interesting dub chord / stab sounds...

[cloutier]

more specifically...

do you think its a certain keyboard or synth? maybe a sampled sound heavily processed, like a glass bottle or something?

those are the kind of things i'm also trying to figure out on my learning curve quest for knowledge extravaganza 2011.



thanks for everything so far, guys! greatly appreciated!

[tone-def]

I think resampling a synth is thing to do. I don't think it really matters if it's analog or digital. It sounds crunchy but that could be YouTube.

[::BLM::]

What synths are you using at the moment Eric?

[cloutier]

What synths are you using at the moment Eric?

since i'm broke as fck, its all vst's. mainly minimonsta, massive, and fm8, but i'm probably going to get the trilian collection soon since it has so much good sh!t.

[AK]

more specifically...

do you think its a certain keyboard or synth? maybe a sampled sound heavily processed, like a glass bottle or something?

those are the kind of things i'm also trying to figure out on my learning curve quest for knowledge extravaganza 2011.



thanks for everything so far, guys! greatly appreciated!

Mate, I think your imagination is probably the best bet if you want to achieve something original soundwise. There's no particular synth that would give you a dub chord sound, it's pretty much achievable with a lot of things. If you intend on playing the chords in quite a low octave, you probably wont need the perfect fifth of the chord. Chords have a tendency tp become a cluster of noise without a sense of pitch when played low so reducing the number of voices can help things to be clearer. So for a simple minor dub chord, try 2 oscillators both set to a sawtooth waveform and up the semitone of the 2nd by 3. This gives you a minor 3rd interval and it will sound like a minor chord even though the 5th isn't present. Open the filter amount to give a bit of initial bite and reduce the filter cut of frequency, use the amp envelope section to carve the envelope of the sound and add filter resonance to taste ( not much, if any ) So you're looking for a stab sound which initially bites but isn't too bright. If the synth has an overdrive/amp sim/rectify type thing, add a small amount of that to prevent it from sounding 'clean'. If it has a 3rd oscillator, dial in a bit of noise too, just to help give it some character.

If you want to make a whole track in this vein, consider 'ageing' it. Like you could sample some vinyl crackle and loop it over and slot that it underneath everything for its texture, then don't go too bright with things like percussion, kicks etc. Reduce the high frequency of things kile kickdrums until they are felt but don't have a hi freq transient attack, that will help keeping things 'softer' and more atmospheric. You can get those kind of overdriven hats by doing exactly that, overdrive them with whatever amp sim/distortion/etc gear you have and then if any nasty low end that comes from that, use a Hi Pass filter to keep the character of the processing but remove any inadvertantly added lo frequencies.

Personally, I think reverb and delay types are a means to an end. For example, if you have a reverb that does not have an inbuilt EQ section, you can always add an EQ after it in the mixers efx send chain. If you want crunchy delays but don't have a tape style delay, you can add a distortion after that in the efx chain.

For some decent free plugins that you may or may not be aware of, go here: http://www.interruptor.ch/dub.shtml

That's the homepage and that was deliberate because apart from the plugins, there's a lot of useful info you might want to look at too if you into dub stuff.

[Phase Ghost]

What AK said.

There are mad ways to get this type of sound. The sounds in this track could easily be samples and not chords from any synth. They're not very distinct in terms of how they were produced. I hear three (maybe 4 later on in the tune) different sounds bouncing around making the "stabs". The reason the subtle sounds work so well is because how sparse and focused the track is. I really love this style of techno. It's what I've always thought when I think of minimal techno. I know the whole dub techno sound has got played out to an extent, but so few do it well. The Rhythm & Sound low end is the holy grail of bass (to me anyways).

Also, is this a deepchord track? I know those guys did some stuff on the Octal label years ago and this sounds very much like a deepchord tune. Deepchord #7 might be my favorite techno record of all time.

[::BLM::]

What synths are you using at the moment Eric?

since i'm broke as fck, its all vst's. mainly minimonsta, massive, and fm8, but i'm probably going to get the trilian collection soon since it has so much good sh!t.

There are these tutorials from someone off here using the synth massive that shows you how to make all these sounds. It's not exactly what you're after, but it will give you an understanding. Try changing the waveforms from whatever he is using to something like organ or sine waves or something like that. As mentioned above its a pretty easy thing to create and there really is no set way of doing it as there are so many ways it could be done.

Hey all,

As promised, here is my tutorial on how to make a nice dubby synth stab.
It's the basis of most of my sounds, and with a bit of tinkering you will get a lot out of it

I have used Massive, but you could do it with just about any synth.

Please note, i am not professing to be an expert sound designer, nor engineer, so some of technique or wording may be wrogn - but hey it's the end result that counts yeah !

This is the noise we will be making today:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/lpfqfz

So to begin with - i always set up a simple midi loop over a couple of bars, in this case playing C minor in C1 (it is important the sound is a chord, and also important it is in the low range). I find this helps with the sound design process as you can hear the changes live as you tinker and don't have to worry about hitting keys all the time.

The reason i have not posted a patch is because it will be much more fun for you to put this together yourself, and in doing so see what parameters affect what, so you might have your own ideas how to improve or create a new sound from this.

This small tutorail is assuming you have basic understanding of Massive and it's routing/modulation functions.

I hope it is of help.

So - onto Massive...

Set up as such - (i have used clock face settings as this is universal):

Osc 1 - sq/saw1
wave table @5o'clock, intensity @1o'clock, amp @3o'clock.

Osc 2 - Va-pwm (detune to +/- 0.30 or there abouts)
wt 5oclock, Pulse width 1oclock, amp 1oclock

no other osc, noise/feedback/modulation off.

Both Osc filters set to F1(all the way to the top)

Filter to serial

Filter 1 set to Lowpass 4, cutoff set to 3oclock,
resonance to 10oclock.

drop mod envelope 4 (one of the blue ones) on to cutoff, set to modulate back from 3 to 12oclock.

Filter 2 off

env4 settings -
attack to 7oclock, lvl to 5oclock
decay to 12oclock, lvl to 12oclock
Release to 7oclock

effect1 to reverb.
set to : dry/wet to 9oclock, size to 3oclock, density to 5oclock, colour to 5oclock.

Eq:
Low - 12
rest to 5.

That should be a lovely sounding Dubby noise...
If not... go back and make sure all your settings are the same and you are playing a minor chord.

Once you have done this noise - you can now try to spice things up.
Try for example...

Insert 2 (make it last INS2 in routing tab, above effect1 in routing diagram) : Bitcrush - dry/wet to 9oclock, crush to 10oclock. This adds some nice white noise/static effect.

Or , perhaps....

add LFO6 to moudlate res on filter 1. If res is 10oclock, mod from 7oclock to 1oclock . Set LFO 6 to sync 1/12... Very nice wobbly yes?!

Or, perhaps....

add LFO6 to moudlate decay on env4. If decay is 12, mod from 7 to 5
Set LFO 6 to sync 1/12 - Play with this Try playing with release on env 4 too... modulate perhaps!!! Very nice

add LFO6 to moudlate cutoff... cool effect!

Basically experiment, try modulate everything

I hope this was of help to you.

The other 10 patches i originally posted are coming soon - don't worry

Oh, and by the way - you can hear a track i have put together with this patch and the a few of the other 10 i originally posted here:

http://soundcloud.com/breakitdown/low-winter-sun

enjoy

here is the original thread: http://www.mnml.nl/phpBB3/viewtopic.php ... 7&start=26

[catchpenny]

looking forward to hearing stuff from you eric!

I'd have a look at filter delays like psp 608.