Reason Tutorials

Don’t get me wrong reason has always had good synths, the subtractor is still one of my favorite bass synths and the Malstrom is still fantastic for edgy goodness and doing evolving pads. The synths in reason were so good in fact that when Reason 4 was announced I kind of ignored Thor and was fixated on the arpeggiator and the ReGroove mixer (Which to be fair IS absolutely awesome).

Over time I’ve come to realize that this was a mistake. The Thor is a powerhouse, it can be subtle, solid, screechy and sometimes unpredictable in a good way. So in the spirit of “Don’t underestimate this beast like I did” I’ve decided to do a “Top 10″ style list of things I didn’t realize or think about when I first saw Thor. Hopefully some of this will be informative and useful to somebody.

1. Wavetable & Noise Oscillators - If you haven’t already, you really have to have to have a good play with these two oscillator types. The wavetable enables you to make such a vast array of sounds it’s almost incomprehensible. Everything from pianos and organs to twinkly bell like tones and deep dark pad noises. Meanwhile the noise osc is really useful for adding grit to synth tones and for doing analogue style drums (see the Analog Snare tutorial) the noise Osc can also be set to make various types of tuned noise which are really harmonically useful in pads and drones.

2. Internal LFO routing - The routing matrix. Well what can one say about this other than “IT’S AWESOME DOOD!!!”. There is such depth to what you can do with the routing matrix that it can sometimes get a bit confusing. The first thing I will say is look at routing the Thors LFOs to various parameters in a subtle way to help give you more evolving sounds. Take a slow “smooth sample and hold” style LFO and route it to a filter or an Osc Frequency pitch or Position setting and hear the results, instant sonic movement in your sound.

3. Routing midi note velocity to multiple things - Ok so we’ve all thought of the obvious routing of velocity to a final output stage low pass filter. The harder you hit a key the more top end is allowed through, the softer you hit the key the more just the bass end is let through. Thats all good stuff.

But what about routing the note velocity to LFO rate (which is in turn routed to delay amount or something else sonicaly interesting?), how about routing note velocity to a 2 filters at once one adding to the output and one taking away? Maybe add another velocity routing to one of the oscillators Position settings? You can be as subtle or extreme as you like with this. If you go far enough you can create patches where almost no two keypresses generate the same sound.

4. Routing Matrix “Scale” option - Ok so we have all these crazy routings set up, but we don’t want them to be in effect all the time or we want the option to apply differing amounts of a routing while we are playing with the patch. How do we do it? Simple use the “scale” option in the routing matrix. Essentially this allows you to specify how much of a set routing is controlled by something else. For example you can have an LFO which is routed to a filter, but if you only want this swishing filter movement to come into effect while the mod wheel is pushed up simply set the second “amount” = 100 and the “Scale” = Mod Wheel. Now the amount of LFOing filter you hear is controlled by how much you push up the Mod Wheel.

5. Filter Self Oscillation - For some quite wild and unpredictable results don’t be afraid to turn on the filter “self osc” button and push the filter resonance into the high 110s+ area, this can result in some wild and nasty screaming noises and odd bass end stuff but used in conjunction with a second band low pass or band pass filter (or even routing external audio, self oscillating breakbeats anyone?) this can generate some very usable but odd stuff.

6. Global Envelope - Ok so it sits there all alone and looks a bit “What is this for?”. Trust me start experimenting with routing the global envelope with various settings to unusual parameters (You know something other than amp or filter) and you may well be surprised at the results.

7. Audio Ins for manipulating audio signals - There are 4 audio in on the back panel of Thor these can be routed to filters and messed with by all the internals of mots parts of the signal chain. Try routing a breakbeat through some LFOed filters and the Shaper and see what you get.

8. Audio Ins Used as a controller in the modulation matrix - You can also route audio signals to things other than filters. You can have the level of audio example routed to an LFO speed or the shaper gain etc. This is wide open for experimentation.

9. Back Panel CV ins & outs - If audio in wasn’t enough there are also 4 CV ins and 4 CV outs to allow Thor to interact with any other device you so choose. Fancy sending the audio level of a signal you are routing through a filter in the Thor out to the arpeggiator speed on an RPG-8 arpeggiator? No problem the Thors CV outs allow you to do this kind of complex routing with ease.

10. The Step Sequencer - To be honest there is so much you can do with this seemingly simple step sequencer that it could fill several extensive tutorials by itself. You can do everything from letting each key press trigger a mini arpeggio to creating some very odd filter and other effects routings with the Step Sequencer. Also remember that you can not just trigger things with the Step Sequencer but you can use other devices to trigger it using the back panel CVs.

I’ve found that one of the lesser understood bits of production and mixing in general is the whole issue of compression. What it does, when to use it, when to leave it alone. In this short tutorial I’ll cover the basics of what each of the parameters of the MClass compressor in reason do and give some examples of settings for different types of compression.

In actuality there are 3 devices in reason which can be used for compression/limiting the MClass Compressor the COMP-01 compressor and the MClass Maximiser. In this tutorial we’ll be using the MClass Compressor as its the most versatile and most generally useful of the 3. It can be used for a wide variety of effects from subtle loudness increases to hard and unnatural sounding side chain pumping effects.

Parameters of the MClass Compressor and what they do

First a quick explanation of what each of the front panel controls actually do.

Input gain: A +/-12dB input level adjuster.

Threshold: Sets the level at which compression will actually start to occur. When the loudness of a signal is below the threshold level then the signal is left unaffected. Any signal above the threshold level is pulled down by an amount determined by the compression ratio. What this tends to mean in reality is that the lower the threshold is set the more obvious the compression will be.

Ratio: This control sets the amount of compression to be applied to the signal above the threshold level it can be set form 1:1 (no effect at all) to infinity:1. For example with a 4:1 compression ratio, if the input increases by 8dB, the output increases by only 2dB. Most practical day to day uses set this somewhere between 2:1 and 10:1

Soft Knee: When engaged this make the compression effcet come in more subtly and thus makes the effect more natural. This is of course not always what you want in modern dance styles or electronica.

