Reason Tutorials

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.

Ok so many people have big collections of snare samples or even the Reason Drum Kit Refill so why bother creating a snare sound using a synthesizer?

Well for several reasons:

1. Its fun
2. Its educational. You need to know about using the noise oscillators and applying filter envelopes to them.
3. Ive always had a soft spot for Kraftwerk, Jean Michelle Jarre and early industrial stuff like Front 242, and they use analog snares all over the place.
4. The sound of an analog snare is unique and with a bit of tweaking you can definitely have a unique snare of your own.

Ok so first open an instance of Thor and click on the “show programmer” button.

Next set Oscillator 1 to be a noise oscillator and choose the “Colour” setting and turn the “Col” knob to maximum.

Now adjust filter 1 frequency to about 100 Hz and envelope (Env) to maximum and adjust the Filter Env Decay to about 2.3 seconds and finally Adjust Amp env decay to about 1 second and Amp Env Release to about 1 second.

Analog Snare with Thor Image01

You should now have a sound something like this.

Ok so not very impressive. But wait a minute now try layering another noise osc with similar settings but adjust the Color parameter slightly, when both oscs sound at the same time you should get something a little more interesting.

Now try playing with Osc 1 & 2 s Color settings, and the low pass filters Env and Vel Parameters to get varing styles of Snare. You can even try adding a third oscillator to add some static or playing with different Filter types.

Analog Snare with Thor Image02

Now you have the basics its time to experiment. Here are another few sounds made this way.