Wednesday, 9 December 2009

Great Radio station for Dubstep music

http://www.dubstep.fm/

This is a great site for dubstep radio - hear new artists and old, for Free online.
You can also upload your own music if you've made any and it could be played on air.
Also has an IRC chat page so you can connect with other music makers.

Monday, 7 December 2009

Mixing Dubstep - Part 3

Low cut.

To increase headroom in your dubstep tracks, and get rid of ineffective and unwanted subsonic frequencies, apply a low cut around 20-30hz, if you don't have monitors that go that low then maybe leave it - you would not want to remove something you cant hear properly as you might take away something that you might want to have in.

Subtle shelfs.

Try to apply a gentle shelf EQ to get the smoothest boosts, another way is to use a wide parametric EQ. This will provide the most musical and dubstep like EQ boosts.

Killer dubstep tip: Multi band compression.

Aside from EQ you may want to experiment with multi-band compression for changing the timbre of you mix. For example you could compress the low end more to bring up its relative presence in the mix. This can have a cleaner result and means you could use less process, further enhancing your final output.

Boost it wide, cut it slim.

Generally speaking a smooth wide boost, coupled with surgical narrow cuts on problem frequencies will give the best overall result.

Go easy.

If you find your self adding more than around 5DB of EQ you will probably be better off to go back to the original dubstep mix and find the problem there. As a rule you should not need to be adding more than 4/5DB for your first 50 attempts. Only when you have a lot of experience should you consider using such a drastic measure.

Treble.

One common misconception is that the high end of a track is all above 12khz, however its actually much lower at around 2khz. One good power tip when learning about frequency ranges is to run a commercial finished dubstep track through a high pass filter, turn up your speakers and slowly move the fader down, letting through more low frequencies. This will show you were you start to hear the punch, knock, bass etc and build a easy picture in your head of what applies to what dubstep frequency range.

Careful with using multi band compression.

Although multi band compression can have a amazing and dramatic effect on a poorly balanced dubstep mix, it can also wreak havoc with a good dubstep mix. If you feel your final mix is well balanced then a single band mastering compressor is likely to have a better result.

Check out this dubstep site for tips and tricks. They also have a dubstep forum

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Simmon_Power

Sunday, 6 December 2009

How to mix dubstep. Part 2 of 5

Never go past 0 DB.

Carefully monitor every process to ensure the levels never creeps past 0DB, this tends to happen more when using heavy limiting in dubstep, but can also happen with aggressive EQ.

A/B Properly.

An easy mistake to make is to make poor judgments by A/B testing to quickly. For example, when applying compression the better setting might not sound so good initially because its not as loud. However once normalized its would be the superior setting. Also A/B test by quickly switching between two or three of your favorite dubstep tracks to see how those producers do things.

Get your dubstep studio as quiet as possible.

Although good dubstep monitoring equipment is essential, it can be wasted money if your room is not set up properly. Some quick and easy tips are to get silent fans in your computer, and invest in some acoustic tiles to dampen pre-delay and early reflections. Essentially your room will be acting like a reverb plug-in unless you add some kind of sound dampening. This can result in over, or under use of EQ.

Test, Test, Test against other dubstep tracks.

A good idea is to listen to your efforts on as many systems and spaces as possible and pay close attention to the results. Over time this will teach you how your mix translates over multiple systems, although to perfect can take more than a lifetime. This is why a mastering engineer is worth his weight in gold. Or printer ink (as thats more expensive than gold!).

Learn the frequencies.

This might sound obvious, but building a mental picture of the dubstep frequency range in your head will pay dividends in all areas of dubstep production. In my view it maybe the most important thing in getting you mix and mastering efforts right. Try and attach words to each area, like warmth (220-320), muddiness (340), knock (600-1k), clarity (4k-7.5k) etc.

Cut it out.

When mixing / mastering dubstep (forget sonic sculpting) its nearly always better to make a frequency cut, rather than a boost. This is because the human brain will deem a sound more natural sounding by using a cut because that is what happens in the real world, sounds are absorbed by different materials (like wood, and concrete) resulting in certain frequencies being removed. Therefore when boosting EQ the brain will not be as used to it as a frequency cut. A good trick if you do want to boost a frequency is to cut all the other frequencies apart from the one you want to boost and then turn the whole volume up. As a rule a 1DB boost is equivalent to a 3DB cut.