Sidechain Solo: Allows you to hear an isolated version of the signal being input through the back panel side chain input.

Attack: Determines how quickly the compression effect is applied to a signal that goes over the threshold. A low value makes the effect come in quickly, a higher value brings the effcet in more slowly. This is useful for stopping the compressor from quietening the hard front edge of snares, high hats, etc.

Release: This determines how long compression is left applied after a signal drops down below the threshold. Lower settings will tend to sound less natural and “Pump” more. Higher settings tend to be used for more natural sounding compression.

Adapt Release: When set this automatically increases the length of the compressors release time for signals with longer peaks.

Output Gain: This is a final make up gain control to allow the final compressed signal to be made up to a level that will fit with the rest of the mix if compression has significantly lowered the overall level of a signal.

General Settings for Drums

You have to listen to how aggressive the initial transient (or click/impact) at the start of the drum hit is and then lower its volume to be closer to the rest of the drum hits volume level. The more aggressive the initial hit the more less time you should give it before bringing in the compressor. Essentially you want to lower the initial impact which is much heavier than the rest of the hit and then use the make up gain to make the overall level of the drum sound louder throughout the drum hit.

Kick - Ratio: 3:1 Attack: 4ms, Release: 45ms. Soft Knee off. Adjust input gain, Threshold level and output gain to suit.

Snare - Ratio: 4:1 Attack: 4ms or less dependant on how aggressive the initial hit of the original sound is, Release: 45ms. Soft Knee off. Adjust input gain, Threshold level and output gain to suit.

General Settings for Other sounds

Vocals - Ratio: From 3:1 to 8:1 dependant on loudness, Attack: 50ms, Release: 100ms, Soft Knee On. Adjust input gain, Threshold level and output gain to suit. This is simply to take the top peaks off the vocal track so the vocals overall level can be mixed up without clipping and so sit nice and up front in the mix.

Acoustic Guitar - Ratio: 5:1 - 10:1, Attack: 5-10 ms Decay: 0.5secs. Soft Knee may be on or off dependant on playing style.

Electric Guitar - ratio 8:1 - 10:1, Attack: 5ms, Decay: 0.5 secs. Soft Knee off.

Bass - Ratio: 4:1 - 12:1, Attack: 1-10ms, Decay 05 secs. Soft Knee off.

Overall Mix Compression - Ratio: 2:1 - 6:1, Attack: 1-5ms, Decay 0.3-0.4 Seconds. Soft Knee on.

Sidechain Compression

Side chain compression is where an external signal is used to trigger the on off of the compressor rather than the threshold level. It is commonly used for House and Dance music “pumping” kick drum effects where the overall level of the general mix is pulled back while letting the Kick drum through at its normal level. We will this use in a future tutorial.

EQ before or after compression?

One question that is asked a lot is “should I EQ before or after compression”. The general consensus seems to be that you should EQ before compression in order to have a more predictable and controllable output volume of a sound in your mix. But (there’s always a but) this is not a written in stone hard rule. In some more experimental cases you can EQ after but the results tend to be less predictable.

Simple yet powerful the Subtractor synth has been a part of Propellerheads Reason since version 1. Its is a lovely little utility synth that manages to pack a hell of a lot of oomph in a very small front panel. I have found over the years that the Subtractor is very good for lead and Bass sounds and even now we have access to the Thor the Subtractors filter section still stands up as being better for “Squidgy” bass style sounds.

In fact there is quite a large amount to cover with the Subtractor so in this post I will just try to cover the basics of what each section does at a simple level without going into too much detail.

Oscillator Section
Ok so here is where we generate our initial sound which we will later shape with filters and so on. As you can see there are 3 oscillators 2 standard Oscs and a Noise Osc.

With the standard Oscs there are 32 different waveforms, these are detailed in depth in the reason manual. The main osc types I use to make 90% of my sounds are the first 4 though (Sawtooth, Square, Triangle and Sine).

Sine: The sine is the purest waveform with the simplest harmonics it works in a number of situations where a smooth type of sound is needed at high ranges it has organ like overtones and is useful at lower tones for adding bass end energy to a sound. For example it is often layered with a kick to give extra low end oomph.

Sawtooth: This waveform has a very rich and bright sound, full of harmonics and overtones. It is great for aggressive lead synth sounds and more modern bass sounds. The Sawtooth wave is the main component of trance and electro house style bass synths for example.

Square: The square wave has a quite “hollow” sound but is also heavy on harmonics. It can be used for hollow old school house bass type noises. It is quite useful in a number of different situations where the aggressiveness of a sawtooth is not needed.

Triangle: Much like the sine wave but with more harmonics, it can be used in similar situations to the sine but where the sine waves smoothness is not as required.

The other oscillator shapes are in fact combinations of the 4 above waveforms in varying degrees but the only way to get to grips with all of them is to experiment.

Just to the right of the wave selector for each oscillator we have the octave control, the use of this should be pretty self explanatory. Set to 2 or 3 for bass end noises and to 4 -6 for lead type sounds anything above 7 is usually not particularly useful for anything other than layering purposes (or upsetting the local dog populous)

Next is the semitone control, this is useful for producing patches that play to oscillators (when you have both turned on) at separate pitches. Generally it can be quite useful to set the two oscillators 3, 5 or 7 semitones apart from each other. experiment with this and see what you can find.

Now we are onto the controls I use in almost every Subtractor patch I make. The cent or tuning controls these are extremely useful for fattening up sounds by detuning one oscillator from the other by a small amount. Generally detune Osc 2 form Osc 1 by about 15-30 cents dependant on how pronounced an effect you want. This will help to make your basses fatter and your leads more piercing.

Finally we have the FM (or frequency modulation) and the Oscillator Mix controls. Frequency modulation is a form of synthesis where the timbre of a waveform is changed by modulating it with a another oscillator, this results in a more complex (and often harsher) sounding tone. FM makes for a less pur but often more interesting and/or harsher tone. The oscillator mix control quite simply sets how much of Osc1 is heard and how much of Osc 2 is heard. All the way to the left and you hear only Osc1, all the way to the right and its just Osc2 and so on.

