Table of contents for 02/2023 in Beat English

Make drums & basses crack! Excite Audio Lifeline Expanse Lite Five great-sounding effects are waiting to enhance your tracks in this month‘s software highlight, Lifeline Expanse Lite. With the modules Format, Dirt, Re-Amp, Width and Space, this plug-in from Excite Audio masters a wide range of effects between subtle enhancement and brutal distortion, charming vintage sounds and convincing room simulations. Download: see page 9 | Info: excite-audio.com | pluginboutique.com win | mac All serial numbers securely accessible: The Beat Serial Center To ensure that none of your serial numbers are lost in the future (for instance, in the event of a new installation, Outlook crash or disk crash), you can now conveniently manage them online. The advantages are obvious: The editorial team can send you targeted software updates, you have…

Music theory seems intimidating and complex to many, but once you have a basic understanding of the fundamentals, it can help you take your musical knowledge to the next level. In the following pages, we‘ll give you practical answers to the most important questions and show you how to write catchy chord progressions and memorable melodies using the software and hardware you‘re most familiar with. And if you want to deepen your knowledge of music theory and practice, we recommend suitable courses, training and study programs. What can you learn in 2 hours? Of course, you won‘t become an absolute music theory crack within 2 hours, but you don‘t have to because in a short time you can already learn the basics that will help you write more rousing chord…

Plugin Boutique Scaler 2 As a MIDI effect, Scaler 2 can control any software or hardware sound generator. With just one finger you can play impressive chord progressions, arpeggios or strummings. You can fall back on 200 ready-made chord sets for countless styles and numerous scales. The plug-in is also a great help when creating catchy melodies. In practice, Scaler 2 shines as an extremely effective tool that facilitates the creation of catchy chord progressions. www.pluginboutique.com | 38Euros Mixed In Key Captain Plugins Epic Whether chord progressions, arpeggios, hook or bass lines, beats or melodies are required: Working with Sundog is a real pleasure and leads to appealing results incredibly quickly. The standalone application can play the hardware or software sound generator of your choice or export MIDI files. In…

The orchestra and the electronics got bigger and bigger! It began to feel like the speakers couldn’t contain the sound. Beat / Where was your first studio when you started out? Craig Armstrong / It was a tiny little room off the side of a building in Glasgow called CaVa Studios which sadly isn’t there anymore. It was one of Glasgow’s main recording studios at the time and I was there in the late 90s, early 2000s. It was lined with keyboards and Akai samplers, you could hardly get in the door. It was a really happy studio, very creative and although it was tiny it had a great vibe! Beat / What do you remember about working with Massive Attack on the Protection album, recorded around this time? Craig…

1 Sound generation As a basis for the Riser, we use the 3x Oscillator synthesizer and select the Sawtooth waveform for all three oscillators. For the second oscillator, we move the Detune control to +20 cent and for the third, we set the Phase Offset to 100%. Then, we create a pattern eight bars long and draw a continuous note in the Piano Roll. 2 ADSR settings Clicking on the cogwheel at the top of the window takes you to the detailed settings. There we first go to Envelope/Instrument settings and then to the Volume section. Now, we set Attack time to 60%. This makes it take a little longer for the sound to reach its full volume, which makes it sound softer and less piercing. 3 Pitch LFO Now, we modulate the…

1 Copyright! First of all: As in all media in the world, the videos on TikTok are also subject to copyright. Publishing sampled passages without the permission of the creators is, therefore, strictly prohibited. Here‘s another tip: If you have created a cool remix, just ask the creator if a co-op or feature would be cool. 2 Base material Downloading is not possible directly from TikTok, but websites like Snaptikvideo [2] not only allow you to download clips, but also make an MP3 out of them. And that‘s what we want. Reason can also import MP4 files, but in our case, the audio tracks were always full of dropouts, doubles and hangs after the import. 3 Sample slicing Once the MP3 is imported, we need the appropriate tempo. Reason is a…

