troubled area.  If it still pops it may be a hiccup between the project and the interface corrupting it.

I do have a new interface - Apollo Twin X USB.   I like it.  I don't have another interface to try.   Closing the DAW doesn't help.  I've thought copying parts of the song onto a new project and see if it still does it, but that seems like a lot of work I'm not ready to try just yet.

Deleting the track is an idea I haven't thought of.  Thanks!

[Amberwolf]

If it pops in the same place on every audio track, then there is something happening at that spot *or* after that amount of time.

What happens if you add a marker at that spot, then rewind to the beginning and insert some measures, selecting all tempos, events, automation, etc in the checkboxes, letting it shift everthing over, so that the spot *should* move if it's any data that's in the track(s) or buses?

If the pop is still at the marker (which moves with the rest of the stuff), then it's caused by something in the data itself somewhere in a track or bus.

If the pop is still at the original time, then it's external to the data and is happenign after a specific amount of time and is probably external to the program itself, a driver, hardware, OS, etc thing. 

[Rickddd]

1. If you insert blank spacing at the start of the song on all tracks, does the pop stay at the same place or does it slide correspondingly with the moved tracks?

2. I saw where you said you only had a couple of effects.  Instead of shutting them off individually, shut them off via the master FX switch.  In theory  shutting all individually and shutting the FX switch should be the same, but in practice, I've heard small differences. The goal is trying to zero in on the culprit.

3. If I were troubleshooting it I'd start with half the tracks muted. Still get the click?  Mute the other half and see. Keep drilling down until isolated, assuming that works!

4. Since it happens when several instruments start, it could be a sound overload at that point. And it need not be big and wide; it might be an instant. Don't know how your interface talks to the system (ASIO, etc), but you might try increasing any buffer sizes.    My system uses ASIO and to get minimal latency I will squeeze it down as far as I can get away with but have to back it off if the system overloads.

Just some thoughts...
 

Edited November 16 by Rickddd

[Bass Guitar]

Troubleshooting needs to be a process of elimination as your issue could be caused by a few different things. Here's a few thoughts I would try. 

I said to Bypass ALL the effects as those could be the cause for different reasons. This eliminates things you might have missed like Pro channel modules. 

It could be a drop out that only happens at that point because something is taxing your system. Like an effect or a VST instrument. 

So increasing your buffers to around 520 might solve the issue. 

You have a new Audio interface and there's no telling if it will perform better than your old one. Example I was surprised to find my Motu interface would drop out at the same buffer setting that all my other interfaces didn't drop out.

Does the Apollo have DSP processing?  Turn that off if it does. 

Freeze the Midi instruments. 

 

[Terry Kelley]

19 hours ago, greg54 said:

I've tried that.  I even tried recording it over, and it doesn't work.  It pops in that same place no matter what.  

Although my fix didn’t work for you I suspect they are related problems.  I assume this is an audio track and not a frozen or VST track …
 

I was going so far as to look at the wave at the byte level to see if there was a discontinuity but it was smooth. But again, I could mute the track and it wouldn’t happen so I had that little bit of evidence. But deleting that section and replacing it worked. 

Maybe I missed it but have you tried loading into the new or older sonar to see if it still happens?

When it happens it’s frustrating for sure. 
 

 

Edited November 16 by Terry Kelley

[greg54]

Well, I turned on my computer and fired up CbB, opened the project, and no pop.

It did it ever single time and now, for reason, it stopped.   I appreciate everyone's comments.

It not popping anymore is a little annoying in a way because I don't know what caused it or why it stopped.

So it may decide to start again (but I genuinely hope not).

Anyway, thanks again for everyone's input.  If it decides to start up again I'll be back.

[sjoens]

Glad to hear it resolved.  As in my case, probably just an audio interface vs system vs DAW hiccup.  Any number of repeated events can trigger them but are usually cleared by a reboot.

[greg54]

So far so good.   Like I said, not sure what caused it so I don't know if it will happen again.  But "hopefully" it will continue to be ok.  

[sjoens]

My project keeps acting up.  Seems about the 3rd time I invoke Melodyne or bounce a clip it happens again.  Reboot and repeat several times until I quit for the day.    When rebooting fails to fix things like this in the long run it's time to start fresh with a new project.

Edited Monday at 09:27 PM by sjoens