You may have noticed that I left out the left most controls of the Oscillator section so far. This is because these are the Phase modulation offset synthesis controls and are actually quite complex compared to the other controls in this section. Essentially these controls allow you to generate a secondary waveform for each oscillator, off set that new waveform and then either multiply or subtract the secondary oscillator with the first.

Each Osc has a Phase Offset knob, which determines the amount of the offset and a mode selector (good band) which determines if it will be multiplied (x), subtracted (-) or ignored (0). Many oscillator sync effects and things like Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) can be achieved with judicious use of these controls. Though it may seem complex at first ignore these controls at your peril there’s synthesis gold in them there phase modulators.

Next up we have the noise generator section. These controls allow you to generate various colours of noise. Noise is generally useful in percussive patches and the noise osc is routed through the osc2 section of the mixer along with the main Osc2 signal. Decay sets the length of time the noise will sound for after a key is released and level sets the overall amplitude of the noise.

Finally we have the Keyboard track and the Ring Modulation switches. keyboard tracking should generally be left on for most patches only really being turned off for untuned percussive sounds. Turning on Ring Modulation multiplies Osc 1 with Osc 2 to produce sum and difference frequencies. Ring modulation creates complex and enharmonic often bell-like sounds.

Filter Section

In subtractive synthesis the charcateristics of the filter could be argues to be one of the most effceting aspects of a stnthesiser on its overall timbre. Im glad to say that the Subractor has a rather nice charcterful filter section which alows a lot of different styles of sound to be produced.

You have 5 different filter types to choose from in filter section 1.

• 24dB & 12dB Low Pass - The most commonly used filter in subtractive synthesis used for rolling off the the top end of a waveform to varying degrees.
• 12dB Bandpass - Allows a variable width band of frequencies in the middle range through.
• 12dB High Pass - Cuts out the bottom end of a sound and allows the high end frequencies through.
• Notch - Rejects a narrow band of frequencies in the mid range. Almost like the opposite of te band pass filter.

The Filter 1 Frequency controls determines the area of the audio spectrum that the filter will operate in. If for example a 12dB low pass filter is set to 0 then no audio signal at all will be let through. If the same filter is set to 127 then all frequencies will be allowed through.

The Filter 1 Resonance control determines different things for different types of filters. For LP or HP filters the resonance determines how much the area the filter frequency is set to will be emphasised. With Band Pass or Notch filters the resonance control determines the width of the passed or cut area of the frequency spectrum.

The keyboard filter track knob determines how much the filter 1 frequency is affected by which key on the keyboard is being pressed. A setting of 0 has no effcet and a setting of 127 has an obvious and pronounced effcet (assuming the filter is not set to completely open anyway).

The Filter 2 section controls a second Low Pass filter which is connected directly after filter 1 in the audio path. Filter 2 can be used to take off the top end of a signal or to accentuate whatever frequencies at a certain area of the audio spectrum are allowed through filter 1.

The filter link button creates a relative link between the filter frequency of filter 1 & 2. As filter 1s frequency is raised filter 2s frequency is also raised a similar amount.

Envelopes Section

The envelopes section of Subtractor is used to determine how various parameters (pitch, volume, filter, etc) will change over time. Its actually pretty simple but should be examined and understood fully before moving on if oscillators and filters determine a synthesisers character or sound the envelope settings give a synth patch its “Feel”.

Envelopes - General Parameters

Attack: This determines the amount of time an envelope will take to reach its peak form the initial key press. Set Attack to 0 and the envelope will hit its maximum value instantly, set it to 127 and it will take many tens of seconds.

Decay: Decay determines how quickly or slowly an envelope drops from its highest level once the attack has peaked. The lower the value the slower the envelope will decay.

Sustain: This sets the minimum value an envelope will attain over the period of decay. If Sustain is set to 127 then no decay will occur, if it is set to 0 then a complete decay to nothing will occur.

Release: This is much like the Decay parameter except that it determines how long it takes an envelope to decay to zero after the key has been released.

There are 3 envelope sections Mod, Filter and Amplitude (Amp), I’ll cover these in reverse order as that is generally accepted as their order of importance.

Amplitude Envelope

The Amp envelope determines how loud each note the subtractor makes is at each point in its life cycle. Generally piano or lead style patches have a low Attack and a medium amplitude release envelope, with varying decay and sustain settings. More pad or drone like sounds will have slower attacks and releases with slow decays.

Filter Envelope

The filter envelope controls the Filter 1 Frequency parameter, there is not much more to be said about it other than most simple instrument patches tend to have an Attack of 0 for this parameter but experimentation and looking at factory patches is in order to see what can be done with the filter envelope.

Filter Envelope Amount

This parameter determines to what degree the filter will be affected by the Filter Envelope. The more to the right this is turned the more obvious the effects of the filter envelope will be.

Mod Envelope

The mod envelope is an amount and destination assignable envelope which can be used to get more interesting sounding and advanced synth effects.

• Osc 1: Assigns the envelope to control the pitch of Osc 1.
• Osc 2: Assigns the envelope to control the pitch of Osc 2.
• Osc Mix: Assigns the Mod Envelope to control the Osc 1&2 mix parameter.
• FM: Assigns the Mod Envelope control the FM Amount parameter.
• Phase: Assigns the Mod Envelope control to the phase offset parameter for Osc 1 and 2.
• Freq 2: Assigns the Mod Envelope control to the Frequency parameter for Filter 2.

Low Frequency Oscillator (LFO) Section

The LFOs are a lot like Osc 1 & 2, in that they also generate a waveform and a frequency. But there are a few big differences. Firstly LFOs only generate waveforms with low frequencies and secondly the output of the LFOs are not in the audio range, they are Instead used for modulating synthesiser parameters. LFOs essentially provide a way to make a synth patch feel more live and give the sound more “Movement”.

LFO 1 Parameters

LFO 1 allows you to select the following waveforms for modulation

• Triangle: This is a smooth waveform, suitable for normal vibrato.
• Inverted Sawtooth: This produces a “ramp up” cycle. The LFO sweeps up to a set point, after which the cycle immediately restarts.
• Sawtooth: This produces a “ramp down” cycle, the same as above but inverted.
• Square: This produces cycles that abruptly changes between two values.
• Random: Produces random stepped modulation to the destination. Sometimes called “Sample & Hold”.
• Soft Random: As above, but with smooth modulation.

