The Official Growl Bass Thread

[johnnyng]

8. Get better quick, or give up. 2013 is likely the end of the brostep sound and all the kids will probably go back to doing their drugs to new-hardstyle or shitmau5 or whatever the big promoters decide to put their weight behind.

2013 will be the year of brosteppish electro house. Just listen to this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... bLUY#t=88s

Isn't that 1000x more catchy than most of brostep tunes?

2012 was brostep/electro house. you are probably right in that it will continue through 2013. But the shelf life of it seems very limited because it isn't a niche. When you have a mass market for anything, it is a double edged sword, once those masses leave, its a wasteland again. Not judging brostep, some of it is very good, these are just musical trends and I feel a lot of kids get into production for the wrong reasons, and if chasing fame/success...lose a lot of valuable time when all the effort into learning and growing gets pissed in the wind during a trend change when the knowledge desired and acquired is mostly specific to that sound.

Sheeeit...we're getting off topic from this thread, my bad.

[mromgwtf]

My time gets spent at least TRYING to make tunes that will be timeless. I know sound design, wonky basses and craze are enjoyable the make, but when things become more about sound design than the actual music, its never a good sign for a scene.

Well, so I'm not the only one. Everytime I open up my daw, I just create some basses, growls, whatever, and then close it. I made some few shitty, never completed songs, they just SUCK. When I started trying to do those growl basses, I started doing series of Growl#.flp project files, now I have like 23 project files and my growls doesn't suck that much, huh? I should start making Song#.flp, so I would learn something about making songs, not basses.

[Eskimo]

My time gets spent at least TRYING to make tunes that will be timeless. I know sound design, wonky basses and craze are enjoyable the make, but when things become more about sound design than the actual music, its never a good sign for a scene.

Well, so I'm not the only one. Everytime I open up my daw, I just create some basses, growls, whatever, and then close it. I made some few shitty, never completed songs, they just SUCK. When I started trying to do those growl basses, I started doing series of Growl#.flp project files, now I have like 23 project files and my growls doesn't suck that much, huh? I should start making Song#.flp, so I would learn something about making songs, not basses.

Get some fresh air and record some ideas into your phone or something, then use the sounds you've made previously in the track! I suck at getting ideas while sitting at the pc but when i get away from it they just flow on!

[shim]

gj everyone. it took 38 pages for this thread to go to shit. its been fun. fuck you all. yolo Soundcloud

[neonmansion]

just to elaborate (if anyone cares). The bass sounds i posted were not resampled. ITs simply fm8 followed by ohmicide 4 filters and a redux. I then map that all to the macros and then automate all 8 knobs till it sounds cool. The thing about using multiple filters (for me anyway is using each one in a cool way)

for example if you do a quick swoop with the highpass it give the bass that wooshing chewy mouthy sound. factor in the distorting and the bit reduction and it sounds cool. No resampling neccessarily

[skerrick]

hmmm need to learn how to make growl bass. will traul through this feed later.. anyone got any vids or advice to post quickly in the meantime to get me started?

[PeriKardium]

Heya guys. So I made this growl like wobble I thought I'd share. Note that I haven't EQ'd off the low sub area, just incase you were going to listen to it with a subwoofer.

Soundcloud

I didn't do the normal "band rejects and notch filters" that everyone says to do - mostly because I really dont know how to ahaha. Instead I have a scream filter and ohmicide both being modulated.

ON THAT NOTE.... Say I wanted to make this more growly, specifically the later part of the clip where you hear the lower sound. Would I slap on an EQ, for example Fabfilters Q, and notch out certain a certain freq range, and then create a peak that sweeps up close to that notched region (either on one side or both)?

[skerrick]

Heya guys. So I made this growl like wobble I thought I'd share. Note that I haven't EQ'd off the low sub area, just incase you were going to listen to it with a subwoofer.

Soundcloud

I didn't do the normal "band rejects and notch filters" that everyone says to do - mostly because I really dont know how to ahaha. Instead I have a scream filter and ohmicide both being modulated.

ON THAT NOTE.... Say I wanted to make this more growly, specifically the later part of the clip where you hear the lower sound. Would I slap on an EQ, for example Fabfilters Q, and notch out certain a certain freq range, and then create a peak that sweeps up close to that notched region (either on one side or both)?

timestretch it. or pitch down. would be easiest options.

[mromgwtf]

I was giving some tips to some guy through soundcloud about making growls. There is some useful information so I can post it here.

Nope, I made it in fl studio.

Actually I realised it's one of my bad growls, I made better ones. Not sure what do you think, but huh, whatever.

All those growl sounds I hear are based on fm synthesis. Fm synthesis is obviously hard, you need to spend A LOT of time to get right sounds with fm synthesis, and you need to layer few synths at once to get a cool sound.