1 Cheap sounds Import the enclosed four tracks into a new project with a 65 BPM tempo. Kick and bass are separate. Both sounds are quite favorable for more presence in the mid frequencies, since their attacks (transients) already provide a lot of midrange and they can take quite a bit of saturation/distortion in this genre without seeming incoherent. 2 A round lowend So that kick and bass don‘t get in each other’s way, we start with a sidechain compression in which the bass ducks away with every kick drum hit. Load Pro-C 2 as an Insert effect on the bass channel and set the Ratio to 6:1, Attack to 3 ms and Release to 120 ms. This makes the compressor react quickly and with strong compression. 3 Sidechaining Open the Side…

At the end of the 90s, Moog launched a series of analog effect pedals under the somewhat controversial name Moogerfooger. These pedals were not really mega sellers at first because they were too complicated for many guitarists and too expensive for synthesizer freaks. Since the components were only available in limited quantities, the pedals were completely sold out at some point. At the same time, the big vintage wave started and, with it, the upwardly open price scale for analog equipment that was no longer available. As a result, particularly with the more popular models of the series, such as the Delay, they are now being traded second-hand in the higher four-digit range, if they are even available at all. So it‘s even more satisfying that Moog now offers the…

Sugar Bytes Graindad When it comes to creating never-before-heard sounds, granular synthesis is still the first choice. That‘s why we were all the more excited about Sugar Bytes‘ first granular effect. Graindad is loaded as an effect plug-in in order to process the audio signal in real time. This is divided into up to 64 (particle) grains. With 12 main parameters, you can manipulate the sound in many ways, allowing Time Stretching and Pitch Shifting, as well as Loop, Stutter, Reverse and Harmonizer effects. Typical parameters such as the density, length, position and pitch of the grains can be user determined. Speed determines how fast the audio buffer is traversed, whereby backward effects can also be achieved. Since the Pitch parameter can be scaled, you can create, in combination with…

Bazille as a Drum Maschine Bazille can also be used to create cool drum sounds and, thanks to the sequencer, even grooves are possible, as our „Robo Drummer“ patch shows. The first of the four sections of the sequencer triggers our bass drum, which consists of a simple sine wave with pitch modulation and filtered pink noise. The snare based on filtered white noise is triggered by the second section of the sequence. The hi-hat we created from filtered white noise makes the beat sound more driving. The corresponding Volume Envelope (Env 4) is triggered by LFO 1. Crazy Chiptune Arpeggios A modular synthesizer that imitates the LoFi sound of the Commodore 64 - pretty decadent, right? No matter, because chip sounds are just plain fun! In the „Planet SID“…

Lesson 1: What are notes & scales? Everyone has probably heard what a note is, but its connection with vibrations and frequencies may not be familiar to everyone. There are twelve notes on our most familiar staff. In our most well-known system, there are twelve notes. Learn here how these notes are created and what frequencies and scales have to do with them. Let‘s go! Lesson 2: What are chords & progressions? As already mentioned in step 8, notes by themselves do not create emotion, but several notes played at the same time do. That brings us to chords. Different chords in a row are called progression and not only create more emotion, but also invite you to hum along. Now we‘ll show you how good chords and progressions are…

After selling 80 million records and giving record-breaking concerts, Jean-Michel Jarre no longer has anything to prove to the world. But he does have something to prove to himself. Even die-hard fans who have little to gain from his current releases will admit: The French Electronic Grandmaster has almost never rested on his laurels. In this respect, „Oxymore“ fits perfectly into the picture. His 21st studio album may even pass for one of the most radical of his career. Built almost exclusively of shimmering sound effects, monstrous basses, and mutating drum patterns, Jarre refuses to accept the common image of him as a melody-loving aesthete. This music irritates, polarizes, and leaves one as much bewildered as enthusiastic. Music of the future? In this case, more likely: a journey back in…

1 Compress To achieve a balanced mix, use compressors during production rather than at mixdown. In the first step, compress individual sounds, such as the kick and snare, to control their sonic behavior. In the next step, compress the group, for example, the drum bus, so that the sounds weave together better. 2 Condense sounds In the last step, the master is compressed. For each step, one compressor unit is enough. For the group compression, the second step, use the glue compressor with a high attack time of 10 ms, a short release of 2 ms and a ratio of 2:1. Adjust the threshold so that a gain reduction of 2-3 dB occurs. 3 Deliberate actions Not every sound needs compression! If your audio samples are already compressed, further compression would rob…