Available LFO 1 Destinations:

• Osc 1&2: Sets LFO 1 to control the pitch of Osc 1 & 2.
• Osc 2: As above but just for Osc 2.
• Filter Freq: Sets LFO 1 to control the filter frequency of Filter 1.
• FM: Sets LFO 1 to control the FM Amount parameter.
• Phase: Sets LFO 1 to control the Phase Offset parameter for Osc 1 & 2.
• Osc Mix: Sets LFO 1 to control the oscillator mix parameter.

Sync: Clicking this button activates/deactivates LFO synchronisation to song tempo.

Rate: Controls the LFOs frequency.

Amount: Determines the degree to which the elected parameter destination will be affected by LFO 1.

LFO 2 Parameters

LFO 2 is slightly different to LFO1 in so far as it is both polyphonic (a separate LFO is created for each key stroke) and it allows the modulation of a slightly different set of parameters. One further difference is that is always uses a sine wave as its modulation source.

Available LFO 2 Destinations:

• Osc 1&2: Sets LFO 2 to control the pitch of Osc 1 & 2.
• Phase: Sets LFO 2 to control the Phase Offset parameter for Osc 1 & 2.
• Filter Freq 2: Sets LFO 2 to control the filter frequency of Filter 2.
• Amp: Sets LFO 2 to modulate the overall volume useful for creating tremolo.

LFO 2 Delay: Sets an amount of time before the effects of LFO 2 kick in.

LFO keyboard tracking: If this is activated, LFO rate will increase the higher up on the keyboard you play.

Rate: Controls the LFOs frequency.

Amount: Determines the degree to which the elected parameter destination will be affected by LFO 2.

Velocity Section

The velocity section is quite self explanatory. It is a series of knobs that determine how much the pressure of each key stroke affects a number of different synth parameters.

The various velocity parameters parameters are :

• Amp: If a positive value is set, the volume will increase the harder you strike a key. The opposite is true for negative values. If set to 0 velocity has no effect on volume.
• FM: Positive values will increase the FM amount the harder you play. The opposite is true for negative values.
• M.Env: Velocity control for the Mod Envelope Amount parameter.
• Phase: Velocity control for the Phase Offset parameter.
• Freq 2: Velocity control for the Filter 2 Frequency parameter.
• F.Env: Velocity control for the Filter Envelope Amount parameter.
• F.Dec: Velocity control for the Filter Envelope Decay parameter. Positive values will increase the Decay time the harder you play. The opposite is true for negative values.
• Osc Mix: Positive values will increase the Osc 2 Mix amount the harder you play. The opposite is true for negative values.
• A.Attack: Positive values will increase the Attack time the harder you play. The opposite is true for negative values.

“Play” section

This section allows you to load and save patches and sets various parameters that react to the keyboard pitch and modulation wheels.

Load & Save Controls: These allow for the loading, saving and stepping through of patches for the subtractor. Quite and advantage over many real analogue synths.

Pitch Bend and Modulation Wheels

Pitch Bend is used for “bending” notes on a keyboard much like bending the strings on a guitar. The Mod wheel can be used to apply various other modulations.

Pitch bend range: This determines the range of pitch bend available via the wheel this can be set up to 2 octaves.

Modulation Wheel: This can be set to control a number of different parameters at once.

The available Modulation wheel Parameters are:

• F. Freq: Sets the Mod Wheel to control the frequency parameter for Filter 1.
• F. Res: Sets the Mod Wheel to control the resonance parameter for Filter 1.
• LFO 1: Sets the Mod Wheel to control the LFO 1 amount parameter.
• Phase: Sets the Mod Wheel to control the Phase Offset parameter for Osc 1 & 2.
• FM: Sets the Mod Wheel to control the FM Amount parameter.

In each case positive amounts increase the amount of modulation when the mod wheel is pushed up and negative amounts have the opposite effect.

Legato: Legato works best with monophonic sounds. Set Polyphony to 1 and hold down one key and then press another key without releasing the last one. You will notice that the pitch changes but the envelopes do not start again.

Portamento: This determines the amount of time it takes for “glides” between the notes you play.

Retrig: The normal setting for polyphonic patches. Each new key press re-triggers the envelopes.

Polyphony: Determines the maximum number of notes a patch can play at once.

Low Bandwidth: This button can be used to conserve CPU power by taking the top end resolution off a sound. With modern CPUs this is extremely rarely worth doing.

External Modulation sources:

The Subtractor can accept the following MIDI extra modulation sources

• Aftertouch (Channel Pressure)
  
• Expression Pedal
  
• Breath Control

At any time one of these can be assigned to the following modulation destinations

• F. Freq: Filter 1 frequency parameter
• LFO 1: LFO 1Amount parameter
• Amp: Overall volume, would allow you to control a patches volume with a foot pedal for example.
• FM: FM Amount parameter

Rear Panel

Flipping the Subtractor around reveals a plethora of connection possibilities, most of which are CV/Gate related.

Audio Output: This is Subtractors main audio output.

Sequencer Control: The Sequencer Control CV and Gate inputs allow you to play the Subtractor from another CV/Gate device . The CV input controls the note pitch and the Gate input delivers note on/off/velocity.
Modulation Inputs: These inputs can control the following parameters:

• Oscillator Pitch (both Osc 1 & 2).
  
• Oscillator Phase Offset (both Osc 1 & 2).
  
• FM Amount
  
• Filter 1 Cutoff
  
• Filter 1 Res
  
• Amp Level
  
• Mod Wheel
  

Modulation Outputs: These can be used to voltage control other devices, or other parameters in the same Subtractor device. The Modulation Outputs are:

• Mod Envelope
  
• Filter Envelope
  
• LFO 1
  

Gate Inputs: These can receive a CV signal to trigger the following envelopes:

• Amp Envelope
  
• Filter Envelope
  
• Mod Envelope

Note that connecting to these inputs overrides the normal triggering of the envelopes.

