Making massive, powerful, Truth/Distance style synths

[Maccaveli]

I was just listening to this Rinse podcast...

...and my mind was absolutely blown by the tune at 40:00. Trampa - Backup, according to Distance. That might be the biggest sounding synth I've ever heard. Other examples of what I'm after include Truth - The Emperor and Distance/Icicle - Exhale.

I'm using Reason 5, so I guess Thor would be the one to go with. Can anyone give me tips on making sounds that just create the impression of immense size and power?

[Sonika]

Have you seen distance's midrange and Reese tutorials?

[Fbac]

^this,

Plus in reason,, Combinators your friend

[Maccaveli]

I had a look at those tutorials, but I found it hard to translate it across to Reason. Like, each time he starts off with some Massive waveform that doesn't exist in Reason. Not that it would to be possible to achieve, but it just kinda puts you on the wrong foot through the whole tutorial. Not to mention he often says 'do this, this and this' without actually explaining what he's doing cos it's assumed people using Massive will be able to follow it easily.

[Sonika]

Fair enough, I could see how that would be tough to follow. On a sidenote, check out Icicle's masterclass if you havent already, he makes his reeses and midranges with the reason synths (I think Thor).

[Maccaveli]

Yeah I already checked that one, the track Digital Samurai on my Soundcloud was what I made immediately after. It's similar to what I'm after but not quite there. I'm mainly just lookin for techniques to take any given sound and make it sound really huge, beyond just slapping a shit-ton of reverb on it

[Cubicle]

It all has to do with some stereo spreading and delicate reverb. The movement's in the synths are pretty easy to follow with Distance's tutorial.
However, translating this to Reason is indeed a pain in the ass.

[Sonika]

Saturation, voices, and chorus are things that come to mind

[topmo3]

any1 got a link for the said distance tutorials? in need of propa massive tutorials, usually they're shite

[Fbac]

Have you tried combineing your synth (and effects) ,, then replicate the synth, connect up using spider audio splitter. maybe even have that go into the small mixer before the output then you could run diffrent versions into diffrent effects then back to the main out..


did that make sense? (if not il re-word >< ha)


also for this sound id proberly reach for the subtractor, but then ive got more experience with it over for so that may be why. but i remember the subtractor stacked well in combine patchs.

[cmgoodman1226]

Yeah I already checked that one, the track Digital Samurai on my Soundcloud was what I made immediately after. It's similar to what I'm after but not quite there. I'm mainly just lookin for techniques to take any given sound and make it sound really huge, beyond just slapping a shit-ton of reverb on it

Thor has some very very good wavetables that are quite similar to the ones that so many people use in massive-> mixed waves with the sine shaper on can provide some great midrange results. The key though is to have the sine shaper one (I usually set it on soft drive)-> REMEMBER to have the sine shaper on though, because a lot of the wavetables sound very frail and thin without it, and you would probably just pass on the sound in its natural form.

In regards to this sound. Sounds like a ton of wet reverb, defenitly some lofi distortion and the use of a bandpass to make give that biting movement. I don't much care for thor's bandpass but the solo filter's bandpass has a nice edge to it.

[idontreallygiveashit]

Have you seen distance's midrange and Reese tutorials?

Could someone link these?

[billybuxton]

Have you seen distance's midrange and Reese tutorials?

Could someone link these?

They are not hard to find

[Sharmaji]

reaktor

[Sonika]

^ those were the midrange ones

here's the one about sub bass:


and here's the one about pads: