Can anyone replicate this bass sound??

  • CLASH


    It's the 'Blue Monday pattern' bass sound from start and runs right through.



    I'm pretty new to sound design and so please bear with me on my terminology


    I've got close but I haven't quite managed the 'metalllic feel'


    I've used wavetable no 62 on two oscillators added ring mod and fm and tried velocity to open the filters does any one else have suggestions??


    Thanks you wonderful peeps ;)

  • Hi there steamy! The following will seem strange at first, but bear with me. Did you hear how the bass sounds like the word "chow" (American pronounciation... or maybe "ciao" in Italian)? Look at yourself in the mirror while you say the word "chow", and you will see that your mouth is closing. The same way, in the synth sound there is a low-pass filter closing. Now, don't laugh, but this is one of the ways I use to replicate sounds. First I try to mimic them with my mouth, then I try to see what mechanics I used vocally.


    So, just in case you don't know yet - you need to set up a slope in your filter envelope. You have two choices - either set your filter cutoff frequency to minimum, envelope attack to zero, a noticable decay, low sustain, short release, and set the filter cutoff frequency to follow the envelope with a positive amount - or - set your filter cutoff to maximum and use the rising slope of the attack, while keeping the rest of the envelope way up there, and then subtracting the envelope from the cutoff frequency using a negative amount. Keep the two filters linked.


    The basic oscillator for this sound is sawtooth I think. I think Vince Clarke used a vintage synth for this one.


    What you need to fine-tune with a careful listen to get the exact character of the sound:


    • Filter resonance - it will make the sound more vowely at first, then it will make it scream.
    • Filter poles - you can say that the more poles, the tighter the synth's mouth is... in SER6 mode you get 2 poles from only ther right filter, 4 poles from only the left filter, and 6 poles in the middle position.
    • Detune the second oscillator - no detune is nice but may be boring, too much detune sounds out of tune, but somwhere in the middle you get a nice buzz and the higher frequencies before the filter closes, sound richer.


    Hope this helped!

  • Thank you very much flabberbob I'm flabberghasted lol


    Your mouth/envelope trick is one I'll be deeply thinking about in future as I too try to replicate sounds with my mouth.


    I'll be giving your instructions a go later on tonight and I'll let you know how I get on.


    :thumbup: