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3. Legato bass with pulse width modulation in Massive

1 > PWM (pulse width modulation) is a great tool for creating sustained bass sounds with organic, rhythmic movement. We’ll use NI’s Massive to make this sound – again, you can download the demo from www.native-instruments.com if you don’t own the synth. Launch your DAW and put Massive on a MIDI track.

2 > Select File»New Sound to initialise the patch. Click Oscillator 1’s wavetable name and select Pulse-Saw PWM from the VA (virtual analogue) section of the menu that appears. Turn the Pls-Saw Pos knob all the way down. This makes the sound disappear completely!

3 > That’s because the Pulse Width knob is turned all the way up, thinning the sound out until it becomes non-existent. Play and hold a note, then gradually turn the Pulse Width knob down. You’ll hear the sound reappear, and if you sweep it rapidly around the 12 o’clock position the PWM generates a rich, buzzy tone.

4 > Leave the Pulse Width knob at 12 o’clock and drag LFO 5’s modulation handle into the first slot underneath it. Drag up on the slot to set the modulation amount to the level shown above. Click the 5 LFO tab to bring up its controls, and turn the XFade Curve all the way up so that we’re modulating the Pulse Width with a pure sine shape. (Audio: 4. Raw PWM)

5 > This gives us a big, rhythmic synth tone that’s ripe for filtering. Click Filter 1’s filter type, and select Lowpass 2 from the list. Turn the Resonance down to minimum and set the Cutoff to 11 o’clock. The Cutoff will automatically follow whatever notes you play, so there’s no need to activate key tracking manually. (Audio: 5. Filtered PWM)

6 > Click the Voicing tab and select Monophon to put the synth in monophonic mode. Set the Trigger mode to Legato. In Legato mode, playing overlapping notes will cause the pitch of the first to glide to that of the second; the speed of this movement is determined by the Glide Time knob in the Osc panel. (Audio: 6. Legato PWM)