Making gabber kicks and making them not take over your mix?

I’ve been dabbling in some Breakcore and as such I was listening to some tracks to get ideas. I heard some gabber kicks and I always wondered how people made those kicks and, more importantly, mixed them in without muddying up the mix. I understand that there are a ton of different tutorials online, but most of them use licensed software (a lot of ohmicide). I was wondering how you can emulate the kind of distortion within Renoise’s native fx and how to create the kicks using free software like Synth1. I’ve tried sidechaining and it’s worked but I still feel like the kick can take over the mix.

Any thoughts, links, or tricks?

I can’t say I’m an expert with the genre, but I’ve found that adding a cabinet effect to the distortion chain can take out some of the mid “bloat” that interferes with a mix. Here’s my go-to for a nice gabber style distortion:

Distortion:

Shape

100% Drive

-6db wet,

-2db dry,

Cabinet:

All Classic, Event-off Axis, Breakdown (some sound off, but most are fine)

10% Gain

40% wet

60% dry

works well with 909s and that sort of thing.

Tip: Use filters to remove sub frequencies from the off beat/tail of your kick

you got an example of one your tunes?

Use 909 kick, split it into sub part and the rest part. Leave the sub part as it is, distort the fuck out the rest part with distortion, cabinet simulator, add some EQ, do whatever you consider useful.

Hi 13^2,

creating a Kick drum usind no samples is quite simple using native Renoise tools.

1_ create an empty sample
2_ the effects chain: Dc Offset (value: more than 0) > RingMod (choose your wave form) > LFO (pointed to the RingMod frequency controller) > Velocity Tracker (which resets the LFO everytime you will trigger a note)
3_ Distortion/Reverb/Echo etc etc.

About mixing it with the rest of the tracks… you could create a dynamic volume behaviour…

Native Signal Follower > Hydra > track Mixer volumes

Basically is like creating a sort of dynamic volume machine that is going to attenuate the volume of the breaks only when the kick drum is playing.

Example: check the “Jonas the Plugexpert” tune in MB5 (http://www.trotch.com/mbc/)

Hope it helps.

Hey, first post!

Gabber kick:

Have a channel and bassdrum designated to each octave frequency in the key of your song with the kick tuned accordingly…

example: A minor, Kick is tuned

Channel 1 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 55Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 2 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 110Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 3 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 220Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 4 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 440Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 5 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 880Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 6 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 1760Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 7 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 3520Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Channel 8 - Kick - Filter and/or EQ 7040Hz - Distortion, Compression, Etc

Adjust and play around to taste. This may seem excessive but you can always remove and adjust later. Now you also know how to make techno.

Some distortion/compression glue on all channels would probably help unite everything into one sound.

1760Hz (or maybe another frequency) is often called the attack. It should be short or a click and no other frequencies should touch this frequency in the mix. It is very important for your kick to exist and your track to function.

Schranz/Hardtechno kicks are similar but with more emphasis on lower frequencies, compression, and reverb.

my main strategy is to use lofi down to 2-4bit to make the kick crunchy.

then add disto, eq, cabinet (experiment with the order in wich the dsps take place), render the sample and then use it to start all over until it’s what i want

sometimes i use a second layer to create some roaring or noise or whatever in the higher frequencies.

you can listen to lots of stuff i made (mainly speedcore) here

www.jealousy-speedcore.de

greetz Rob

Hi 13^2,

creating a Kick drum usind no samples is quite simple using native Renoise tools.

1_ create an empty sample
2_ the effects chain: Dc Offset (value: more than 0) > RingMod (choose your wave form) > LFO (pointed to the RingMod frequency controller) > Velocity Tracker (which resets the LFO everytime you will trigger a note)
3_ Distortion/Reverb/Echo etc etc.

About mixing it with the rest of the tracks… you could create a dynamic volume behaviour…

Native Signal Follower > Hydra > track Mixer volumes

Basically is like creating a sort of dynamic volume machine that is going to attenuate the volume of the breaks only when the kick drum is playing.

Example: check the “Jonas the Plugexpert” tune in MB5 (http://www.trotch.com/mbc/)

Hope it helps.

Will try this when i get home.

you should ckeck the list of tutorial i’v made about crossbreed and breakcore

https://satanicalbotsritual.wordpress.com/

a good kick is three part

a clean kick really short to click at the beginnning

a high distortion take anything put a pitch env AD and mess till it’ good (sometime multiple distortion is needed)

a sub part take a 808 kick and boost a 50 Hz

http://forum.renoise.com/index.php/files/file/605-hardcore-techno-kick/

Hi 13^2,

creating a Kick drum usind no samples is quite simple using native Renoise tools.

