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Quick Ableton Live 9.5 filter tips

Ableton Live 9.5 is out – with nice new analog-modeled filters.
Here’s two quickies relating to them.

1) The new analog-modeled filters can self-oscillate, so by setting the resonance really high (goes up to 125%) and adding some drive (by using the MS2 filter, for example), you can create sinewave type of sound if you play a sample that’s silent.

2) If you have a sample that’s just noise or something similar, crank up the LP filter resonance all the way up to 125%, add some reverb, and you can create a nice bleep sound that you can play melodies with.

Badass plugins post

plugingalore
Plugins galore!

This one’s been in the air for a while: to write about the plugins I use the most. I don’t have an absolute massive ton of plugs, and as I’ve become more experienced, I’ve tried to adapt the “less is more” and “learn a few tools inside out” philosophy with plugins, but I suppose still have/had a few too many “waiting to get used” (I actually ended up deleting a few while going thru the list, trying to pick the ones I’d write about).
For this one, I’ll concentrate on the effects Continue reading Badass plugins post →

Lightless coffee desktop

coffee-desk-800

Love dark roast coffee vibes?  Well, if you do, grab yourself a coffee-themed Lightless desktop (has a few different sizes).
Art by Lonekink.

Speaking of Lightless, I’ll soon have finished mastering a pretty exciting compilation for Lightless, which features music from some pretty damn talented bass music heads whose tunes you must hear…stay tuned.

Checkout: Serum synth

serum
Serum

Being a total music tech geek who’s reading Gearslutz and other related forums all the time when not busy making music, mastering it for clients or  playing with plug-ins and DAWs, I thought it might be relevant to start writing about it a little. So here’s a little checkout of the Serum synth by Xfer Records. I won’t go into writing a comprehensive manual or a comparison, but just say how I felt about it. I know there’s numerous reviews out there, but I wanted to do one of my own just go get practice with writing a bit longer as I’m planning to write more for the blog.

I bought Serum recently after demoing it for a while. I don’t dare demo things very often because Continue reading Checkout: Serum synth →

Lush oldskool DNB style pad with Serum in 15 seconds

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[sorry for the distorted sound – that’s Instagram messing it up, not me!]
• Select an oscillator; here I’m going for “Mellow But Instable” of the analog ones
• crank up the unison up to 16
• lessen the unison detune amount so it doesn’t sound too out of tune
• add reverb from FX
• set the stack from Global settings to 12+7(1x); this means that every 2nd unison voice will play up an octave (0, +12, 0, +12, 0 +12, etc), and a fifth is also used in the layering of sounds, so you’ll get a really rich sound
• adjust filter to taste
• play a chord (C2–D#2–G2 heard here)

There you go!

About high-passing your beats

bad good

Every now and then I receive songs for mastering that sound a bit too hollow in the beat department. Often, the problem lies in the beat that’s been high-pass filtered too high/steep.
The pics show how it’s roughly supposed to look if you have the necessary meat in there (good) or if it’s been high-passed too much (bad), ending up in a hollow-sounding beat. Both pics are from songs when there is no bassline happening; it’s good to check the beats without bass, too. The kick area will peak depending on where your kick hits, but regardless, you shouldn’t have that gap there (as in the bad pic).
Earlier I blogged about high-passing your song and getting your sub bass right, which both relate to the same matter as well and were essentially about how it’s supposed to look when you have bass going on.
Even though listening is key, tools such as Voxengo SPAN are great tools in this matter.