sidechain FX...do you use em ?

spark240

I posted a track on Soundcloud and someone suggested I " low cut some bass from side signal"

What does this mean exactly?

Said track..

digitalscream

The simplest one is sidechaining compression. Basically, it means compressing a track using the signal from another track to control the compressor.

An example - compressing your bass track for each hit of the kick drum to stop the bass swamping it and the kick getting lost. Every time the kick is hit, it triggers the compressor to reduce the bass track's volume.

octatonic

No idea what that comment means- 'side signal' only really makes sense to me when using mid/side recording techniques which I doubt you have used.

Do they mean the bass in the extreme L & R channels?

It can be a problem when using synths that are hard panned- just use a high pass filter set around 60-80hz with 12db/octave.

Be careful with taking too much advice from comments- most people don't know what they are talking about and they frequently misuse terms.

I use side chain compression all the time- for instance if I want the kick drum to pop through I key the bass drum to the other bass information (bass guitar, low pitched guitars & synths) so that they are reduced by between 0.5 and 2db, which allows the kick drum to pop through.

Similar techniques for allowing the snare or vocal to pop through.

steamabacus

Don't listen to anybody's production advice unless you've heard their own productions.

spark240

Mmm.....I will investigste further,  am experimenting with the Kick/Bass comp thing ...

Thanks 

Teetonetal

digitalscream said:

The simplest one is sidechaining compression. Basically, it means compressing a track using the signal from another track to control the compressor.

An example - compressing your bass track for each hit of the kick drum to stop the bass swamping it and the kick getting lost. Every time the kick is hit, it triggers the compressor to reduce the bass track's volume.

This is really useful and very easy to do in Reaper, a lot harder in some other DAWs, it was something that was suggested to me when I asked for mix critiques. It just allows the Kick to POP out slightly.

I've also been told to use it as a ducking effect on the vocals, so you run all your mid frequency instruments to a mix bus, then use the vocal to trigger a compressor to reduce the level of this bus. Again, just allows the vocals to occupy a bit more space.

I think dance producers often get hi-hats to trigger a bass side chain too, so that the bass track pumps.

Cirrus

I use sidechain stuff on occasion, sometimes in slightly less common ways - on our last album for several tracks I used an expander on the drums room mic, positioned right at the back of the room and compressed quite heavily, which was triggered by the snare close mic. So every time the snare was hit, the room mic jumped up in volume roughly 2dB for around 200ms, just long enough to push some room ambience forward in the mix and make the kit sound more lively.

More often than not, for the stuff like kick/ bass guitar interaction I'll automate volumes by hand if necessary - but for the stuff I do the arrangments usually aren't busy enough, and the tones are complimentary enough, that using sidechain compression isn't something I think about because you can hear them both fine. For more modern styles and busier arrangements like Djent type stuff, I suspect it'd be almost mandatory.

Heartfeltdawn

Teetonetal said:

I think dance producers often get hi-hats to trigger a bass side chain too, so that the bass track pumps.

Or to make a track loaded with reverb pump. You end up with this lovely breathing effect depending on how you've set the compressor. 

Winny_Pooh

As stated using a kick input to drop volume on a bassline is used on many styles of music.

Sidechaining the whole mix or other elements is more of a dance music thing. Listen to Daft Punk's around the world.

sweepy

The biggest issue I found with experimenting with side chaining or indeed any multi track eq etc, was fatigue, if you are tweaking away for ages, your ears can get a little confused, be prepared to take a break, have a cuppa, grab some fresh air and then go back to it, stopped me going the wrong way, more than once .

PolarityMan

My most recent use was sidechaining a lead guitar part to a vocal so that when the singing was happening the lead guitar dropped in volume slightly but came to the front in the gap between vocal phrases.

Worked ok but tbh might have been jsut as quick automating it. 

spark240

I like this technique...I have been doing some volume automation but the sidechain idea could work better in some cases 

Drew_TNBD

I never use sidechains.

Grunfeld

Heartfeltdawn said:
Or to make a track loaded with reverb pump. You end up with this lovely breathing effect depending on how you've set the compressor. 

Oh I really dislike that effect! 

I get that it's distinctive and has its own particular sound but when I'm checking out new music as soon as I hear that effect I'll reach for the next track button.

Heartfeltdawn

Grunfeld said:

Oh I really dislike that effect! 

I get that it's distinctive and has its own particular sound but when I'm checking out new music as soon as I hear that effect I'll reach for the next track button.

It depends on how you use it. Make it too obvious and it sounds rubbish. Use it in more unusual ways and it has a place. 

wave100

I would guess he was referring to mid/side processing which apparently is gaining some popularity with people doing mastering, or perhaps he means rolling some bass off the side chain which means the compressor will respond less to bassy components (rather than triggering the sidechain from individual tracks as suggested above)

Nerine

Yeah. Plenty of divs that spout guff.

too much low information in the sides.. Jesus.

It can happen, but you've got to have a pretty weird mix for there to be too much bass in the sides and not enough up the middle lol.

I've read about mid side, but I really don't see the point in worrying about it when mixing.

If you can mix properly, mid/side processing isn't really that important IMO.

plus tracks usually have to be recorded using the M/S technique to fully exploit it.

You can use plugins to make the bass mono below a certain frequency. But sometimes I fail to see what the difference is between having it come out of two speakers rather two speakers.

You usually pan bass mono up the middle. That will still come from both speakers in a stereo pair.