1_ create an empty sample
2_ the effects chain: Dc Offset (value: more than 0) > RingMod (choose your wave form) > LFO (pointed to the RingMod frequency controller) > Velocity Tracker (which resets the LFO everytime you will trigger a note)
3_ Distortion/Reverb/Echo etc etc.

About mixing it with the rest of the tracks… you could create a dynamic volume behaviour…

Native Signal Follower > Hydra > track Mixer volumes

Basically is like creating a sort of dynamic volume machine that is going to attenuate the volume of the breaks only when the kick drum is playing.

Example: check the “Jonas the Plugexpert” tune in MB5 (http://www.trotch.com/mbc/)

Hope it helps.

I would like to know this process in a bit more detail, all I get is some spacy sound that is not good as a basedrum :confused:

Ringmod stuff sounds like the old RM was used, the new 3.1 one has different frequency controls. But in 3.1 you have a ringmod filter to get sines from when you feed a dc sample into it.

Nonetheless I wouldn’t use the DC/ringmod trick for making kickdrums if they have to be tight, because you cannot control the phase. Just use sine (or whatever) samples and envelopes. Using the ringmod for synthesis is fun nerd stuff for idmish sounds without using samples, but if you want a hard hitting workhorse better resample and build from controlled fathoms to begin with.

I make a lot of bassdrums with just renoise, then I drink a cup of tea, then a second, and then I make some more bassdrums with just renoise. Using raw wavecycle, click and noise samples. Using a wavecylce (i.e. Sine_C1 for a start…) and the amp/pitch envelopes, then lots of lots of tuning until it knocks just right. Click goes filtered so it is centered around 1-3 khz, the tap made out of noise best lives in 4-6 khz and will make reverbs happy. You can also make a less-hitting bassdrum sample hit harder by adding a pitch envelope to it again.

Pitch envelope for knock/boom is delicate business. normally I sync 2 fader operators with target zero for the click, and multiply the first by the second to get a smoother curve. Then maybe some slower falling beyond zero for the kick tail to drop a bit in pitch after hitting the key. Up the pitch modulation range to 24 or 48 semitones for the attack, then you will maybe manage to make a knock with the faders operating at 0.3-0.7 to center pitch in like 60-250 ms, just play around.

View those as elements to layer (sub(, knock), click, tap), better not try to make the envelope also deliver the click/tap, because it will be hard to make it still knock in the upper bass and not turn into some lazer zap.

I don’t do gabber, but I imagine to get the distortion right and not wash out shit, it would be a good idea to keep sub/knock dry, and distort a parallel copy of them like mad and highpass it to keep it out of the range of the dry sub/knock, and also EQ holes into it so other elements can live in those spaces.

Dj TerraByte

make a new instrument with an empty sample, the sample does not sound cause has nothing in it

go in the instrument editor in a new effects chain or the track effect chain directly

add the following effects:

Dc Offset (set “value”: more than 0) [this will create the volume for the RingMod wave form]

RingMod (choose a wave form)

LFO (pointed to the RingMod frequency controller) [this will modulate the pitch of the RingMod wave… if you choose custom, you can make is ramp from higher to very low tone creating so the peak of the kick]

Velocity Tracker (which resets the LFO everytime you will trigger a note) [this will reset the Pitch every time you trig a note]

Is a very mechanical way to make sounds… and yes, as suggested by OopslFly, is not really stable for real use…

Sample the result and use the sample as a new starting point is imo the way to go.

Dj TerraByte

make a new instrument with an empty sample, the sample does not sound cause has nothing in it

go in the instrument editor in a new effects chain or the track effect chain directly

add the following effects:

Dc Offset (set “value”: more than 0) [this will create the volume for the RingMod wave form]

RingMod (choose a wave form)

LFO (pointed to the RingMod frequency controller) [this will modulate the pitch of the RingMod wave… if you choose custom, you can make is ramp from higher to very low tone creating so the peak of the kick]

Velocity Tracker (which resets the LFO everytime you will trigger a note) [this will reset the Pitch every time you trig a note]

Is a very mechanical way to make sounds… and yes, as suggested by OopslFly, is not really stable for real use…

Sample the result and use the sample as a new starting point is imo the way to go.

Thanks, now i get it :slight_smile:

I’ve been using Renose distortion on my kicks a lot lately. Found it way easier to control by using a send channel. With that I eq out the bad parts on the send channel and everything meshes nicely.