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Hey, I'm sort of new around here but I've struck a mental block on a particular subject.

I've really got into Ambient Dubstep recently (Phaeleh mainly) but I have a question:

What sort of instruments/sounds/samples work well in an Ambient Dubstep track?

I mean Bongos tend to work well, and so do female vocals and white-noise-whooshes but I'm curious if there's any others anyone can name.

This could turn into an interesting discussion

-Jak

wooden instruments with lots of reverb/delay

I like to use a lot of natural sounds such as footsteps, people talking, dirt being pushed around etc..
I also like finding male vocals and making them sound female, then pitching them up, cutting them, and adding reverb to them.
It's all really about experimentation. Listen to some burial and try to point out every sample you hear.

I use lots of crackly vinyl sounds and field recordings if that helps I also use delay a lot I guess... I find that I never really use distortion either, lots of sine waves. Maybe that's just me though.

Whatever sample you've got, run a seperate instance of it through a heavy delay, then high pass the output. Bounce it out and layer it under the 'dry' sample.

FM synthesis. Read all about it.

I like the sound of adding samples of footsteps, I was thinking of starting a tune with a sample of rain beating down gently on a window, leading into a droning piano with some echo. What do people use for snare samples? I find that having a dry, snappy snare sounds a bit harsh amongst the low frequencies. I like the sound of claps or maybe a tap on the rim of the snare.

One thing you can do is time-stretch samples. You can take a lot of the snap out of a snare by stretching it out. This seems to be even more so the case with samples which are maybe not traditional trap kit material ... instead of a drum sample, maybe you've got some sort of hammer strike.

Industrial sounds are useful for this.

Rim shots with a fair bit of reverb sound good instead of using a snare

i know phaeleh uses a lot of guitar sounds. they're great for producing sort of soft, ambient melodies.

field recordings of basically anything can add atmosphere and depth to a song. i've heard that aphex twin, a master of ambiance, once set a microphone up in his house overnight and used many of the strange sounds that he recorded.

space is also an instrument, so it's not always about what you put in but what you leave out.

xstatic wrote:i know phaeleh uses a lot of guitar sounds. they're great for producing sort of soft, ambient melodies.

field recordings of basically anything can add atmosphere and depth to a song. i've heard that aphex twin, a master of ambiance, once set a microphone up in his house overnight and used many of the strange sounds that he recorded.

space is also an instrument, so it's not always about what you put in but what you leave out.

The Aphex Twin thing reminds me of a song I did that I felt needed a little air/ambiance, so I just hit record on my laptops mic and used that in the background. You can hear footsteps from upstairs, my drink bubbling, even a little sound from outside. It definitely gave the song a more live feel.

pretty much any sound, just put fuck loads of reverb on it

Fullmetaljak wrote:I like the sound of adding samples of footsteps, I was thinking of starting a tune with a sample of rain beating down gently on a window, leading into a droning piano with some echo. What do people use for snare samples? I find that having a dry, snappy snare sounds a bit harsh amongst the low frequencies. I like the sound of claps or maybe a tap on the rim of the snare.

recorded myself snapping a belt and then ran it through some heavy verb and whatnot. ended up with a nice atmospheric snare

I like finding tribal drumming samples and laying them behind my drums to give a more live drum feel

Lots of reversed things.

Lots of reversed reverbed things.

Dubtechnoey chords and stabs made from pads. Field recordings and time-stretched, pitched down things for atmos.

That's pretty much my staple, eg:

Soundcloud
edit: Soundcloud being a biatch, dunno why it won't embed

Happy to deconstruct any of the sounds in that ^ if anyone into this particular style would find that useful.

3rdeye wrote:Lots of reversed things.

Lots of reversed reverbed things.

Dubtechnoey chords and stabs made from pads. Field recordings and time-stretched, pitched down things for atmos.

That's pretty much my staple, eg:

Soundcloud
edit: Soundcloud being a biatch, dunno why it won't embed

Happy to deconstruct any of the sounds in that ^ if anyone into this particular style would find that useful.

Reversing stuff sounds awesome especially cymbals and gongs.

Also, I like the idea of just recording the room that you're producing in, would add a really nice ambience to the track (I especially like the slight hum that computers make)

Just wanna throw it out there, someone mentioned that snapping a belt makes a nice snare, thumping a wooden table or something can make a warm, muffled kick which can sound quite nice within a track. I personally prefer warm but punchy kicks but the option is there.

I wonder if someone can make a track which is entirely altered field recordings?

Fullmetaljak wrote:I wonder if someone can make a track which is entirely altered field recordings?

Have a look at xoxos' VSTs - http://www.xoxos.net/vst/vst.html

The 'nature' stuff and some of the physical models (like his 'virtual machine') are brilliant for creating random noises...

i need to buy a field recorder. although for now i have a recorder app on my iPhone that allows me to do just this..
now to use it! lunchtime soon..

stretch and pitch your sounds