Dubstepforum.com

I am new to producing Dubstep and am trying to learn techniques to make a propper track. I made a poor demo of a song Soundcloud after following an online tutorial. I was told by a couple peeps who listened to it that I needed to use some sidechaining. I have sidechained my bass with a kick in house music, but when I sidechaned my bass with the kick in this demo track, it totally killed my bass line. Now I have a mid bass over top a sub bass and I sidechained them together. How do you properly sidechain bass in Dubstep? Would you only sidechain the sub bass maybe so you're mid bass can still go over top your kicks? I don't know...some input would be greatly appreciated. Oh and this track is total ween city, I know. My main focus was on trying to get the bass down.

what program are you using? or compressor etc? maybe i can give you some more applicable device if i know...

stupid of me. the basics are the same. sorry im in zombie mode at this point.

Your threshold is gonna effect how much of a cut there is on the sound when your kick hits. so if you adjust your threshold to say -40db, its going to cut out alot more than say a milder threshold of -15 dbs.

attack will adjust how quickly it ducks the sound out from the onset of the kick.
your release will effect how long it takes for the compression to end and bring back the signal of your bass.

for more subtle sidechaining, especially if you are just trying to get a punchy kick and duck some of the bass out, use a mild threshold so it doesnt kill your bass signal, a relatively quick attack and a quickISH release. 40-50 ms on the attack possibly and 70-150 on your release. these are just relative numbers, not set in stone. obviously your tune will call for different settings.
but dubstep is so bassline oriented in a lot of aspects i dont really recommend sidechaining. if you have to sidechain to get your kick audible, you are doing something wrong in the larger scheme of things, and id recommend learning how to fix the problem without sidechaining. but to each his own.

it sounds like to me you are adding sidechaining to create a very obvious sound effect, such as that found in electro.
Please, anybody here correct me if im wrong or misguided on any of this.

I am just using Reason 4.0 to get my chops down at the moment.

make sense? i can try to explain better if need be.

You make plenty of sense.

Split your kick/snare or whatever in 2 channels with the spider audio splitter, send one to your mixer and the other to the sidechain in of the mclass compressor of the sound you wanna sidechain . To do this hit tab to flip around the rack if u already dont know.

ahh so true haha the crucial step.

Sidechaining means less bass, don't do it. Use EQ properly instead.

Brisance wrote:Sidechaining means less bass, don't do it. Use EQ properly instead.

+1
I dont think i have ever side-chained my bass for technical reasons. I use it sometimes as a pumping effect
see this track here-
Soundcloud

Dear dear someone who gives a crap,

Do you even know what sidechaining IS? You guys are talking about ducking, that's just one of the many ways of using sidechaining. Practically, sidechaining means using parameters of one track to control another. It's an effect, not a must for specific genres of music. Use your ears, not a step-by-step instruction to make your tunes, man. You and your music are worth it. How tempting it might be, think for thyself. Try to understand WHAT you do, not HOW you do it and you'll learn WHEN and HOW to apply WHAT.

About ducking bass with kick; you're compressing the kick with the bassline without having the actual output of the kick, so the bassline is 'compressed' (ducked) everytime the kick hits in. Just ask yourself if you want that, nothing more.

Sorry guys, friday.. I need my fix..

1 Highpass your Kicks to 90
2 Lowpass your Bass to 90

(At this point it will already sound good)

3a Duplicate your Kick track.
3b Remove the HP from this one.

4 Wherever the bassline doesn't overlap a Kick, move that kick down to 3b.

Sorted.

Yeah sidechaining is only required if the frequencies interface.
You can eq bass out of your kick and notch ~100hz out of your bass and you should be sorted if muddiness is the issue.
If you have sub in your kick and you want that then I'd recommend a quick duck using bass frequencies of the kick as the modulation source

you could always split the frequency bands on the bass so nothing below 90 hz is ducked but when it drifts up into the 100 + territory it gets ducked

depnds on the sound i want

some 4/4 tracks in dubstep wud sound good side chained, half step would sound differnt with the kick sidechained so wud only be used if u want the bass to have a higher attack on the sub.
for this song u shud just eq the kick so it sits above the sub like every1 has said in here.