But, I found a trick in NI massive that gives you fm-like sound in seconds. Just try that:
Select some waveform. For example "arctic". Now the trick, the bend +/- mode. Switch from spectrum to bend+/- mode. Now move the intensity knob. It gives you damn fm sound!
Make a rich sound from 3 oscillators. You don't need to use bend+/- on every one of them. You can use for example 2 bend+/-, and one spectrum oscillator. Then the talking part: you have to assign ONE macro knob to a lot of parameters. So when you move that, you automate shitload of parameters which give you super vowel-like talking effect. The parameters you want to automate are obviously intensity knobs on bend +/- oscillators, and filter cutoffs. The trick to get a vowel sound, is to move the Ser.->Par. slider to the top, so the filters are running in series, I mean it's working like that:

INPUT -> FILTER 1 -> FILTER 2 -> OUTPUT

If you move the slider to the bottom, the filters will run in parallel, so it would works like this:

INPUT -|- FILTER1 ---> |
| FILTER 2 --->|
| --> OUTPUT

If you don't get it, the signal is being split into two signals, each one is being filtered out by ONE filter, and then those signals are being added together.

So let's get to the vowel part. My filter part is looking like this:
http://i.imgur.com/5B33o.png

I assigned macro 1 to the filters cutoff. When I move it, it starts to talk! .

Then, when you get your base, talking sound. You want to process it. Processing isn't hard. You want to add A LOT of distortion effects, but each one of those distortion effects has to be SUBTLE. Adding a lot of subtle plugins is way better than little heavy plugins. You can add some subtle phasers, flangers and that shit.

Hope I explained it right
MrOMGWTF.

[alexfsu]

@Sure_Fire, people have saif that some stuff in the track in my sig sounds like KTN growly stuff - want any info on them?

Yeah man that would be sick. If you could just give me the rough idea behind them (oscilators, filters distortion, effects etc.), I like toying around with things rather than actually building them to excactly like they are from in depth tutes and what not (been like that since my lego days )

From another thread where I posted:

There's 3 different basses in the main "verse".

All are reese-based.
>The first (at the drop) is a simple reese that was resampled in Harmor (see SeamlessR's tuts on YouTube) just to give it that phasy sound - basic stuff. I then used Kontakt to play the samples and used Kontakts phaser (this is what makes the talky sound. I think I used the screaming phaser preset). This is then routed to a mixer channel with Noveltech Character and iZotope Trash adding some grit.
>The second (plays a little riff between sections of the first bass) is more of a fat saw than a reese again it was resampled in Harmor (see SeamlessR's tuts on YouTube) to give it that phasy sound and again I used Kontakt to play the samples and used Kontakts phaser effect. This is then routed to a mixer channel with Noveltech Character and iZotope Trash with similar settings - I did try WOW on this but the formants actually ruined it.
>The third (more different than the others) is a Massive patch based on SAW I and SAW II with Deep Throat (set to bend +/-). The LFO then alters the WT-Pos of the Deep Throat wave pretty much from 0 to 100 and also alters a Bandreject filter. I also used Massives phaser on this and the sine shaper. This wasn't resampled - although I've now ended up resampling it for a more juicy sound. Now I can't exactly remember what effects I had on this because I've now changed them but I think it was just a very, very light bitcrusher and Noveltech Character - no distortion, the Massive patch was gritty enough.

Now if I'm honest all the patches are really simple, I've done no frequency splitting and I've done no EQ automation. But it sounds quite good to me atm.

To improve the sound each one is layered with an analogue sub patch and a saw bass. Both of these are EQ'd to sit under the reeses so from low to high: SUB¦SAW¦REESE.

The saws and reeses are bussed together with a comp to glue them.

That's about it, obviously there's other stuff (pads and swooshy noises that help fill stuff out).

Want any more details?

What's the purpose of layering your growl with a saw in addition to the subbass if your sound has all the necessary mids?

[blu2]

I made this in fl
I think I'm starting to get the hang of it
Soundcloud

[skerrick]

@blu2: man those sounds are sick, get some hectic beats behind that shit!!

[Augment]

Got some really basic growls in my entry for the seven lions remix contest.
Modulating wavetables, compressing the shit out of it and then eq automation.
http://play.beatport.com/contests/seven ... 77291fd488

[skerrick]

anyone with FL Studio can use poizone to thier advantage really really well. use the cutoff and reso in the MOD section.. turn the reso to full, make the cutoff at 0. make the kbtrk and veltrk (or whateverr they are) face each other (far right one in the mod section should be pointing left, the dial just to the left of it should be pointing all the way right). make a chorus of 4, turn on the delay and touch nothing except for turning the wet dial all the way to full, turn on pulse, saw, sine, osc, everything, make sure you set the smooth setting to full though, it can be found around the bottom right (just to the left of the arp section). play around.
BUT this is the important part. you hold down a bass note on your keys, and slowly (or quickly) raise the cutoff and then bring it back (FUCK i hope this makes sense, i can visualise it perfectly) and as youre raising and lowering the cutoff with these settings in effect, youll get a growl INCREDIBLY similar to this: http://soundcloud.com/perikardium/monster-wobble
hope i was of some help.
i used it all throughout this tune at varying intensities and you can hear it right at the start. - imagine it louder. and you can alway FM synthesize it a little more if you like..
Soundcloud