CV Input “Trim” Controls: Another thing to note about all the CV inputs is the “Trim” control just to the left of each input. The trim controls allow you to determine the amount by which an external CV source can effect the subtractors internal modulation. The lower the trim control is set the less the effect of any CV input.

By SiKo

Since I like to start with a bass and a kick, here’s how I learned to do it.

Download the song file (You will need this)

Rack preparation
Between the Hardware interface and your (first) mixer place an MClass mastering unit (default one is fine for now).

To get the sound of a pumping and grooving bass/kick combination, I use the kick to duck the bass signal and the combination of the kick and the bass to duck the shadow mixer (leads, samples, ‘the rest’)

I made a combinator patch to set-up the mixers needed. Load this into a combinator:

The kick
I connected the kick to the small (line) mixer.

If you are wondering how I made the kick:

In this song I used a sample. (Found a bunch on forum.isratrance.com, check it out!). Also possible is to use a subtractor or maelstrom to create a kick. A lot of good patches are shipping in the PsyCrafter vol. 1 refill which is very nice if you need good leads, fx and synths for your (psychedelic trance) tracks.

In general it’s more efficient and maintainable to keep things in combinators, so here’s the kick combi:

and the back of the rack:

As you can see, I split the kick audio signal and route one copy into the vocoder’s carrier inputs and one copy of the signal into the modulator input. This allows me to EQ the sound, shift the sound and mix it (via dry/wet) with the original kick sound to get the sound I want. Also I changed the velocity amount (less) on the redrum so we get an equal powered kick no matter the velocity and in this case I changed the length of the sample because the kick sound had a funny sounding tail. (This is just an example emphasizing the modulation possibilities you have for modulating the sound =f the kick).

After comes another EQ to find the nice spot in the kick to emphasize.

The bass
Ok, on to the bass:

Again, you can use samples (The disco bass patch in the FSB is a nice one for psy basses or use subtractor, malstrom or thor.)

I use a malstrom bass from the aforementioned refill. Same tuning tricks apply: vocoder (shaping the sound) and in the case of a synth bass, I use a compressor as well. (Anyway a compressor on the bass is a nice idea, just listen, don’t just follow what I or others are saying J)

To get the machine going

With some smart midi notes (a lot of info to be found in the istratrance forums), it already starts to sound nice together with the kick

But we’re not done!

First of all, to complete the kick/bass combi sound, we want the bass to be ducked by the kick, in order to find that grooving/pumping sound.

Side chaining is the word and I made a combinator to hook up the kick and bass so that you can side chain compress the bass with the kick.

(Sometimes when your bass is velocity sensitive, and pencil/record smart notes, side chaining will not have the most dramatic effect … but it never hurts when done subtly).

The finishing touch

And now for final tuning and mixing: ReGroove!

On sequenced notes (and unfortunately not on matrix and arpeggiator generated notes) you can apply groove templates that alter

- timing (following the chosen template)

- velocity (idem)

- length of the midi notes (idem)

- relative position to the rigid grid

The ReGroove mixer can shuffle the notes as well!

Great on drums, but also on bass … give it a try, and check the .rns where I did just that.

I hope this was interesting to you. Since I don’t have a professional audio background, I might have made mistakes, misassumptions or whatever. So if you think you might add or correct to this post, please don’t hesitate!

Happy grooving, boom out,

SiKo

Everyone’s heard it, or a derivative of it and a lot of people love the sound of the classic “Reese” bass. The reese bass and derivatives thereof have been around for so long now that they are almost as much of a cliché as the 303 acid sound. Yet this doesn’t stop us loving that deep deep warp and wobble in our Drum & Bass and Electro house tracks.

In this tutorial I’ll show you a way to recreate a bass with very similar characteristics to the classic reese but with a bit of “wobble control” so you can vary the sound to your own liking.

First right click and create a Thor in the rack. Now create 3 Analogue Oscillators, Leave them all set to sawtooth. Now lower Osc 1 & 2 to octave 3 and Osc 3 to octave 2. detune the second oscillator by about +15 to 20 cents and detune Osc 3 by about -20 cents. Now Route Osc 1 & 2 to Filter 1 and Osc 3 to Filter 2.

Both Filter 1 & 2 should be set to Low Pass.

Filter 1s settings are Frequency = 380 or so, Res = 60, Env Amount = 35, Velocity Amount=90
Filter 2s settings are Frequency = 40 or so, Res = 0, Env Amount = 35, Velocity Amount=90

Set the shaper coming out of filter 1 on. Settings soft clip drive = 0.

Filter Envelope settings should be A=0, D=4.5, S=-7.6 dB, R= 3 ms.
Amp Envelope settings should be A=0, D=4.5, S=-7 dB, R= 2.3 s.

Finally set Polyphony to 1 and Keyboard mode to “Mono Legato”

This should sound something like this.

Now to add some basic “wobble” in to the sound. First set LFO 2 to about 1/2 way up (2.5 Hz or so) and leave waveform = sine.

Ok so here’s the clever bit. Go to the modulation matrix and set the following routings up

Source = LFO2, Amount =100, Destination = Filter 1 Freq, Amount 70, Scale = Rotary 2
Source = LFO2, Amount =100, Destination = Filter 2 Freq, Amount 80, Scale = Rotary 2
Source = Rotary 2, Amount = 55, Destination = LFO2

So now we have both Filters being influenced by the LFO2 output. But turning the Rotary 2 control not only influences the amount of modulation sent to the filters but also the speed of that oscillation. So now when you tweak rotary 2 you get an intensity and speed change to the wobble.

You’ll notice as an optional extra I’ve also routed the Rotary 1 output to the Shaper Drive so as to allow me to tweak distortion amount and also a negative amount to the Filter 3 frequency (A fully open low pass) to cut off the top end of the sound as it gets more distorted to make for a “smother” sound. Both of these final tweaks are optional extras and not actually needed to get a traditional “reese” sound.