1 16-bar loop Import the enclosed tracks into a new Project with a 65 BPM tempo. Mark all events and shorten them to four bars. This Trap beat should now be arranged to 16 bars. To get started, duplicate all tracks three times by marking all events and dragging the middle rectangle to the right until you fill 16 bars. 2 Macro arrangement To build up and maintain the tension, we now want to remove individual instruments from the loops so that the arrangement can build up. For example, start with just percussion, pads and melody. Then, let the bass and drums come in on the second pass, while the melody doesn‘t reappear until later, on the fourth repeat. 3 Sound coloring Duplicate the percussion track so that the first loop is on…

Toontrack Progressive Metal EBX Every November, Toontrack celebrates Metal Month with a series of offers and exciting new products. One of them is this expansion for EZBass, dedicated entirely to Progressive Metal. All sounds come from a six-string Ibanez BTB1836 Bass, which is also popular in Fusion and Jazz. The instrument was played with the fingers and with a plectrum and, in addition to DI recordings, there are also presets processed with effects in a stylistically confident manner. The virtual six-string is playable over a wide range on the keyboard, and slap and tapping articulations have also been captured. The bass sounds and the included MIDI riffs were inspired by bands like Queensrÿche, Savatage, Dream Theater, Tool, and Meshuggah. So, it‘s not surprising that the MIDI library also contains patterns…

76 ENCHANTING HARPS & CINEMATIC TEXTURES In Classical music, they are an indispensable element; and in blockbusters, they usually underpin magical and fantastic scenes, but they also have their firm - albeit mostly discreet - place in electronic music, in numerous House and Pop hits. We want to expand that! In our soundbank, you‘ll find both classical and celtic harps on the one hand, and otherworldly variants on the other, which we‘ve prepared with resampling and bitcrushers, especially for Techno. www.zamplersounds.com Facts LAYERZ for Zampler: ▲ 1.36 GB soundbank, 482 samples ▲ 76 patches ▲ 26 plucked, celtic, concert & folk harps ▲ 25 space, strummed & reverse harps ▲ 3 harp duets ▲ 3 harps with choirs / strings ▲ 16 textures & atmospheres LAYERZ for Akai MPCs: ▲…

The small hybrid synthesizer, MicroFreak, has become a real success for Arturia with its flexible sound and multiple possibilities. But not everyone gets along with the limited paraphony and the Buchla-style touch keyboard. The MiniFreak, therefore, has a normal keyboard with 37 slim keys, is 6-voice polyphonic and offers two instead of one digital engine in parallel. Its hybrid design featuring an analog multimode filter has been retained, as has the extensive sequencer, which is directly accessible on the MiniFreak thanks to additional buttons. Mini vs. Micro However, MicroFreak owners should not immediately put their copy in the classifieds, because the MiniFreak requires you to do without some rather important functions from the MicroFreak. This includes polyphonic aftertouch, which is an individual modulation of each note played, such as a…

The heart of this module is its screen for selecting the desired pitch and scale, along with nine buttons that are used to play and program notes. The middle button labeled „0“ triggers the currently stored root note, the other buttons named „+1“, „+2“ and „-3“ and so on do not jump by semitones as usual, but by intervals, meaning by the corresponding number steps up or down in the scale. More about that in a moment. Also, Misha is fully MIDI compatible. What makes Misha different? The principle is very simple in itself, just unfamiliar, so let‘s get technical for a moment. For an example: If you choose pitch C and the Major scale, C3 is the starting note. Button „0“ therefore plays a C3. Button „+1“ jumps to…

