Full and warm bass sound

[lem]

Note priority?.....

Y'kno, like low note priority, last note priority....etc.

I know I have had notes disappear when running midi from Ableton even when I have recorded without loosing notes. Sometimes its just a matter of shortening the notes so they don't overlap nad there is a bit of space between each note.

But I would have guessed you have tried that...

[steevio]

Note priority? I'm not sure about specific cause, I'm not working today so I need to do a pile of tests with a number of things. I keep putting them off but I gotta nail these problems once and for all.

Anyway, @ steevio, y'know I don't think I have ever gone for a pulse wave for bass. Absolutely no idea why, I just nearly always choose a sawtooth first and a LP filter. When I read this, I just created a small step sequence on the 101 and shaped the envelope to what I wanted and just used the Pulse waveform and nothing else. With the 101 it's obviously a square when the slider is at the bottom and your typical thin pulse at the top but there's some nice bass with that single waveform alone...I was setting the pulse width to 4 on the slider with no PWM ie: set to manual ( I don't like PWM on bass ) There's a nice rounded tone right there without the need for the sawtooth or sub oscillators.

One thing I just don't get with the 101, is unlike other synths, the 3 waveforms never seem to be out of phase or cause a cancellation of any kind. The main thing with certain software or V/A synths I have used, is that there's only a very small sweet spot where a combination of oscillators maintain any sense of weight for bass duties. Witht he 101, I'm getting the impression no matter what I do with the mix of the voices or the width of the pulse wave, there's always weight and depth. I don't get how this can be in an analogue synth. If it were digitally controlled or running sampled waveforms I could understand how it would be possible to align the waveforms so that you could avoid phase cancellation or something. Just an observation I have found, maybe it's that each waveform can't be detuned or something????

yeah mate, ive been banging on on here for years about using pulse waves for bass, and no-one seems to get it.

saws are no good , because theyve got all the harmonics, so you're always going to get the same sound. with a pulse you can find just the right harmonic mixture to give you the amount of warmth you want by adjusting the pulsewidth.

get an oscilloscope linked up and watch the harmonics come and go as you move the slider upwards, you'll see frequencies completely dissappear and come back again, in a pattern that becomes second nature to you after a while.
for instance say i've got a chord sound on a synth that has a low note say G3 (196Hz) , i can remove that exact frequency from the bass by adjusting the pulse width, if the bass is harmonically related to the chord. this gives the bass room to breath and the chord stands out on its own, this is way way more effective than using EQ which is a clumsy imprecise technique, this is surgical lazer precision ! you are removing one sinewave from a waveform not a band of frequencies.
i think when i tell people i dont use EQ, they think i'm a nutter, if you understand harmonics you can do most things without EQ if you're synthesizing your own sounds.

the waveforms are in phase on the 101, simple as that, and they arent detunable, i might be wrong but i assume they come from the same VCO core.

edit ; same goes for the kick / bass relationship, you can use pulsewidth to remove the kick frequency from the bass waveform, again way more effective than EQ, of course this wont work for you if you use samples, this is a synthesis technique, you have so much more control over everything with synthesis.

[AK]

get an oscilloscope linked up and watch the harmonics come and go as you move the slider upwards, you'll see frequencies completely dissappear and come back again, in a pattern that becomes second nature to you after a while.
for instance say i've got a chord sound on a synth that has a low note say G3 (196Hz) , i can remove that exact frequency from the bass by adjusting the pulse width, if the bass is harmonically related to the chord. this gives the bass room to breath and the chord stands out on its own, this is way way more effective than using EQ which is a clumsy imprecise technique, this is surgical lazer precision ! you are removing one sinewave from a waveform not a band of frequencies.
i think when i tell people i dont use EQ, they think i'm a nutter, if you understand harmonics you can do most things without EQ if you're synthesizing your own sounds.

.

Yeah I can clearly see that. The 2nd peaking frequency starts reducing as I'm increasing the pulse width from a square. Maybe I need a different analyser though for accuracy in looking at this because, hee, I'm actually pressing a low 'A' note ( just a Pulse wave doing a square ) and the highest peaking frequency is saying 64.6hz, well that and it also blinks a 43.1hz frequency too. So it's reading almost an F note and a C note. ( Tunings right as I double checked with a pitch detector and it read A+2 cents )

What are you using for this? If I want to do some experiments with this, I'm not having much confidence if it isn't even catching the fundamental correctly as surely the other frequencies are out too?

See with the Pulse wave set to square and playing a sustained A note, there's clearly a 2nd peaking frequency at around 188hz - shame this analyser can only estimate as the hz display at the bottom jumps up in values, so yeah, around 188hz, increaing the pulse width reduces that frequency and if I continue increasing the width, I start introducing a frequency around 230hz as the 188hz starts falling off. I'd probably not take into account the 3rd - at least not for this but yeah, what are you using to do this sort of stuff? I should be seeing 55hz and I'm not so I'm assuming the rest is off too.

