Dark Techno Bass

[HaikoNahm]

A general note on all of the twaddle above: One does very well to remember what can happen in a span of 10 years.
It's year 2016 now. Tons of false information regarding and no properer know-how comes from the mid 90' up to the mid 00'

Steve posted that lovely video up there.

The "analog" die hard fans appears to be more and more like hifi and audiophile nerds to me these days. They swallow everything. Jazzcables and what not.



Very much so, it's obvious. And it have nothing to do with the point here. If a digital signaled behaved like an analog one I'd be very worried hehe.

Anyone fancy to take a wild guess and elaborate on which of these tracks are mostly done analog and out of the box, and which are not?

how about the solution?

[SFBM]

Jokes aside, maybe you should try going out of the box? Basslines can come from just about anything, the "dark techno bass" you hear in some tunes might just be a lowpassed sound of a burning car with some distortion on it. Working with synths can be a bore, you often get more interesting results from unexpected places.

Your question is pretty hard to answer thoroughly. If you're having problems with how your bass sits in your mix there's a ton of information on that to be found on this forum.

Do you mono your bass mate? It's all about the levels. If you want to make a song with a "big" bass you have to twerk it real good together with all the other elements.

1st thread for 2017:
"How do I get that lowpassed burning car reverb rumble sound?"

Might be onto a new genre there

[pimo]

I hope its ok if i post this here!?

I tried to make some rumbling techno bass for the first time yesterday with some direction from the various tips and info here on the forum, things quickly got out of control and i added some lowpassed toms on top and probibly messed up badly. Would still like some feedback or suggestions of any kind though

https://soundcloud.com/user-153824754-7 ... ng-testing

[kertikristof]

I hope its ok if i post this here!?

I tried to make some rumbling techno bass for the first time yesterday with some direction from the various tips and info here on the forum, things quickly got out of control and i added some lowpassed toms on top and probibly messed up badly. Would still like some feedback or suggestions of any kind though

https://soundcloud.com/user-153824754-7 ... ng-testing

I like it. I would work on the kick from here. The kick sounds like its out of someone's ass. You have to be careful while working on only two elements (kick, bass). Of course they are the backbone of a techno track, but they have to sound cool specially in your whole mix, not soloed. Back on the kick: It was a smart move, that you picked a "topkick", this way it's kind of clean, not badly rumbling.

From here, it's going to be interesting, what type of sounds will you pick, to build a whole track.

[Mattias]

how about the solution?

When enough people guess or someone goes with the right answer

[Constructs]

One vst I would recommend is KICK from nicky romero. Great for techno kicks, really easy to keep your kicks in tune and create interesting asdr patterns. Use a little bit of saturation, bring the output down and the drive up.

For starters, I would recommend getting your kick to -6 to -12db, just turn your speakers up if you want it to be loud. Mix around that and sidechain where appropriate. Reverb can sound cool on kicks but usually sounds muddy if you don't cut out the low on the sending signal.

As others have said there are tons of great ways to make kicks but this plugin is nice because it has presets you can inspect. Bazzism is another good one.

[quest]

Gotta try and be clear about the argument presented here...

Void is absolutely right about the reality that all audio inevitably winds up passed through a AD converter at least once, if not twice (twice in my workflow, once in tracking, once in mixing... standard HDD recording). Some tracks might stay as MIDI triggered until mix stage then they only get AD'ed once (more for mastering almost certainly)... but that's not the point.

One point I was trying to make last time this discussion came up was that if you put an analog waveform through an AD converter then DA converter, what you put in is not exactly what you get back out. It is altered, imperceivably to the ear, but not to the body. Proof is forthcoming!

But the point I was trying to make in this thread was different.

All I was trying to say here is that I feel a connection with an analogue synthesizer that's about halfway between the connection I feel with a high quality acoustic instrument (I'm a dedicated pianist) and that which I feel with a digital synthesizer. This doesn't really apply to all digital synths, maybe it's nostalgia but I feel some sort of stronger connection to retro digital synths like my Atari ST or Yamaha DX7, but nothing quite like with my analogue poly.

