Soft synth for a big dark bass sond?

Mr. Grinder

Hello again,

Could any of you experts recommend me a "soft synth"? Basically, I'm looking at creating that very dark bass sound - used in "Dark side" Drum & Bass. Anything like Ed Rush and Optical's Wormhole, etc.

I know a hardware synth like the Access Virus is probably the best bet, but my wallet wont allow it.

I've been having a gander at Native instrument's "Massive" and Subtronic's "Trillion". They both seem pretty good so far. What do you guys think?

Any advice or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks again,

.ak

I really like Massive, the sounds you can get from it are very close to hardware... but the interface is terrible. They tried to make it too 'unique'.. All you want is basic oscilator operations and filters.

Try Sylenth.. Its a great synth that you can create some really good sounds, and for what you're doing it's dead easy to operate the filter and create some lovely soft subs...

-A

Mr. Grinder

Yeah, so far I've been blown away by "Massive"... The sounds are absolutely the type of stuff I wanted to create (or try to). Pity it's hard to use tho'.

I've not heard of the other one you mentioned, but I'm off to check it out now.

Thanks for the help!

G.

Mr. Grinder

.ak wrote: »

Try Sylenth.. Its a great synth that you can create some really good sounds, and for what you're doing it's dead easy to operate the filter and create some lovely soft subs...

Wow! Just had a listen to it... and it has an awesome set of sounds too. I'm confused again.

Cheers,

G.

.ak

Don't get bogged down just using one. Use all elements at your disposal... However, I would recommend 'mastering' one first. I'd also recommend mastering Sylenth, as it's set up very basic like, and if you can use sylenth, you'll be able to master any synth. It's also incredibly easy to 'carve' a synth sound from scratch with Sylenth, rather than using presets.

-A

Mr. Grinder

Good advise... get good at one first! Or else my brain will melt.

Been listening to Sylenth demos all morning now and I'm really impressed. I'm very close to a purchase - just have one last question for ya' if you don't mind. Nearly all the demos I've heard are trance/techno which it does unbelievingly very well. Can you carve those really dark hissing baselines with it too (similar to the massive demo stuff)?

Cool man... thanks again.

.ak

Yeah man, it's all about the cut off filter....

If you want, tomorrow evening I could make a few loops with some dark basslines/subs to show you what it'll sound like? Keeping in mind I don't produce dub/dubstep I'll try my best...

-A

Neurojazz

Massive is much better for Dubstep style basses, has much more control over the LFO over parts of the sounds.

Sylenth is a good all round synth that doesn't need much time to learn, but lacks the total control that Massive offers.

Massive is also a CPU heavy plugin, and sylenth is very light on CPU.

Most Dubstep artists will cite Massive as their main tool.

The manual is heavy, but it's worth investing the time in it to get those types of results - like with any tool, it's only as good as the person is trained in it.

Hope that helps!

Mr. Grinder

.ak wrote: »

Yeah man, it's all about the cut off filter....

If you want, tomorrow evening I could make a few loops with some dark basslines/subs to show you what it'll sound like? Keeping in mind I don't produce dub/dubstep I'll try my best...

-A

Cool man, that's be great only if you have the time. Thanks for all your help matey.

Neurojazz wrote: »

Massive is much better for Dubstep style basses, has much more control over the LFO over parts of the sounds.

Cheers man. Yeah, as I was saying earlier it blew me away when I first heard it. And it can certainly replicate that hissing wobbely bass sound of Dark Side. I am aiming for early stuff like "Torque" etc. I'm sure it can take an age to master like everything I suppose.

Mr. Grinder

These are the types of sounds I'd be after (hope it's okay to pop a youtube link in here btw). Don't really mind what software used to be honest.

I know it would take years to lean to do it well - but you gotta' start somewhere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziUOte8UO6c&feature=related

WOW!

Neurojazz

Mr. Grinder wrote: »

These are the types of sounds I'd be after (hope it's okay to pop a youtube link in here btw). Don't really mind what software used to be honest.

I know it would take years to lean to do it well - but you gotta' start somewhere.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziUOte8UO6c&feature=related

WOW!

Massive all the way for that style - sylenth is good for other things - more leads/pads and 'humming' basses - it is much warmer than Massive.

Mr. Grinder

Hello,

Just thought I post an update... I purchased "Massive" and have been playing around with it for a few days now. I'm very impressed so far - the range of options is huge and the sound is very aggressive (which suits my style). Virtually every sound option is customizable too. However, I found it (and still do) a pretty daunting program, but with the help of some good tutorials - I'm slowly making my way through it.

While the "Massive" synth, for my style is awesome! I'm still going to invest in Sylenth (next pay day) , as it has a more "liquid and softer sound" and I would like to be able to incorporate into my repertoire as well.

Again thanks to .ak and Nurojazz for taking the time to help me out.

Executive Steve

Mr. Grinder wrote: »

Cool man, that's be great only if you have the time. Thanks for all your help matey.




Cheers man. Yeah, as I was saying earlier it blew me away when I first heard it. And it can certainly replicate that hissing wobbely bass sound of Dark Side. I am aiming for early stuff like "Torque" etc. I'm sure it can take an age to master like everything I suppose.

