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4. Splitting the bass into low and high parts for processing
1 Splitting a bass sound into two bands allows us to add modulation, stereo width and distortion to the high part while retaining a solid low end. Import Backing.wav, Growl.wav and Bass.wav from the Tutorial FIles folder. Turn the Bass and Growl’s volume faders down until both are silent – we’ll process them via sends instead.
2 Create two blank stereo return channels. We’ll send both the Growl and Bass channels to both of these returns, using pre-fader sends of 0dB. Name FX1 Sub and FX2 Mid/High to avoid confusion later on. We’ll start by processing the Sub channel first – add an instance of Soundtoys Decapitator to it, then mute the other FX send.
3 We’ll use Decapitator to ‘solidify’ the sub while retaining harmonics in the low mids. Turn on Punish mode and change the Style to E to give us some EMImodelled saturation. Next, set the Tone to Dark with the High Cut filter at 1kHz. We’ll use DDMF’s LP10 CM to roll off some high frequencies at 300Hz. To prevent phase distortion, we’ll use the FlexLP model.
4 Mute the low send and unmute the mid/high one before inserting NI’s Guitar Rig 5 on it. We can use a few modules chained together to add some tearing distortion and stereo effects. Start with the Mulholland Drive distortion unit, with the Wet/Dry at 10% before adding an LFO from the Modulation section – we’ll use this to modulate the distortion.
5 Assign the LFO to the distortion’s Drive (drag the ‘LFO’ window onto the Drive dial). Right-click the Drive dial and set the amount to 26%, then change the LFO’s shape to Saw Up and its Rate to 1.39Hz. This moves the Drive for an aggressive, tearing sound. After this, add a Stoned Phaser to bring out the modulation already present in the sound.
6 Add some high-frequency bite by hitting the phaser’s Colour button. After this processing, we’ll need to filter the mid/high channel to avoid frequency clashes with the sub channel. Add an LP10 with a FlexHP filter at 300Hz ( 18dB/oct) and unmute the Sub FX send. You’ll hear the two sends come together as one, with a full low end and phased, distorted highs.