I can only deduce this is because there is something fundamentally different about the nuance of the waveform generated, maybe like with vinyl it is the "faults" in the signal, I don't know, but I'd wager that this is something to this significant enough that with a high enough precision/accuracy/resolution measurement instrument, used in a correctly formulated experiment, you could definitely prove that a generated waveform by an analogue instrument is not even close to the same as virtual analogue. And that this has a measurable effect on the subject.

But the right experiment is not A/Bing a trio of tracks as being ITB/OTB, although I would thirdly argue there are aesthetically pleasing improvements found when summing in analogue but that is neither here nor there, we are discussing differences between a raw analogue waveform and a digital VST emulating analogue.

The experiment you need is a bit trickier, you'd have to get into the kind of research I do, biofeedback research that measures the body's response to waveforms over an extended period of time. This is where I'd present evidence for my arguments.

When you jam around on an analogue, after awhile you get pulled in, you are getting entrained to the frequencies generated by the instrument, *better* than the same amount of time spent on a virtual analogue. This was my original point, the (theoretical) technical science behind why many of us might be more inspired by analogue instruments. Because we are being entrained our biological waveforms, (brainwaves, heartrate, muscle tension, skin resistance) to some ratio of the fundamental of what we are generating or experiencing played back from the instrument.

It's a really roundabound way of saying that the bassline generator on my anapoly inspires me more than alternatives, but you draw the argument out of me by way of routine ridicule I have to say is wholly unjustified.

[RealityControl]

Anyone fancy to take a wild guess and elaborate on which of these tracks are mostly done analog and out of the box, and which are not?

I'm going to go with;
1. ITB
2. OTB
3. OTB

Though I'm half expecting that your intention was to mislead me into that decision.

[rktic]

Anyone fancy to take a wild guess and elaborate on which of these tracks are mostly done analog and out of the box, and which are not?

[/quote]

No idea
Not giving a shit
Another great track.

[Mattias]

Ronny is closest to my prefered solution

[Lost to the Void]

Yeah my answer could only be, I like track blah, don't like track blah.
Could not give a fuck what it was made on, argument is so totally pointless now.
Great music has been made on shit from a bin, and on gold standard studio gear, all the rest is just audiophile bullshit.
Ooh do you connect to your instrument on a spiritual level?
Do you massage special oils on to the keys under moonlight?
Fuck off, get some tequila down ya neck and make some noise you cunt....

Jazz cables, will be my standard response to all this crap from now on.

[Huck Farper]

The first step to a good dark techno bass is turning off the lights.

[Lost to the Void]

Dark techno bass, not dark techno basement you fool!

[Mattias]

Yeah my answer could only be, I like track blah, don't like track blah.
Could not give a fuck what it was made on, argument is so totally pointless now.

That's more like it.

[Sensive]

The first step to a good dark techno bass is turning off the lights.

LoL

[Planar]

Ronny is closest to my prefered solution

Looks like this will remain a mystery until Quest invents his analog-o-tron analog detector. I can barely wait for the answer...

[quest]

The first step to a good dark techno bass is turning off the lights.

Dark techno bass, not dark techno basement you fool!

Nah, this is a good answer I say. If you want dark techno bass, as opposed to "dark" techno bass (that trying too hard sound you hear in a lot of the stuff trying to straddle techno with hardcore but achieving neither), you would do well to start listening to what actually unsettles you. By being in the dark for long enough, your brainwaves will dip out of the beta range and you will be more attuned to whether or not you're coming up with something genuinely dark or not. Great advice.

Void, I don't get you, on one hand you say you are into meditation etc., but here you ridicule the very same sort of thing. You're rather inconsistent. And now I don't believe you anymore.