[steevio]

http://www.sillanumsoft.org/prod01.htm


not sure if they are all free, but some deffo are, the one i use was free

meaning that there are lots of different versions on the download page

edit; the oscilloscope is slightly tricky to set up so that the waveforms stand still and fit the screen, its trial and error, but all you need for the above is the spectrum analyser... which just works as is..
but its worth setting the oscilloscope up, to see your waveshapes, i have mine permanently plumbed in.

[NoAffiliation]

^^^

avalon compressors - wish i could afford one of those mofos !

i thought you hated compressors!

that ssl g clone is a grand and it's better than an avalon!!

[steevio]

^^^

avalon compressors - wish i could afford one of those mofos !

i thought you hated compressors!

that ssl g clone is a grand and it's better than an avalon!!

if youre going to quote me bro, dont edit it to suit, i also said ;

"then i'd be happy to use compression. dont expect the same results from software compression."

have you used an avalon ? have you compared it directly with the ssl ?
i used an avalon tube compressor to master most of the Mindtours releases, and i loved the sound.

i 've never said i 'hated' compression, all ive said is that i never use it, meaning in production, but i'm not averse to using slight compression in mastering, although i havent used it on my last few releases.
i'd love a good quality compressor to use on the odd occassion where i couldnt get the exact sound i wanted otherwsie, but i cant justify spending that sort of money for that.

i gave up using project studio hardware and software compression a few years ago, and instead learned how to get the sound right without it because i realised that i would need to spend alot of money to get what i wanted.
so instead of spending thousands on quality dynamics processors, i put my money into buying quality synthesis.

[loopdon]

get an oscilloscope linked up and watch the harmonics come and go as you move the slider upwards, you'll see frequencies completely dissappear and come back again, in a pattern that becomes second nature to you after a while.
for instance say i've got a chord sound on a synth that has a low note say G3 (196Hz) , i can remove that exact frequency from the bass by adjusting the pulse width, if the bass is harmonically related to the chord. this gives the bass room to breath and the chord stands out on its own, this is way way more effective than using EQ which is a clumsy imprecise technique, this is surgical lazer precision ! you are removing one sinewave from a waveform not a band of frequencies.
i think when i tell people i dont use EQ, they think i'm a nutter, if you understand harmonics you can do most things without EQ if you're synthesizing your own sounds.

.

Yeah I can clearly see that. The 2nd peaking frequency starts reducing as I'm increasing the pulse width from a square. Maybe I need a different analyser though for accuracy in looking at this because, hee, I'm actually pressing a low 'A' note ( just a Pulse wave doing a square ) and the highest peaking frequency is saying 64.6hz, well that and it also blinks a 43.1hz frequency too. So it's reading almost an F note and a C note. ( Tunings right as I double checked with a pitch detector and it read A+2 cents )

What are you using for this? If I want to do some experiments with this, I'm not having much confidence if it isn't even catching the fundamental correctly as surely the other frequencies are out too?

See with the Pulse wave set to square and playing a sustained A note, there's clearly a 2nd peaking frequency at around 188hz - shame this analyser can only estimate as the hz display at the bottom jumps up in values, so yeah, around 188hz, increaing the pulse width reduces that frequency and if I continue increasing the width, I start introducing a frequency around 230hz as the 188hz starts falling off. I'd probably not take into account the 3rd - at least not for this but yeah, what are you using to do this sort of stuff? I should be seeing 55hz and I'm not so I'm assuming the rest is off too.

Steevio, I enjoy those posts. All about getting it right at the start.

[NoAffiliation]

^^^

avalon compressors - wish i could afford one of those mofos !

i thought you hated compressors!

that ssl g clone is a grand and it's better than an avalon!!

if youre going to quote me bro, dont edit it to suit, i also said ;

"then i'd be happy to use compression. dont expect the same results from software compression."

have you used an avalon ? have you compared it directly with the ssl ?
i used an avalon tube compressor to master most of the Mindtours releases, and i loved the sound.

i 've never said i 'hated' compression, all ive said is that i never use it, meaning in production, but i'm not averse to using slight compression in mastering, although i havent used it on my last few releases.
i'd love a good quality compressor to use on the odd occassion where i couldnt get the exact sound i wanted otherwsie, but i cant justify spending that sort of money for that.

i gave up using project studio hardware and software compression a few years ago, and instead learned how to get the sound right without it because i realised that i would need to spend alot of money to get what i wanted.
so instead of spending thousands on quality dynamics processors, i put my money into buying quality synthesis.

i was just joking around... i've just read you as an anti-compression type of guy over the years. and yes avalon sounds fantastic. the model i heard was kind of like a channel strip, i think it had eq on it...

if it's been a few years you may want to check out what software compression can offer, things have really improved, even in the freeware domain.