Super happy double secret patch tips

[ElectricPuppy]

I was making a simple bass patch on my PEK, but it sounded too thin. So's I asks myself, "Self, how can this be? Surely the PEK is capable of pHaT bAsS, so what am I doing wrong?" And then I hit on it:

 

Put just a "touch" of distortion on it. Just a *little*.

 

OH YEAH BABY PHAAAAAAT BAAAAAAAAASS!!! BWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!

 

And that's my super secret patch tip o' the day. Anyone else?

[ElectricPuppy]

Geez, a whole ten minutes, and NO ONE has any Super Happy Double Secret patch tip to divulge?

 

Pah! OK, you slackers, one more to get the ball rolling:

 

Friends don't let friends use Unison mode on the 106. Just... don't.

[bruto]

I probably do more trickery with Cakewalk that with patch tweeking.

 

One thing I like to do is to set Cakewalk's track pitch to +7 (or whatever) and play my keyboard. It sends the same note back and gives you the big 5th (or 9th if you set it to +14.)

 

I also do a lot of layering with synths and modules. Sometimes even a subtle bit of bass or pad can really make a patch sound good.

 

I just bought an Akai AX73 and found that it makes an incredible CS80 lead sound on one of the (non-original) presets when I simultaneously slide the filter cut off.

[ElectricPuppy]

Layering can be a great way to discover new sounds. There's a patch on the TI called something like "epwsh" or something like that. Kind of a cruptic name, and by itself, it's kind of bland. But, I just happened to layer it with an EP patch on the Motif and... MAGIC! Now I understand the name, EP "wash". Really nice combination.

[Gribs]

Lets see, how about modulate your LFO or envelope loop frequency to taste by keynote played. That works nice for vibrato. It also works really nice for chords with bell tones. You can make it sound like the bigger, lower pitch bells are ringing more slowly than the little higher pitched bells.

[kpatz]

Layering a DX EP over other sounds adds sparkle.

 

Subtle, slow LFO applied to pitch can add some life to an otherwise boring pad.

 

Want a FAT sound from a Juno? PWM + Chorus. Yummy. Works on Polysix and other similar synths as well.

 

Got a JX-8P/10/MKS-70? Want PWM? Pulse + osc sync + LFO modulation on DCO1 = PWM.

[eric]

Layer acoustic piano sounds with CP80 electric grand sounds. Amazing!

[ElectricPuppy]

Layer acoustic piano sounds with CP80 electric grand sounds. Amazing!

 

Snidery will get you everywhere, mister.

[Allerian]

Modulate stuff.

[theextremist04]

 

Layering can be a great way to discover new sounds. There's a patch on the TI called something like "epwsh" or something like that. Kind of a cruptic name, and by itself, it's kind of bland. But, I just happened to layer it with an EP patch on the Motif and... MAGIC! Now I understand the name, EP "wash". Really nice combination.

 

 

Yep. 8 SH101 basses in a mix on my fusion sounds FAT. Or 16 kick drums- ready to blow any speaker.

[eric]

Snidery will get you everywhere, mister.

 

My post was delivered with the utmostest sinceriosity! I promise.

[Mintbeetle]

If it's digital, a little dab of slow sine or random LFO on pitch. Same for cutoff if there's enough LFOs. Gotta have that instability.

 

Remembering that detuned oscillators make sick riffs and leads, but muddy up the bass. Keep it tuned or use 1 osc for sub frequencies.

 

If I have a cool sound with weak bass, I'll throw on a steep highpass around 100hz and use another synth's sine or square wave to fill in.

 

Drums: crush to 10 or 12 bits.

 

I just recently fell head over heels for the sound of delay with a resonant filter in the feedback loop. I've been messing with it in Crystal; unfortunately I don't have a standalone delay that can do it.

[ElectricPuppy]

Excellent ideas, Mint, thanks!

 

Do you see this, Eric? This is Quality Tippery. If only you would apply yourself like The Minty One has here, then you too could earn my highly sought-after respect.

 

Highly. Sought. After. Oh, yes.

 

[StompBoxLover]

layering

instead of having to sounds hammering out notes simultaneously, lenghten the amp attack and/or filter attack of either one and see what happens. this way the two sounds stop fighting for predominance and work together.

also try to avoid overly long decay and release phases, since they will muddy the overall mix.

 

MIDI

take one of your standard bass lines and reverse it.

 

if you happen to have to comping-type parts, move one around in eigth note steps with the sequencer playing. your ears will know when you hit the sweet-spot. (also, try 16ths, triplets etc.)

 

distortion

use distortion on the output of the synth instead of distorting single voices. this will give you much more guitar-like intermodulations...

 

ringmodulators

don't use them! really, don't.

in fact rip them out of your synth/rack and send them to me!

 

advice

for every piece of advice given, try the opposite at least once.

(except for the ringmodulators. send.them.to.me.)

[Mintbeetle]

Not really a patch tip, but if you're using a mouse to enter notes, remember to mess around with velocity every now and then. It's easy to forget and end up with a whole lot of "127" notes that sound fake and make ears tired. Same with timing- move stuff off the grid a little. Put some instruments a little behind or in front of the beat. It can change the whole feel of a song.

 

Use velocity and keyboard scaling for things other than volume and filter cutoff. Pulsewidth, for example.

 

Load up a softsynth with a Random arpeggiator. Put a big chord through it. Now copy and create several more instances of the synth. Change the arpeggiator clock and the octave on some of the instances. Tweak filter and oscillator settings. You end up with ever-changing inversions and variations on the same chord. This sounds AWESOME.

 

 

 

I was hoping for more contributions to this thread. I guess people just want to talk about gear.

[kooki_sf]

bounce to tape.

 

figure out how to convert a midi note into a midi beat clock "start" command, so that sequencers can trigger themselves. any 16 step sequencer is instantly a n-step sequencer.

 

old romplers can be used like granular synths if you have access to the midi implementation.

 

if its not patched through a butt probe, your doing it wrong.

[ElectricPuppy]

if its not patched through a butt probe, your doing it wrong.

 

I sincerely hope you're talking about the Metasonix variety. Otherwise... I'm not sure I want to know the details.

[Awake77]

 

Load up a softsynth with a Random arpeggiator. Put a big chord through it. Now copy and create several more instances of the synth. Change the arpeggiator clock and the octave on some of the instances. Tweak filter and oscillator settings. You end up with ever-changing inversions and variations on the same chord. This sounds AWESOME.

 

 

That's a great tip!

 

One thing Im constantly experimenting with is creative ways to use compression...a constant challenge is trying to fit deep basslines and phat kicks together in the same mix, if you slap a compressor on the bass track and feed its side chain input with a send from the kick track, it will 'duck' the bass volume every time the kick hits.

 

You can really experiment with the threshold, ratio, attack, and release parameters of the compressor to create subtle changes in the dymanics between the kick drum and the bassline - from a simple volume drop to having the bass 'swoop' in right after the kick's attack transient...there's tons of possibilities.

 

Layering is a great technique as mentioned above - one way I like to implement it is to 'fit' the amp envelopes of the synths im layering together like a puzzle piece one sound has a faster attack and shorter delay, the othe rhas a slow attack and a longer sustain...add some subtle compression to glue the tones together and it can work pretty well.