Some of the rest of you, you are clearly just wingmen, and you are in over your heads. You're mixing up what I'm actually arguing about, with what I agree is a truly pointless argument about whether analogue or digital begets a better end result (yes, obviously neither, it depends on the inspiration, the talent, the tools and how well the individual can use them).

Let me try one last time.

According to ongoing biofeedback research, certain combinations of factors in wave sources yield larger (absolute) deltas in effect as measured by biofeedback sensors. One of said factors is analogue synthesis as opposed to digital synthesis.

These are experiments conducted over 30 minutes to 1 hour using drone pads, sequences and rhythms. There are many other wave sources involved, this is not the exclusive focus of the research.

I am more interested now in integrating haptic entrainment (synthesizing directly for SubPac and other haptic devices) and photic entrainment (colour and light intensity patterns beamed to each eye through closed eyelids). So designing better experiments for the analogue vs digital thing is not a priority for me right now. It's just something I noticed along the way. I will come back around to it in the optimization phase.

Anyway the great thing about empirical proof, is either you have it, or you don't.

[Planar]

Quest. I'm going to be blunt. No one really cares about the minutiae of some research you might be conducting or have read about, especially given how little bearing it has on actual real life music production; which your last post seems to imply you're aware of. I'm personally not finding this line of posting from you insightful, entertaining nor educating given how vague you always are about these concepts and in the context of it being a music production forum. If you want to discuss biofeedback research I suggest you create a topic for it in the general forum and see if anyone wants to discuss it with you.

what I'm actually arguing about

You're arguing about your own straw man you created in this thread due to being called out, and if you look carefully you'll see that no-one else is actively arguing with you. You should move on to more interesting topics or join in with Mattias and his silly game he's designed to wind up some posters

Some of the rest of you, you are clearly just wingmen, and you are in over your heads.

That's not nice.

[Lost to the Void]

Yeah I'm not sure what meditation has to do with it.
Whilst I meditate I do so under the steerage of the words of crowley "the aims of religion, the methods of science" and try to engage any mind practice eyes wide open, discarding as much woo as possible.

If you are referring to the dark techno basement comment well that was a joke.

As for your science. Well despite repeated calls for some full description of how the experiment was carried out or any results, all we have is here say. I do remember a long time ago you were a little more candid about what you actually did and it seemed to have flaws in the execution if I remember.
Either way it's merely hearsay at the moment.

Is it really relevant t here?
I don't think so.

Techno has always been about technology and producing unnatural results with it. The tired old analog debate simply has no place any more. We have long since moved through the hybrid phase and are now truly entering the acousmatic phase of the music.
At least the cutting edge is, the trendy set are walking backwards in to time making old sounding crap.

In the context of a production forum, whilst we may get shirty here when people try to take shortcuts and we tend to push people away from the bland and towards the more creative, the artistic.
I certainly don`t think I would ever be arrogant enough to tell someone they cannot make valid music because of what they are using.
It`s not helpful to anyone.

Knowing historically and seeing myself what great music can be made with, really, all it takes is the soul, the drive, and the creativity, and that`s all you need to express what is inside you. Fuck what you make it on, whether it`s a shitty old acoustic guitar with a cracked headstock, or a multi million pound studio, if you put the truth of your soul behind it, then it is valid, and the beauty lies in there.
Zooming in the the waveforms to the quantum level to hunt for some mythical fractalisation is just a pure waste of time.

And so, in terms of the OP, all he needs to something to generate bass sounds, analog, digital, electroacoustic, whatever.
Nothing is better, and whether or not he connects to that has more to do with his self and how he is than anything else.

Wingmen?
come on now, everyone here has their own voice, and we all disagree with each from time to time, there`s no club, I speak for myself. No need for name calling.

[SFBM]

The first step to a good dark techno bass is turning off the lights.

Hahahahaha I don't know why I find this so funny
Contains a grain of truth, maybe? lol