fullness and movement -not a complete noob, example provided

[djaeke]

Here's a song I did recently (not 100% dubstep...but I do dubstep too, and it's a pretty general question that applies to my dubstep stuff as well):

Soundcloud

I like it, yeah, but I feel like it's not really full enough. don't get me wrong, it's pretty full, possibly my biggest yet, but I want to take it a step further. so, based on that example, here's a few questions!

1. fullness. I want more of it. I hear tunes by guys like knife party, the guys on Never Say Die, porter robinson, and I heard basically a synth, drums, and...not a whole lot else. sometimes more than one synth yeah, but still. I know what you're gonna say already: white noise, layering. Well I want a little more specific direction. I've tried both those things, to moderate results (I especially feel like I did well on the white noise, but if you have any tips to further enhance it, that'd be coolcoolcool), and I just want some ideas, not for you to literally be like "HERE ARE SOME MAGIC SETTINGS". what are some things you tend to do, usually? how do you use the white noise? where might you filter it? how might you shape the envelope? what kind of stuff do you usually layer?

2. movement. specifically, the best ways to do it. I use massive, any even TINY direction in how to make your synths (especially big saw basses, as I am so fond of them) feel organic and have movement would be cool. and while we're on the topic, resampling. I know what it is, I haven't the slightest idea how to do it. looked through some topics on it, and I was utterly confused. I'm not a complete noob on most stuff, resampling, I AM CLUELESS.

3. background noise. I've been playing with the idea of background noise to make a track fuller, but where do I get that? I don't have the best mic, and I don't live in the best city to capture say, street ambience. I need some direction on how to go about with background noise. I know on (so many people will hate me for this) skrillex's levels remix and foty, he used audience noise from his concerts and put that behind it and I can tell it made a MAJOR DIFFERENCE. is there some way I could get a similar effect, not having access to that kind of sample material?

I use Massive and little bit of Z3ta+2 in Ableton Live. I like Ohmicide for distortion and dominion for saturation.

[ChadDub]

It's all in layering sounds to fill up the spectrum. It's just a bunch of lower volume sounds backing up your lead and drums.

[djaeke]

for example, what would you do? I get you have to fill up the spectrum but obviously filling the whole thing is bad, right? where should I try to fill it out?

(I'm assuming I'd just copy the bass, mess with it, then eq it down the the frequencies I wanna fill, I just wanna know what frequencies need fillin', generally)

[e-motion]

Finding the right sounds is also important. You may have some sounds with shit tons of modulation that sound pretty cool but they'll probably be hard to control and to make full because they vary so much. As Chad said above you can layer but if you're after the "full sound" you must choose the right sounds.

Some days ago I made a bass that fills up the whole frequency spectrum except for sub and highs (leaving space for high hats), making it a lot easy to mix and master (basically, you put a maximizer on the master and it sounds HUGE), BUT it is ultra static.

[ChadDub]

Nah the best thing to do is find instruments that naturally sit in that frequency range. Like for mids you could use a trumpet or a tuba or something, or a saw wave, etc. For highs you could use whistles or high pitched saw stabs or w/e etc.

Generally in dubstep you pretty much wanna fill the entire frequency spectrum. If you're making a hip hop beat that will eventually have a rapper on it, you wanna make room for vocals.

The most common mistake people make is in the mids. They either have too much and make it muddy or too little and make it weak. Just make sure you're in a balance with those mid frequencies.

[djaeke]

so, while layer/eqing is one thing to do (probably just for subtle stuff), the best thing to do is just have a synth layer for whatever frequency range I need to fill?

and how about reverb? I know some light reverb can put a little something-something on a track, but what do I put it on?

and I reaaaally would like an answer to my 3rd point (maybe I shoulda put it first )

[ChadDub]

You don't need background noise.

[drake89]

Nah the best thing to do is find instruments that naturally sit in that frequency range. Like for mids you could use... a tuba

[Bassf4ce]

I don't know much, but for your third point I would go search for some random samples (maybe something to fit the theme of your song) and just put them sporadically through out the song. I like this website http://www.freesound.org/browse/
but you can go to any website with a bunch of samples. you might find something you like .

[drake89]

and how about reverb? I know some light reverb can put a little something-something on a track, but what do I put it on?

and I reaaaally would like an answer to my 3rd point (maybe I shoulda put it first )

get a reverb plugin and make a setting that you like. I know ableton has some eq features and I turn most of them off, 500ms is a good starting point. 1sec reverb gives a pretty heavy dub sound.

put that on a master send track, crank amount knob 100%. then send everything to it 100%, that's what I do anyway and I like the results.

[ChadDub]

Nah the best thing to do is find instruments that naturally sit in that frequency range. Like for mids you could use... a tuba

Hey man, I used a Tuba for the mids on this:

Soundcloud

[nowaysj]

Nah the best thing to do is find instruments that naturally sit in that frequency range. Like for mids you could use... a tuba

Well, alternatively you could use a saw wave.