Saturday, 5 December 2009

How to mix dubstep. Part 1 of 5

1. Intro

Here I will show you how to mix a dubstep track in 12 easy steps.Obviously mixing is subjective, but following this guide will keep you your track on the right track. The thing about using samples and synth's is that no matter how well prepared the sound is, even if you sample it from a commercial dubstep record, as soon as you add it in with a new mix it will lose most of its good features. This is because fat sounds, in fat tracks sound that way they do due to the relationship they have with each other, and they way they were processed (compressed etc) with each other - Not necessarily because they are individually amazing sounds. This is why learning how to mix dubstep correctly will make the difference between getting to the top, and staying at home in your bedroom. The best tip I can give is, listen, then listen some more. The devil is in the detail.

Learning these tips should take around 5-10 mix downs to grasp the basics, I can usually mix down a track to release quality in 3 hours after doing about 100 mix downs. These tips are very effective.

2. Dubstep Frequency Range

These frequency ranges should help you add or subtract the correct EQ, beware, adding a certain element to all sounds will give poor results eg, bite. You can use the frequency map included to great effect.

Dubstep Sub bass: 20hz - 100hz. Prominent frequency 30hz.

Top bass: 44khz - 20khz - Prominent frequency 220hz

808 Kick Drum: 20 Hz - 4khz - Prominent frequency 60hz.

909 Kick Drum: 40hz - 7.5khz - Prominent frequency 110hz

D&B Kick Drum: 120hz - 7.5khz - Prominent frequency 150hz

Crash: 500hz - 20khz Prominent Frequency 2khz

Congas: 120hz - 7.5khz - Prominent frequency 500hz

Claps: 2khz - 16khz - Prominent frequency 6khz

Pads: 110hz - 20khz - Prominent frequency 800hz

Rising FX: 20hz - 20khz - Prominent frequency 1.7khz

Stabs: 500hz - 10khz - Prominent Frequency 3.5khz

You can use the above to give each part to your dubstep mix its own space. This enables the listener to hear each sound clearly with out it sounding muddled. Use careful EQ to create a space for each part, you can either do this by cutting the frequencies of other instruments around the sound you are trying to give space to (the most effective way) or boosting the frequencies of the part in question. Using frequency cuts is best because the human brain will deem a sound more natural sounding by using a cut. This is because of what happens in the real world, sounds are absorbed by different materials (like wood, and concrete) resulting in certain frequencies being removed. Therefore when boosting EQ the brain will not be used to it as it, were as a cut will sound perfectly expectable. A good trick if you don't want to boost a frequency, is to cut all the other frequencies apart from the one you want to boost and then turn the whole volume up. As a rule a 1DB boost is equivalent to a 3DB cut.

Here are the frequency ranges and there associated attributes, boosting / cutting EQ to a part in these frequencies will enhance or diminish the attribute:

Weight: - 20hz - 150hz

Warmth: 220hz - 380hz

Muddiness: 250hz - 400hz

Knock / Punch: 600hz - 1khz

Definition / Bite: 1khz - 2khz

Clarity: 4khz - 7.5khz

Air and Sparkle: 7.5khz - 20khz

If the above is not familiar with you take a few days to learn this by putting it in to practice. Get a dubstep mix you have done, but are not happy with and try and get every thing separated so each part can be heared clearly.

Power Tip: Don't go mad with EQ, use volume first, then if you have to use a EQ, cut of around 2/6db, if finally you need to boost never go over 6db of boost until you have done at least 100 mix downs and are very confident with EQ.

The main reason people go wrong is they see EQ as a 'sonic sculpting' tool. Which it can be, but in small amounts. Try and avoid this to start with. If you ever get a chance to see a professional engineers desk after a mix down, you will see there are lots of subtle cuts, and a few well placed boosts. Not drastic, huge boosts everywhere, like most people do when they start out, including me and probably everyone, ever! Always remember that if you cut one end of the frequency spectrum comparatively you are boosting the other end.

Power Tip: As a rule use gentle wide boosts to bring subtle attention to a part, and narrow surgical cuts to remove problem frequencies.

Friday, 4 December 2009

How to create dubstep using a Reese bass and oscillator. Benga, Skream and Rusko.

Dubstep, techno and drum and bass technicians will at some point want a heavy Reese bass for there new dance floor track. The Reese bass is the classic 'dirty bass' sound. From the deeper terrorist Reese to the intense alien girl Reese they all have one thing in common. The saw tooth wave.

Firstly, get a multi oscillator synth (ideally 3 or 4 oscillators) for example the native massive, ES2 by Logic or reasons maelstrom. You will want to set the first oscillator and all the other oscillators to the saw tooth wave form. There are many harmonic frequencies in the saw tooth, The normal waves ramps upward and then drops sharply. There are also sawtooth waves where the wave ramps down and then rises sharply. That kind of sawtooth wave is called a 'reverse sawtooth' or 'inverse sawtooth'. As signals, the two variations of the sawtooth sound the same until paired together.

