We all know that feeling when we’ve created a great beat .. so we play it for a while and refine it over the next few days and somehow the power of it just ebbs away, somehow it feels like the magic spark has died. The track has slipped through your fingers and it’s lost …
Before the advent of the DAW musicians recorded rough “Demo” versions of their songs using a cassette or four-track machine. A musician would record many different rough versions of each song and then pick out the best parts from all of them to re-record in a professional recording studio. The Demo was a staple of …
Sidechain compression is a topic most producers know: for example sidechaining a kick against a bass. However, you can sidechain for other effects too. How about an inline side-chained distortion on a kick’s reverb? These sidechain secrets help you create amazing unusual sounds. Get weird deep evolving sounds, kick drums, and self-sidechaining snares. Check it …
Disco or funk claps are a distinctive sound of a group of people in a studio. Think of the intro to Car Wash by Rose Royce and you’ll know that it’s a great dance floor motivator, a human percussive sound which is very different to the tight drum machine claps of house. Here’s how to …
Analog lead-synth sounds have an organic evocative and expressive quality which makes them great for creating emotive riffs. Here’s how to make an analog-style flute-synth lead in Ableton’s Operator! Here’s the sound we are going to make. The sound of an analog synth There are several key components to the sound of an analogue synth …
The MS20 makes excellent raw and dirty sounds including a unique rich analogue bass patch. Ableton’s Wavetable may not seem like the immediately obvious synth to recreate this fat sound but it’s actually perfect for it. So lets make one now. This is the sound we will be making and for fun I’ve made a …
Myth 1: Always cut EQ not boost The Myth: “boosting EQ adds noise” and “boosts with digital EQs sound terrible” and also “boosting adds phase distortion”. Why it’s wrong: This was the top tip 20 years ago from internet experts, but cutting and boosting are functionally the same in terms of sound, phase, and noise. …
An ambient evolving drone is a unique sound which can become a whole track, it can be used as a “sound-bed” supporting minimalist rhythms , or it can simply be a pleasant way to spend an afternoon. This is what we are going to be making. This sound is actually very simple, the source can …
Making Pads in Ableton for House House pads come in a lot of variations or flavours, here we show you how to cook up your own in Ableton so you always can create a unique pad, exactly suited to what’s needed in your tracks. Create lush pads from beginner to advanced with step by step …
Ableton Live has a lot of features and some of them are hidden or known to only a very few people. Here are five features you might not know about which will speed up your workflow and power-up your music creation. The hidden rack hierarchy view To navigate complex racks there is a hidden …