You should experiment with seperating your bass into three parts, low, mid and hi, processing them seperately and resampling and layering. Noisia, Teebee and all of those heads will spend ages doing stuff like that. The bassline on "The Tide" even has a sample of a power-washer cleaning the window of their studio in it somewhere

Try taking orchestral samples and pitching them way way down and layering them with pitched down 808 kicks - that's how Alix Perez and the likes do their basslines - his "Allegiance" collaboration with Lynx is a great example of that.

Running your bassline through Guitar FX pedals is an old trick that was used a lot in the Torque days - can give a sound serious grit and character, all those tunes were made on surprisingly basic setups - few samplers, a turntable, Mackie desk, Juno 106, loads of guitar FX pedals, a bottle of Wray & Nephews and a tonne of weed.

Executive Steve

And needless to say you should chuck me over a link when you get something you're happy with finished

Mr. Grinder

Hey man,

Thanks for the advice! Yeah, I figured the old torque stuff was a relatively simple set up, but the sounds they got were really very cool! Just shows you what you can accomplish with all that weed. Never thought of running stuff through my guitar distortion pedals tho', and I have a few really decent tones. I'll definitely try that! Nice one man...


That's very much the style I'd be going for. Maybe with a little more wobble bass (from Massive).

Cheers,

G.

Mr. Grinder

Bit of an update for those who are interested.

Okay, in the search for the "perfect Dark Bass sound" I've got my hands on N.I. "Massive" (as you know), which I'm absolutely loving but I'm also still trying to get to grips with it too... Half the fun is in the learning tho'!

However, I could not resist it for long, so I also bought "Sylenth" as well. Wow... does this synth sound good. Right out of the box you've got some superb patches. It's pretty to carve your own sounds out too. I've been messing around with it for a day or two now, and by grud it can produce a phat sounds in seconds.

Rev those four Ocilators up and put 8 voices on each. Got some pretty Dark sounds out of it as well... Not quite as good as Massive for that - because Massive's OCSs can be tunned down to - 24! And you can slap an LFO on nearly anything.

So with a combo of the two, I think I'll be able to get some great sounds (much to learning tho').

Not too sure which I prefer at the moment - but I'd definitely recommend them both!

Thanks for all the advice!

Doge

I bought this a month or 2 back, and it has a pretty dark and gritty sound to it:

http://www.humanoidsounds.co.uk/products.html

Its basically donation ware, you can buy it for as little as 1 dollar if you like.

I think it would be especially suited to dubstep and dark drum and bass.

I dont think it would have as much modulation as massive for extreme wobble, but you should try it out because of its unique character.

Doge

Mr. Grinder wrote: »

Rev those four Ocilators up and put 8 voices on each. Got some pretty Dark sounds out of it as well... Not quite as good as Massive for that - because Massive's OCSs can be tunned down to - 24! And you can slap an LFO on nearly anything.

When you say they can be tuned down to 24 now, do you mean by 24 semitones?

Sure if a synth only has a range of 12, all you do is play the same key one octave lower and tune down then, its the exact same frequency wise like.

Most synths have a a knob that lets you choose the octave for each oscillator also.

Mr. Grinder

Hey mate,

Just listening to that synth now. Actually it sounds pretty damn nice... Thanks for the info.

Sorry, yes for Massive I meant semi-tones.

Cheers, G.

Michael..

.ak wrote: »

I really like Massive, the sounds you can get from it are very close to hardware... but the interface is terrible. They tried to make it too 'unique'.. All you want is basic oscilator operations and filters.

Try Sylenth.. Its a great synth that you can create some really good sounds, and for what you're doing it's dead easy to operate the filter and create some lovely soft subs...

-A

Ya,Massive is a great plugin - it's capable of producing really interesting sounds.Even if you can't programme it properly,the presets are great.

Sylenth is a great plugin too - the sound quality is immense.However if I was
to be critical I think the presets are poor enough - very trancey.

Mr. Grinder

Michael.. wrote: »

Ya,Massive is a great plugin - it's capable of producing really interesting sounds.Even if you can't programme it properly,the presets are great.

Sylenth is a great plugin too - the sound quality is immense.However if I was
to be critical I think the presets are poor enough - very trancey.

It's funny, but I'm finding Massive a bit of a let down at the moment. I'm sure part of it is that I'm still getting to grips with the whole Subtractive Syntheses thing. However, ironically I'm getting much "darker sounds" with Sylenth. Also, they sound huge in comparison to Massive. Having four Oscillators and being able to give them 8 voices each produces an incredibly rich sound. Obviously there is no where near the amount of modulation options that you have in Massive, but I guess that's where your sampler would come in handy.

I know what you mean about the presets in Sylenth tho'. I mean, they are really good if you are into trance and Dancey type of sounds. Not so suitable for Dark Drum N' Bass. But you can tweak them pretty easily...

I've been fooling around with Rob Papen's "Predator" Synth also (I'm just using a demo at the moment). I've been getting some really mad sounds with it. It has some really nice options that I've not seen on other synths so far. And the sound is pretty phat indeed.

Cheers, G.