Finally add a Comp 01 compressor (Settings: ratio = 100, Threshold = 25, Attack = 127, Release =25) to even out volume fluctuations and a MClass Equaliser set to “Low cut” to remove the less than 30Hz rumble .

You should have a noise something like this now.

Playing with the two rotaries during playback should afford you some interesting sounds, a few examples of which you can hear below.

One thing many beginners have problems with in reason is mixing. While mixing is a very deep subject and in fact many entire books have been written on the subject in this article we’ll attempt to cover the first of the fundamental aspects of mixing, EQ. What devices to use, how to use them and for what.

First of all in Reason there are 3 different devices used to EQ audio signals, and each one has a slightly different sound. Personally I use the devices in the following ways others methods may vary, the thing about EQ being its a very personal and everyone will have variations on how they do things.

M Class Equalizer - I use this for most of my EQ, it can be used for everything from subtle frequency boosts and cuts on single tracks to overall mix EQing. It also gets used a lot to cut the below 30Hz rumble from individual tracks. Sometimes the very low frequencies in a track cannot be heard but can be felt and can in actuality force a track to be quieter as you need to move the fader down to avoid distortion /clipping on the track.

PEQ-2 2 band Parametric EQ - Although this has been superseded by the M Class Equaliser I still think it has its uses, I feel it has a slightly different sound and “feel” to the M Class. I tend to use this for less subtle EQing and for “effect like” EQing, I also use it to do automated EQ to bring out individual sounds for small sections of a mix.

Finally the Reason Mixer EQ - These are pretty much unsubtle “Tone Controls” much like you would see on a stereo amplifier, the mixer EQ is not frequency or Q adjustable and so is really only for fairly brutal or “Quick and Dirty” sound sculpting. In general I would steer clear of using it in mixing as its pretty much impossible to use it for proper EQing. Lets hope this is changed in new versions of reason.

Ok so what is the purpose of EQ in mixing? Well ask 10 producers and you’ll get 10 different answers. The explanation I like best is “EQ is a way of sculpting sounds so they play nicely with each other in a mix”.

Many beginners with mixing think “I want this sound to be massively bassy and loud, Ill boost the low frequencies as much as I can!”. Unfortunately the world is not that simple, all you end up with is a muddy messy bass end that over powers other sounds in the mix and in actuality probably ends up making the track sound quieter as you have to lower it in the mix to get it to work.

No, to do effective EQing we have to look at where each instrument fits into the mix and EQ accordingly. Sometimes in fact you may find you will have to cut “Feature frequencies” of a sound in order to get it to sit with another part of your mix. I know this may sound overwhelming and perhaps a little counter intuitive but don’t worry about it, like I said EQ is an art form and it takes time to develop the sound you want.

One of the most useful things I’ve ever been told about EQ is “In mixing you should spend more time cutting frequencies when you EQ than you should boosting them”, this is solid practical advice and will definitely help improve your mixes no end. EQing out frequencies that clash with other instruments will help you fit things into the mix in a tighter way and will also help your mix feel louder and more powerful over all.

Practicalities - What frequencies do what?

General:
20 Hz and below - impossible to detect, remove as it only adds unnecessary energy to the total sound, thereby most probably holding down the overall volume of the track

60 Hz and below - sub bass (feel only)

80(-100) Hz - feel AND hear bass

100-120 Hz - the “club sound system punch” resides here

200 Hz and below - bottom

250 Hz - notch filter here can add thump to a kick drum

150-400 Hz - boxiness

200 Hz-1.5 KHz - punch, fatness, impact

800 Hz-4 KHz - edge, clarity, harshness, defines timbre

4500 Hz - exteremly tiring to the ears, add a slight notch here

5-7 KHz - de-essing is done here

4-9 KHz - brightness, presence, definition, sibilance, high frequency distortion

6-15 KHz - air and presence

9-15 KHz - adding will give sparkle, shimmer, bring out details - cutting will smooth out harshness and darken the mix

EQ Reference: Frequencies

50Hz
Boost: To thicken up bass drums and sub-bass parts.
Cut: Below this frequency on all vocal tracks. This should reduce the effect of any microphone ‘pops’.

70-100Hz
Boost: For bass lines and bass drums.
Cut: For vocals.

General: Be wary of boosting the bass of too many tracks. Low frequency sounds are particularly vulnerable to phase cancellation between sounds of similar frequency. This can result in a net ‘cut of the bass frequencies.

200-400Hz
Boost: To add warmth to vocals or to thicken a guitar sound.
Cut: To bring more clarity to vocals or to thin cymbals and higher frequency percussion.
Boost or Cut: to control the ‘woody’ sound of a snare.

400-800Hz
Boost: To add warmth to toms.
Boost or Cut: To control bass clarity, or to thicken or thin guitar sounds.
General: In can be worthwhile applying cut to some of the instruments in the mix to bring more clarity to the bass within the overall mix.

800Hz-1KHz
Boost: To thicken vocal tracks. At 1 KHz apply boost to add a knock to a bass drum.

1-3KHz
Boost: To make a piano more aggressive. Applying boost between 1KHz and 5KHz will also make guitars and basslines more cutting.
Cut: Apply cut between 2 KHz and 3KHz to smooth a harsh sounding vocal part.
General: This frequency range is often used to make instruments stand out in a mix.

3-6KHz
Boost: For a more ‘plucked’ sounding bass part. Apply boost at around 6KHz to add some definition to vocal parts and distorted guitars.
Cut: Apply cut at about 3KHz to remove the hard edge of piercing vocals. Apply cut between 5KHZ and 6KHz to dull down some parts in a mix.

6-10KHz
Boost: To sweeten vocals. The higher the frequency you boost the more ‘airy/breathy’ the result will be. Also boost to add definition to the sound of acoustic guitars or to add edge to synth sounds or strings or to enhance the sound of a variety of percussion sounds. For example boost this range to:
Bring out cymbals. Add ring to a snare. Add edge to a bass drum.

10-16KHz
Boost: To make vocals more ‘airy’ or for crisp cymbals and percussion. Also boost this frequency to add sparkle to pads, but only if the frequency is present in the original sound, otherwise you will just be adding hiss to the recording.

Individual Instruments, what frequencies do what.

