Hi. For some time now i have been listening mostly to Hardcore, Hard Dance, Cheese Dance and most of them have a very nice distorted Acid type sound.

I came across this track

And i really liked the Acid, i tried to re-create it and failed. I just can't seem to figure out how that synth is so warm, when i made something like it i had to low cut it because to much some was coming out of it and when i did this the sound got weaker and weaker to the point to were it sounded thin, How has this sound been accomplished and how do i get it sounding like that what are the delay and reverb settings you guys and girls hear and should i put delay first or reverb?

So is it low passed, what do i need to do in the EQ and compression to get to this

Oh also many of my attempts have been in mono and i can't force it into stereo, What am i doing wrong?


i like anything like this for example, tidy trax, kai tracid

you can hear the same kind of acid here

but how do i achieve this without a TB303?

How does the sound change slightly when it plays longer notes on this sort of acid, how do i acheieve that on spire or any other vst you can recommend?

Thank you

 

Last edited by a moderator: Aug 16, 2021

I mean, is that not what i said? that iv'e got the sound or similar My question was more on the side of how do i got about mixing. Your answer is something iyd expect from a reddit user. Not good man, not good.

probably why i also left last time because of members like you. Just keep that in mind why forums seem to die out and you'll have your answer.

 

Last edited: Aug 16, 2021

Well, first of all, it is a sawtooth waveform what you need to use, any synth would have that wavetable or kind of wave to select in an oscillator.
You use one oscillator with that waveform. Then, you need to go to 2nd octave or so, because the higher the octave, the quickier is the sound wave and it would not sound such as, for example,
Emanuel Top - Turkish Bazar

Secondly, you should apply some distortion (a good plugin for acidlines' distortion would be Redoptor 2). Here is the recreation of Emmanuel Top's "Acid Phase", where the guy is using overdrive pedal "MXR Distortion+" but there are many distortion/overdrive VST effects on the market.
Emmanuel Top "Acid Phase" – Roland TB-303 Pattern

Here you'll see a TeeBee 303 from Roland directly and you'll notice how you need to touch cutoff, resonance, envelope amount... to get that "spicy" acid soul:
Roland TB-303 Bass Line In Action

And finally, you asked for Spire VST, but I would recommend you to get d16 Group's Phoscyon or ABL3 (v.3.3), but anyway, Spire's way to do it, here:
Creating 303 Acid Lines with Reveal Sound's Spire Synth

Remember: go down a couple of octaves, C-2 or so.

This is how to program Phoscyon, but I am thinking that you would like to program your midi patterns in your DAW
How To Program & Make Acid TB-303 Basslines

Respect to the longer notes you ask, some notes are just longer, and others use sliding, which is to tie a note to a following one and there's also the accent, higher volume notes, which you will achieve by increasing the velocity of those notes you want to accent, up to the max.

Here you have a screenshot of my current project in Bitwig Studio, just to show you slides (in red circles) and accent (in purple circle). Also, if you want to get an acidline, it's usually pretty common to write it choosing a key, for example, I choosed D1 and from there, I went up to D2 initially. Then, I pitched a semitone up some of the higher octave notes to create some tension (D#2), with some other notes in the fifth (A1) and the seventh (C2):


I hope all this help you to get to understand how acid lines are written.

 

Heres one I prepared eariler

 

You good sir, Are a legend. This is the answer i was looking for, i'll come back to this after work and try it all out the best i can. Thank you very much

 

I am glad that answer could solve your doubts!
Cheers!

 

Hey! Good oldschool Goatrance, as it must be!

 

IMHO, and it's been a while since I made this kind of music, from what I can hear in the first example, there are three synths which make the sound, not only one. And their oscillators are routed diffenretly - stereowise.

 

Can you go into more detail what you mean by this? routed differently in the ADSR or just routed differently like maybe Hard sync?

 

I don't think No Avenger meant that at all.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Aug 16, 2021

Well I've achieved it that way anyways and i am now proud of what i have made, using hard sync pwm, lfo, drive, mod, and pitch i was able to achieve this on a free vst in fact its from 2006 so i am guessing this is also what he used since this did come out in 2006.... :P

 

Last edited: Aug 17, 2021

as a person whos made hardcore hard dance for 15 plus years its eq camelphat but since camphats now non exsistant eq ott distortion

 

Good job i have that, i'll give that a try i forgot all about camelphat tbh

 

my advice will seem strange at first bit "listen"
i fallen for the same trap often myself ;)

So what you hear mustn't actually be what you perceive
That means that, a fat - sidechained, pumping sound isn't what´s actually happening!
It could be better to have a volume automation and move the rendered wave to the desired place
this is rhythmicly often much more interesting.

What this means for you?
Even though you achieved what you wanted(today).
Sometimes our ears play a trick on us!
Mono, sounding stereo? = Two mono sounds (the same sound), but they have
different attack on the compressor. That´s a Dr.Dre, Prodigy trick.
Because even if you think otherwise they mostly produce in mono!!

Different but similar sound, to do the work 1 sound would & could not achieve!
For instance:
Take you acid sound, double it, Mid.Side. it, highpass one sound+ take out all the mid(of M.S.).
Now play around with the volume and "paning" of the S.ide signal, now everything can sound wider
without the Energy of the sound missing.
Elysia Museq or directional eq from DDMF (i think free) work wonders!

So to finish.
Sometimes just aiming for a similar result not exact perceived sound.
Will free you creative mind up to experiment and you might have
More fun and less frustration

 

Last edited: Aug 18, 2021

that´s it...

 

It's a processed sawtooth.. just experiment. I've made this sound with my 303, SH1, MS10,20 (real ones and emulators))) A good weapon if you're after acid sounds is the ABL or any modular emulator.. then processing with EQ, any distortion, delay, chorus, and reverb
Follow Anything Simon Posford does...he's the king of everything

You can use anything really

 

Last edited: Aug 18, 2021