Erosion: add roughness without hiding the note
Useful grit leaves something clear underneath it. With Erosion, the task is to find an edge that helps a sound speak without replacing its attack and pitch with a wash of roughness.
Choose what must remain recognisable
Listen for two things in this original eight-second synthetic string-like phrase: the bright beginning of each note and the pitch in its quieter decay. It is generated from harmonics and envelopes, not a guitar recording. The starting Noise setting adds movement to a very short delay. It does not simply mix an independent hiss recording over the phrase.
Keep the note readable beneath the roughness
Interactive audio example
Set the displayed Amount to zero to establish the reference, then return it to 50. The complete signal still travels through a short delay at zero Amount, so this is a no-modulation reference rather than a promise of zero latency. Ask whether you can still follow the note's decay. If the rough surface distracts from that line, reduce Amount to 25 before changing anything else.
Put the roughness where it earns its space
Drag horizontally in the graph to move Freq from around 5.5 kHz toward 3 kHz, watching the displayed value. Keep Amount similar while comparing. Frequency tunes the modulator, not an output EQ band. Delay modulation creates additional spectral components around those already in the source, so the added character is not confined to one neat band centred exactly on the displayed number.
Judge the attack and the decay separately. A setting that makes the bright beginning more obvious may make the fading portion seem less pitched. That is the masking tradeoff: new texture can compete with the information that identifies the note. Move Frequency back upward or lower Amount if the phrase becomes difficult to follow. There is no universally correct grit frequency for every source.
In Noise mode, compare Width at 0.5 and 1.5. Width is the noise modulator's bandwidth in octaves. Widening it also increases the modulation's effective energy in this implementation, so the change is not only a redistribution of identical loudness. Lower Amount after widening if the comparison turns into “more effect wins.” A narrow setting can leave a more concentrated edge; a broad setting can obscure more of the source.
Noise, wide noise, or a definite tone?
Switch from Noise to Wide Noise at the same settings. Noise shares a modulator across channels; Wide Noise uses independent noise generators. Listen for a less stable stereo relationship, not an automatic improvement in width. If the texture pulls attention sideways while the phrase needs a firm centre, return to Noise or reduce Amount. Check any widening against a mono reference rather than judging it only on headphones.
Now select Sine and lower Freq toward 700 Hz. The roughness becomes a more organised modulation pattern that can produce conspicuous sidebands. It can be useful when random texture feels vague, but those extra components need not agree with the note's harmony. Width has no effect in Sine mode. Do not keep adjusting it to solve a tonal clash; change Frequency, reduce Amount or return to Noise.
Read Amount in the right units
The panel displays Amount from 0 to 200, while the stored value runs from zero to one with a squared mapping. This example's stored 0.5 therefore appears as 50, not 50%. Doubling a stored value is not the same as doubling the panel number. Use the displayed values for these listening moves.
Erosion has no dry/wet control here: both channels pass through its modulated delay. Backing off means reducing Amount, narrowing Width in a noise mode, or bypassing the device. The noise drives delay time rather than feeding the audio output directly, so this is not a tool for filling silent gaps with a separate noise bed.