Kicks:
60Hz with a Q of 1.4 — Add fullness to kicks.

5Khz with a Q of 2.8 — Adds attack to Kicks

bottom (60 - 80 Hz),

slap (4 kHz)

EQ - Cut below 80Hz to remove rumble
Boost between 80 -125 Hz for bass
Boost between 3 - 5kHz to get the slap

Processing - Compression 4:1/6:1 slow attack med release.

Reverb:Tight room reverb (0.1-0.2ms)

Snares:

200Hz - 250Hz with a Q of 1.4 — Adds wood to snares

3Khz with a Q of 1.4 — Adds attack to snare.

7Khz with a Q of 2.8 — Adds Sharpness to snares and percussion

fatness at 120-240Hz

boing at 400Hz

crispness at 5kHz

snap at 10kHz

fatness (240 Hz), crispness (5 kHz)

EQ - Boost above 2kHz for that crisp edge
Cut at 1kHz to get rid of the sharp peak
Boost at 125Hz for a full snare sound
Cut at 80Hz to remove rumble

Processing - Compression 4:1 slow attack med release.
Reverb: Tight room reverb (0.1-0.2ms)

Vocals

Fullness at 120 Hz, boominess at 200 - 240 Hz, presence at 5 kHz, sibilance at 7.5 - 10 kHz

General: Roll off below 60Hz using a High Pass Filter. This range is unlikely to contain anything useful, so you may as well reduce the noise the track contributes to the mix.

Treat Harsh Vocals: To soften vocals apply cut in a narrow bandwidth somewhere in the 2.5KHz to 4KHz range.

Get An Open Sound: Apply a gentle boost above 6KHz using a shelving filter.

Get Brightness, Not Harshness: Apply a gentle boost using a wide-band Bandpass Filter above 6KHz. Use the Sweep control to sweep the frequencies to get it right.

Get Smoothness: Apply some cut in a narrow band in the 1KHz to 2KHz range.

Bring Out The Bass: Apply some boost in a reasonably narrow band somewhere in the 200Hz to 600Hz range.

Radio Vocal Effect: Apply some cut at the High Frequencies, lots of boost about 1.5KHz and lots of cut below 700Hz.

Telephone Effect: Apply lots of compression pre EQ, and a little analogue distortion by turning up the input gain. Apply some cut at the High Frequencies, lots of boost about 1.5KHz and lots of cut below 700Hz.

Hats:
10Khz with a Q of 1.0 — Adds brightness to hats and cymbals

Hi Hat & Cymbals: sizzle (7.5 - 10 kHz), clank (200 Hz)

EQ - Boost above 5kHz for sharp sparkle

Cut at 1kHz to remove jangling

Processing - Compression use high ratio for high energy feel
Reverb: Looser than Bass n Snare allow the hats and especially the Rides to ring a little
Get Definition: Roll off everything below 600Hz using a High Pass Filter.
Get Sizzle: Apply boost at 10KHz using a Band Pass Filter. Adjust the bandwidth to get the sound right.
Treat Clangy Hats: Apply some cut between 1KHz and 4KHz.
Hi hats/cymbals - clank or gong sound at 200 Hz, shimmer at 7.5 kHz - 12 kHz

Toms:

Toms - attack (5 kHz), fullness (120 - 240 Hz)

rack toms - fullness at 240 Hz, attack at 5 kHz

floor toms - fullness at 80 - 120 Hz, attack at 5 kHz

Percussion:

conga/bongo - resonance at 200 - 240 Hz, slap at 5 kHz

Guitar:
Treat Unclear Vocals: Apply some cut to the guitar between 1KHz and 5KHz to bring the vocals to the front of the mix.
General: Apply a little boost between 100Hz and 250Hz and again between 10KHz and 12KHz.

fullness (240 Hz), bite (2.5 kHz), air / sizzle (8 kHz)

Acoustic Guitar:

Add Sparkle: Try some gentle boost at 10KHz using a Band Pass Filter with a medium bandwidth.

General: Try applying some mid-range cut to the rhythm section to make vocals and other instruments more clearly heard.

harshness / bite (2 kHz), boominess (120 - 200 Hz), cut (7 - 10 kHz)

Bass Guitar:

bottom (60 - 80 Hz), attack (700 - 1000 Hz), string noise (2.5 kHz)

Horns

fullness at 120 - 240 Hz, shrill at 5 - 7.5 kHz

Strings

fullness at 240 Hz, scratchiness at 7.5 - 10 kHz

In recent years there has been a resurgence in interest in old school, 8 Bit video game style sounds both in “chiptune” music and as another sound style in more general dance and indie music. In this reason tutorial I will show you how to emulate this style of sound using the Thor synth found in reason 4.

The 2 main elements we will be using to emulate the chiptune sound are

1. Very quick arpeggiation of note pitch
2. Subtle bit reduction/Clipping

Ok so firstly we will need a Thor, so right click on your rack and create one. Now choose an analogue style oscillator for Osc 1 and it to square wave. Now select a Low Pass Filter (24db Type 1) for Filter 1 setting the Frequency to about half way (850Hz or so) and the Resonance to zero. Now set the Envelope amount for the filter to about 100. The next thing we need to do is add some digital artefacts to the signal chain, we do this by turning the shaper on setting it to “Hard Clip” and setting the amount to about 20.

Set the following parameters on the Filter Envelope. A = 0, D = 4.3 seconds, S = -35 dB, R = 3.5 seconds. And then the following on the Amp Envelope. A = 0, D= 4.3seconds, S= -10 dB, R = 1 second.

We will be using LFO 1 and 2 to simulate arpeggiation in this patch so first set both LFO 1 & 2 to the Square wave waveform and the tempo rate to about half way (around 2.40 Hz), this may seem a bit slow but there is a reason for this which will become clear soon.

The next thing we will be doing will be using the modulation matrix to send both LFO1 & 2 to oscillator 1s pitch. We do this by setting the first modulation source = LFO 1, the amount to about 80% and the destination to Osc 1 Pitch. Now we set the second modulation source = LFO 2, the amount to about -50% and again set the destination to Osc 1 Pitch.