[blu2]

anyone with FL Studio can use poizone to thier advantage really really well. use the cutoff and reso in the MOD section.. turn the reso to full, make the cutoff at 0. make the kbtrk and veltrk (or whateverr they are) face each other (far right one in the mod section should be pointing left, the dial just to the left of it should be pointing all the way right). make a chorus of 4, turn on the delay and touch nothing except for turning the wet dial all the way to full, turn on pulse, saw, sine, osc, everything, make sure you set the smooth setting to full though, it can be found around the bottom right (just to the left of the arp section). play around.
BUT this is the important part. you hold down a bass note on your keys, and slowly (or quickly) raise the cutoff and then bring it back (FUCK i hope this makes sense, i can visualise it perfectly) and as youre raising and lowering the cutoff with these settings in effect, youll get a growl INCREDIBLY similar to this: http://soundcloud.com/perikardium/monster-wobble
hope i was of some help.
i used it all throughout this tune at varying intensities and you can hear it right at the start. - imagine it louder. and you can alway FM synthesize it a little more if you like..
Soundcloud

I prefer using sytrus. I think it's a lot more powerful than poizon. I've spent a lot of time using poizon and for me it works great for melodies n such. but with sytrus you can really just craft sexy noises perfectly. I know sytrus will be my friend for awhile

[skerrick]

yeah man i literally spent my entire lunch break watching sytrus tutorials! it looks kinda easy but we'll see when i get home, blaze up and have a crack.

[PeriKardium]

I was giving some tips to some guy through soundcloud about making growls. There is some useful information so I can post it here.

Nope, I made it in fl studio.

Actually I realised it's one of my bad growls, I made better ones. Not sure what do you think, but huh, whatever.

All those growl sounds I hear are based on fm synthesis. Fm synthesis is obviously hard, you need to spend A LOT of time to get right sounds with fm synthesis, and you need to layer few synths at once to get a cool sound.

But, I found a trick in NI massive that gives you fm-like sound in seconds. Just try that:
Select some waveform. For example "arctic". Now the trick, the bend +/- mode. Switch from spectrum to bend+/- mode. Now move the intensity knob. It gives you damn fm sound!
Make a rich sound from 3 oscillators. You don't need to use bend+/- on every one of them. You can use for example 2 bend+/-, and one spectrum oscillator. Then the talking part: you have to assign ONE macro knob to a lot of parameters. So when you move that, you automate shitload of parameters which give you super vowel-like talking effect. The parameters you want to automate are obviously intensity knobs on bend +/- oscillators, and filter cutoffs. The trick to get a vowel sound, is to move the Ser.->Par. slider to the top, so the filters are running in series, I mean it's working like that:

INPUT -> FILTER 1 -> FILTER 2 -> OUTPUT

If you move the slider to the bottom, the filters will run in parallel, so it would works like this:

INPUT -|- FILTER1 ---> |
| FILTER 2 --->|
| --> OUTPUT

If you don't get it, the signal is being split into two signals, each one is being filtered out by ONE filter, and then those signals are being added together.

So let's get to the vowel part. My filter part is looking like this:
http://i.imgur.com/5B33o.png

I assigned macro 1 to the filters cutoff. When I move it, it starts to talk! .

Then, when you get your base, talking sound. You want to process it. Processing isn't hard. You want to add A LOT of distortion effects, but each one of those distortion effects has to be SUBTLE. Adding a lot of subtle plugins is way better than little heavy plugins. You can add some subtle phasers, flangers and that shit.

Hope I explained it right
MrOMGWTF.

The Bend -/+ really does work well for growly sounds This is something I slapped together as I try to procrastinate Orgo Chem studying! It's only massive, and meself being new, probably sounds fairly basic and bleh. BUT it is a good starting ground IMO! I am sure with some added distortions and such I can give it more growl!

Soundcloud

The more I play around with these the more I understand what's doing what!

[Trichome]

you dont need shit tons of effects to make good growls. if the base sound is shit, its not like fx is going to be able to perfect it. ill make a growl without any fx and upload it soon

[PeriKardium]

you dont need shit tons of effects to make good growls. if the base sound is shit, its not like fx is going to be able to perfect it. ill make a growl without any fx and upload it soon

Wait so my base sound is shit?

[Electric_Head]

It's not a base sound.
It's not a bass sound either.

It's midrange.