OP, you are asking good important questions. I honestly think you have a problem with your ear. Like not actually your ear, but the way you listen. Drop one of the songs you are referencing into your daw, and just try to recreate that song. This will give you a very intimate understanding of sound choices, volume, space, arrangement, techniques to control the flow, shit, everything you are asking about. Most importantly, you will get smacked in the face with the amount of detail and work goes into making you think that pro tracks are empty.

[Attila]

1. fullness. I want more of it. I hear tunes by guys like knife party, the guys on Never Say Die, porter robinson, and I heard basically a synth, drums, and...not a whole lot else. sometimes more than one synth yeah, but still. I know what you're gonna say already: white noise, layering. Well I want a little more specific direction. I've tried both those things, to moderate results (I especially feel like I did well on the white noise, but if you have any tips to further enhance it, that'd be coolcoolcool), and I just want some ideas, not for you to literally be like "HERE ARE SOME MAGIC SETTINGS". what are some things you tend to do, usually? how do you use the white noise? where might you filter it? how might you shape the envelope? what kind of stuff do you usually layer?

The first thing that stood out to me in your track are how weak the drums sound...the kick doesn't really have any impact. Actually the track on the whole just lacks punch. For white noise though I usually just use two samples, one for highs and one for mids. Then bandpass and compress to taste. For movement I widen it with a filter delay and then automate the width with a utility in Live. Especially for intros and such on electro tracks, I generally use a pretty aggressive sound with a lot of movement. Also, I always drag three reference tracks into the arrangement so I can constantly a/b and make sure everything's sounding good.

[didge]

@OP: There is more than enough going on in your track to make it full; your problem is you have *too* much, that is, too many frequencies clashing resulting in nothing sound particularly distinct. As was mentioned above, your drums aren't really saying a lot; try scooping the 150-400 content from your drums for a start, then slightly higher in your basses, just get rid of all the shit you don't need *then* go about making it louder and fuller.

[djaeke]

Thank you all for all the replies!

two things, though, one, how do you get punch? I thought I was doing pretty well with punch, I guess not. I've been using compressors on drums, ( including that track I think) but am I using it wrong? would an envelope shaper help?

second, any good links to resampling stuff? or is there a better way of getting bass movement I'm missing? keep in mind on that track most of the moving sounds are from the original track, my original basses tend to lack that something-something that keeps them moving. I hear pretty static sounds in, like, flux pavilion's stuff, for example, but it has...a little movement? I dunno, something that makes it not just this annoying buzz, you know?

I did come critical listening on some tracks I like and I'm definitely hearing some things I was missing. appreciate the feedback!

[sunny_b_uk]

combine the use of compression and distortion, that will help the most for every sound. id also say layering but not too much as it can get messy doing that.
tbh it all takes a while and its mostly tweaking and tweaking till you get a good clear sound
lately 1 thing i do is not rely too much on eqing (untill the end) i try to tweak my sounds so they sound clear without any EQ.
so when it comes to mixing down the sound is all good and will b way easier to fit in the mix.

[bodom418]

One of the ways in which I've been injecting some movement into my bass lines lately is - this is based on Massive, for wide application purposes - is to set one or two of your oscillators to either of the "Bend +, Bend +/-, etc. From there, I'll assign a slow LFO to the Intensity, which usually provides some movement which, I think, balances nicely between subtle and obnoxious, if you catch my drift.

as far as resampling, check out Ascian's tutorials on youtube. Brilliant stuff. Such as -http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keq0WT_p ... tpVetcjg0=

It's a lot to take in between the 4 parts, but well worth it.

Combine this with appropriate compression, and you should be a happy individual. Definitely feel where you're coming from; this has been my issue too lately

[Triphosphate]

Thank you all for all the replies!

two things, though, one, how do you get punch? I thought I was doing pretty well with punch, I guess not. I've been using compressors on drums, ( including that track I think) but am I using it wrong? would an envelope shaper help?

A lot of the time compressing your drums is going to take punch away... remember that a compressor flattens out transients in favor of a greater RMS... and in most cases "Punch" is a result of greater transients. You might want to increase the attack on your compressors so that the drum's initial impact is preserved or use Envelope shapers or Transient shapers, they are SUPER handy in maintaining a powerful impact for your drums. Or try both, run it through a transient shaper to boost the impact then compress to get some middle ground.

[djaeke]

Thank you guys! I'm loving the Ascian tutorials, glad you showed him to me. it's especially helpful since we use a lot of the same tools, no need to "translate" anything

[python453]

Nobody says you have to record street ambiance yourself,
Search up street noise at freesound.org, I'm sure they'll have something.
Not sure if that would solve the fullness problem though..