We now have something that sounds like this.

Not the 8 bit chiptune sound you are really after.

But wait a minute didn’t I say something earlier about speeding up the LFOs? Yes indeed we now need to do some more assignment in the modulation matrix. Ok so set the third modulation source = Modifiers, Rotary 1, the amount to 100% and the destination to LFO 1 rate, now set the fourth (and final for this patch) modulation source = Modifiers, Rotary 2, the amount to 100% and the destination to LFO 2 rate.

Now play with the two rotary controls on the Thor during playback and you should be able to get a plethora of different crazy 8 bit style sounds just by tweaking the two knobs. Here is an example of the final type of sound you should be getting.

Obviously you can experiment further with, extra oscillators, different Oscillator types, adding a Scream 4 set on “bit reduction” to the output of the Thor and so on but as always I like to leave a little something for you to play with. Go forth and experiment.

Here is the first reason tutorial that covers one of the very basic things that I always get surprised people are always asking about on various reason boards, how to record and edit device automation and specifically in this case how to record and edit effect device automation.

The first thing you have to understand is that if you are going to record automation for a device in reason then it must have a track to send the automation to. Most sound creation devices (EG: NN-XT, Subtractor, etc) automatically have a new track created and assigned to them when they are first created. This is not the case with effects devices such as the RV-7000 or the Scream 4.

With effects devices first right click on the rack and create the device then right click on whichever knob or button you wish to automate on the device itself and you should see one of the options available is “Edit Automation”. Click on this and a new track that will store automation will appear for the device. You should also notice that the knob being automated now has a green box around it to indicate that it is now assigned to an automation track.

Now to the recording of the automation. First click on the “record” button in the transport controls section, the sequencer should start to record as you would expect. Now start to twiddle the knob you have decided to record automation for and hey presto you will see a new clip box begin to appear in the sequencer track, this clip is where the automation is being stored. Once you have finished recording your automation simply press the stop button on the transport control (or alternately press the space bar).

Finally we can edit our recorded automation with the sequencer editing tools. Sometimes you will wish to make minor adjustments to your automation or perhaps even write the automation completely by hand. In this case you need to double click on the automation clip you have recorded.

Once inside the clip you will see a number of points in the clip. Any of these points can be moved using the selection Tool (The arrow), deleted using the eraser tool or new points can be drawn using the pencil tool.

You can now watch your devices knob move in prefect synchronization with your automation clip during playback.

One of the questions I see turn up on music boards all the time is “How do I get that acid house sound?” or “how do I make a 303 sound?”. So I thought I’d show you the basic settings I tend to use.

Firstly I still find that the Subtractor gives a more authentic “acid” sound than the Thor, even though the Thor has an 18db filter I find the actual sound of the Subtractor filter is better for emulating the 303.

Ok so firstly right click and create a Subtractor then click and create a matrix pattern sequencer to drive it.

Now the settings you need are as follows:

1. Firstly the 303 is a monosynth so set the Subtractors Portamento = 25, Polyphony = 1 and mode to “legato”
2. Set Osc 1 to a sawtooth waveform. Oct = 2, Osc Mix = 0 (IE: 100% set to Osc 1)
3. Set Filter 1 Frequency = 32, and Resonance = 55 on a 24 Db Low pass filter.
4. Set the Filter envelope to Attack = 0, Decay = 44, Sustain = 18, Release = 44.
5. Set the Amplitude Envelope to Attack = 10, Decay = 85, Sustain = 15, Release = 15.
6. Set the Filter frequency Mod wheel amount = 20 and the Filter Resonance Mod wheel amount = 100.

Now you should have something that looks like this

and sounds something like this (If you tweak the mod wheel during playback).

Ok so that’s pretty good but not as raucous or nasty as a lot of acid techno or hard house style tracks would use. So obviously the next step is to add a bit of distortion into the mix.

Simply drop a Scream 4 sound destruction unit in line with the Subtractor and set the distortion algorithm to “Tape” (The Tape is setting is good for making thing s sound a little more analogue and also adding loudness via a little bit of compression). Now set the Tape algorithms speed = 40 and compression = 64.

Your synth should now sound a little more like this.

One other setting you can play with to modify the type of 303 sound you get is the Amp envelope decay (for shorter and longer notes), this was one of the settings that tended to get tweaked on the original TB303.

One of my favourite styles of sounds for percussion is the IDM style glitches and buzzes you often hear in a lot of current electronica. There are many ways to make such sounds with VSTs that involve audio buffer manipulation various styles of bit reduction and distortion. Here’s a quick reason tutorial on how to emulate some of these effects.

Firstly find some sounds you would like to “glitch up”, I usually go for things like 909/analogue snares, and more metallic sounding hi hats and cymbals as a starting point.

Ok so method one involves getting a small bank of these sounds an messing with the playback parameters in the NN-XT sampler.

Load your sounds into the NN-XT and map them by selecting all the samples and using the “Automap zones chromatically” feature.

Now (making sure you still have all the samples selected change the playback mode to either FW-LOOP or FW-SUS and set the sample loop start for the samples to about 1-5% and loop end to another 1-2% longer.

You will find that sounds that have 1-2% section looping tend to sound like tuned buzz type noises and those that have even shorter loop times ( < 1% or so) tend to sound like clicks and glitches, all this relies on having suitable samples to start with of course. Anything with a strong impact at the sample start tends to work best.

Now grab individual samples and vary the loop lengths to make for more interesting variation in the sounds you get from this process. Unfortunately the loop start and end points in the NN-XT cannot be automated and so this technique is a little more limited than it would be otherwise (Say for example in Ableton Lives “Sampler”) but you can of course emulate changes in loop lengths on a single sample by copying the same sample to multiple zones and manipulating each zones loop length.

You can now play with amplitude envelope release times and filters to make the sounds less digital and harsh although in a lot of cases that hard digital edge is what people are after when using this technique.

One extra little tweak I find tends to add a little interest is selecting all the samples and setting the spread parameter to about 70% or so, this makes the stereo field a little more interesting.

Here are some example loops created using these techniques.