My guess is that someone is using words that they don't really fully understand.

Plus, low end is omni-directional. It's difficult to discern its origin.

A simple hi-pass filter on some of your panned elements should probably suffice.

Don't get bogged down with shit that simply isn't important just because some pretentious twonk enjoys the technically accurate way to the musical way.

PLENTY of utter rubbish which is borne mostly of pretentiousness gets spouted so often on forums. Including here.

OMG I can't believe you didn't do mid side, or hi passed your kick drum, or tamed the sustain of your toms with a gate or parallel compressed your kit, or sidechained everything to everything else, or automated that vocal or whatever else some people spout is a necessity for a good mix. Lol.
WALOB.

It's entirely possible to make KILLER mixes with bog standard EQ and compression moves and a little bit of fader riding.

A mix is about good balance. Fancy processing and routing does sweet F all to an imbalanced mix. It won't miraculously fix it.

Mixing is about the small percentile increases. Like cooking. Taking something ordinary and creating the illusion that it's extraordinary.

It's about how everything fits together and how it's balanced.

It's not about mid side processing. So don't worry.





Although I'll be honest and say that I use techniques and routing far more advanced than the above. But only when it can't be solved with a simple balance adjustment in either the time or frequency domain or if I'm looking to do something fancy on purpose.

Unfortunately for most, the best tool to have when mixing, is experience and simply knowing what you are actually listening for and knowing how to balance correctly.

that's the crux of it. It's also the hardest bit to get right/learn.

Clarky

several FX in the Axe-FX can be side-chained..

one thing I found works quite well is to apply it to the delay.. so when you're having a bit of a shred, the delay ducks and keeps you tidy.. then as you play less the delay's wet level is allowed to get a little stronger..

the tricky part is getting the delay's ducked level right and the speed that it comes back in.. cos if you set it too strongly is can sound quite unnatural.. I know of some folk that like to do this.. for me personally though it didn't really hit the spot..

wayneirie

Nerine said:

Yeah. Plenty of divs that spout guff.

too much low information in the sides.. Jesus.

It can happen, but you've got to have a pretty weird mix for there to be too much bass in the sides and not enough up the middle lol.

I've read about mid side, but I really don't see the point in worrying about it when mixing.

If you can mix properly, mid/side processing isn't really that important IMO.

plus tracks usually have to be recorded using the M/S technique to fully exploit it.

You can use plugins to make the bass mono below a certain frequency. But sometimes I fail to see what the difference is between having it come out of two speakers rather two speakers.

You usually pan bass mono up the middle. That will still come from both speakers in a stereo pair.

My guess is that someone is using words that they don't really fully understand.

Plus, low end is omni-directional. It's difficult to discern its origin.

A simple hi-pass filter on some of your panned elements should probably suffice.

Don't get bogged down with shit that simply isn't important just because some pretentious twonk enjoys the technically accurate way to the musical way.

PLENTY of utter rubbish which is borne mostly of pretentiousness gets spouted so often on forums. Including here.

OMG I can't believe you didn't do mid side, or hi passed your kick drum, or tamed the sustain of your toms with a gate or parallel compressed your kit, or sidechained everything to everything else, or automated that vocal or whatever else some people spout is a necessity for a good mix. Lol.
WALOB.

It's entirely possible to make KILLER mixes with bog standard EQ and compression moves and a little bit of fader riding.

A mix is about good balance. Fancy processing and routing does sweet F all to an imbalanced mix. It won't miraculously fix it.

Mixing is about the small percentile increases. Like cooking. Taking something ordinary and creating the illusion that it's extraordinary.

It's about how everything fits together and how it's balanced.

It's not about mid side processing. So don't worry.





Although I'll be honest and say that I use techniques and routing far more advanced than the above. But only when it can't be solved with a simple balance adjustment in either the time or frequency domain or if I'm looking to do something fancy on purpose.

Unfortunately for most, the best tool to have when mixing, is experience and simply knowing what you are actually listening for and knowing how to balance correctly.

that's the crux of it. It's also the hardest bit to get right/learn.

Wis'd. Couldn't agree More.

guitarfishbay

Clarky;890955" said:

several FX in the Axe-FX can be side-chained..one thing I found works quite well is to apply it to the delay.. so when you're having a bit of a shred, the delay ducks and keeps you tidy.. then as you play less the delay's wet level is allowed to get a little stronger..the tricky part is getting the delay's ducked level right and the speed that it comes back in.. cos if you set it too strongly is can sound quite unnatural.. I know of some folk that like to do this.. for me personally though it didn't really hit the spot..

I thought there was a ducking delay model without needing to set up a side chain? Or is it ducking verb? Can't remember but I think there is

octatonic

guitarfishbay said:

Clarky;890955" said:

several FX in the Axe-FX can be side-chained..one thing I found works quite well is to apply it to the delay.. so when you're having a bit of a shred, the delay ducks and keeps you tidy.. then as you play less the delay's wet level is allowed to get a little stronger..the tricky part is getting the delay's ducked level right and the speed that it comes back in.. cos if you set it too strongly is can sound quite unnatural.. I know of some folk that like to do this.. for me personally though it didn't really hit the spot..

I thought there was a ducking delay model without needing to set up a side chain? Or is it ducking verb? Can't remember but I think there is

Pretty much all of the delays can be set up to duck- I have all of my delays set to ducking, only a db or two, it keeps it from getting crowded.