After you have got your synth running with 3 oscillators, it's time to detune them by around +/- 25cents, this is very effective for drum and bass and dubstep. This gives the Reese a very dark edgy sound, rather than just a buzzy electro kind of sound.

Once you have got your detuned saw tooth, (this is essentially the basis of the Reese) - You can go ahead and start twisting and shaping the sound for your specific genre, dubstep or drum and bass. Here are some of the main parameters you can use:

ASDR on the filter
A interesting method to get a movement on the Reese bass is to add filtering triggered by an envelope, Reese bass patches are very sensitive to filters and utilizing a high pass filter you can get a very driven sounding lead, or use a low pass and get a very nice bass. try using about 20% of filter attack for dubstep and 30% for jungle.

Phaser
Because of the harmonic phases all ready occurring due to the multiple oscillation, adding a phase plug in can and does work very well. It's better to use a sparse amount of phase to subtly enhance the sound rather than extreme amounts

Flanger
The flange process can add a nice bit of subtle metallic rasp to the sound, this helps gives you a big bad dubstep sound.

Delay
The delay effect can make a Reese sound wicked! Pre drop delayed Reese bass can add a very tense build up.

Reverb
Again subtle uses of reverb can act very effectively on your sound, Guitar amp reverbs tend to work well with Reese bass and also come packed with distortion for extra bite.

Other effects that enhances your Reece include: Distortion, compression, LFO, unison and analogue knobs (like on the ES2 and massive) and auto filters work especially well with dubstep.

In summary, it is best to process your Reese line a lot for dubstep and drum and bass music production. It's a well used if not over used sound, so to make it stand out you will have to be creative with your sound programming skills - Filters act in the most effective way and reverb is king!

Thursday, 3 December 2009

How to make a good dubstep wobble, DJ, make music.

OK, so you want to make some big bad bass wobble for you next dubstep track. Ill be going over a few different ways to get that shake down sound, and let me tell you its not all about the LFO as you might think.

So the LFO is one way of getting a nice dubstep wobble bass but you can get a very similar and more stable effect by using the filter envelopes on your synth. How this works is simple, you get your starting sound (probably a 2 oscillator square wave, slightly detuned, low pass filter etc). Then you set one of your envelopes to trigger the filter cut off, setting the attack in time with the music. This means when you play a note it will start with the filter cut off in a low position and then quickly open the filter exactly like how an LFO would would work but you just get the first open 'woooow' sound rather than a repeating 'wooowoooowoooow' sound like with a LFO. When this method is played with a quick note pattern (short often notes) it sound very similar to an LFO.

The LFO. This control is probably the main source you will turn to when you want to get your speakers wobbling like a true dubstep champion. You have the following controls:

Rate: This sets how fast or slow the wobble will be. You can either opt for a synchronized setting or free settings were you set the timings by hand. There are many arguments for each, but ultimately its up to you. The most common rate for dubstep is the ¼ or 1/8 settings. A good way to get a wicked variation is to have 2 synths one with a ¼ setting and one with a 1/8 setting and having different rates played per key, so first and second note would be ¼ and the 3rd note a 1/8 setting. This just ruffles things up a bit and keep the track fresh.

Amp: This effectively sets the amount of LFO (Low Frequency Oscillator) used, a low setting will mean the cut off will travel less further up to fully open, and a max amp will mean the filter opens up all the way, and then all the way back to the initial position. The automation of this setting can bring plenty of nastiness and joy to a track.

Delay: The delay effect is the time before the LFO kicks in after the note is pressed. Can be used to create very interesting sounds combined with other effects.

Sync to note on: Essential this means the LFO will reset on every key press, if it's off then playing a different note will make the LFO continue oscillating at its current rate and the note change.

Advancing, you can combine the 2 effects having a filter envelope for the first part of the sound and then having the LFO triggered half a second later using the 'delay' setting on the LFO (if you have one). This gives a kind of stuttered leap in to each note, done right its sound very very rude indeed especially for dubstep production.

The main thing to remember when programming synths is subtle movements of each slider works 100% better than drastic switches from left to right. All the advanced subtleness of extreme sound creation lies in the finding of the sweet spots of each control. These are very rarely at either end so be gentle with the synth and you will be rewarded with unique and pleasing (or dis-pleasing if that's your preference) sounds and patches.

The kind of sounds that typically works best for a dubstep wobble are, square waves with distortion, triangle waves and saw tooth waves for nastier sounds. Sine waves can be used but often are not the main preference for dubstep productions.