Loud voice and high demands Name: ………………Matthias Basedow Age: …………………25 years Instrument: ………Acoustic Guitar Genre: ……………..Singer-Songwriter/Acoustic Gear: Main Device: ……..Laptop MSI GF63 8RD, DAW: ……………….Steinberg Cubase 12 Pro MIDI Keyboard: ….Arturia MicroLab Audio Interface:.. Steinberg UR22C Headphones: …….Shure SRH1540 Miicrophone: …….Shure SM58 Field Recorder: ….Zoom H1n Matthi is the owner of MeinHomestudio services and helps music enthusiasts realize their projects as a Producer and Mixing Engineer. A Beat writer, artist and multi-instrumentalist, he doesn‘t like to be pigeonholed and moves freely between the genres of Singer-Songwriter, Hip Hop, Pop and Rock - but always with stringed instruments. Matthi owns more guitars than shoes! However, he is only allowed to take one instrument into the forest and has chosen his nylon guitar „Gaia“. Hippie with hardware Name: ………………Tim Bornemeier Age: …………………31…

1 What is Autotonic? In a nutshell, Autotonic provides the notes of a selectable scale distributed on the white keys of the keyboard. The black keys are only used to switch scales. So you can happily hit the (white) keys and don‘t have to worry about any mistakes, but can concentrate fully on the combinations and moods of the different scales. 2 MIDI-Settings If you use Autotonic as a standalone app, open the MIDI I/O menu and select the desired MIDI inputs and outputs. If you use the program together with your DAW, open it. Autotonic provides its own MIDI ports to plug into a DAW. Create a new MIDI track, select your MIDI keyboard as input and Autotonic MIDI In as output. 3 Set ports Note: Some DAWs, for example Live,…

Beat / What do techno and alchemy have to do with each other? Christian / I don‘t know if a concrete connection between a musical genre and an ancient branch of natural philosophy can even be imagined. But if connection is meant as affinity, then there is a connection, since both, a compositional process and an alchemical one, are transformative in nature. The basic premise is that the composition meant is not a quick copy & paste work, but a careful, experimental musical exploration with intuition and harmonic boldness. A studio session of this kind can even put the composer or producer into a trance-like state. Then we can actually talk about a transformation of the elements. What is chemical in alchemy will be mental, emotional and spiritual in composition.…

REGISTRATION & INSTALLATION After registering the data from the current Beat edition on serialcenter.com, you will receive an email with a 100% discount code for Expanse Lite, which you can redeem at Plugin Boutique [1]. Add Expanse Lite to your shopping cart and click Secure Checkout. On the Payment page, you can enter the Coupon Code to get the plug-in for free. After checkout, you will find the installer and serial number under My Account, which you can use to activate the plug-in in your DAW after installation. [1] pluginboutique.com/product/2-Effects/53-Multi-Effect-/8019-Lifeline-Expanse-Lite Further info: Info: excite-audio.com | pluginboutique.com License & Password: www.serialcenter.de 1 Vintage Drum Sound Many producers swear by vintage samplers like the AKAI MPC60 [2] and E-MU SP-1200 to give Hip Hop beats a LoFi sound full of character. Expanse…

1Vary kick There is almost nothing more boring than the kick running in 4/4 time and without a break. This is where we‘ll start first and make the beat at least four bars long. Press Record and add at least one more note for the kick in each bar. Then, hold down the respective step keys and turn down the Filter FREQ to about 47. 2 Ghost steps We also reduce the PROBABILITY of these „Ghost Steps“ to 50 or 75% so that they are only played occasionally. If the kick is up to it, you can also vary TUNE slightly. In the last bar, we also delete the last kick, so that there is a short break. And that‘s 0:1 against boredom. But on with the snare. 3 Snare pimping Instead…

1 Load a synth First, we need a polyphonically playable synth sound that we can control with Chorder and Arpeggiator. To do this, drag Mai Tai from the browser into the Arrange window. We have programmed a simple polyphonic pluck sound. You can find the preset „Deadmau5-Pluck“ in the issue data. Then, set a project tempo of 126 BPM. 2 Chord generator Press [F4] to open the Inspector for the track and click on the + symbol for Note FX. Select the Chorder chord generator here and switch to its interface. With this tool, you can trigger chords using single MIDI notes. It is also possible to create your own chord sets, but we will use the EDM Melody Maker (Use Synth) preset. 3 Play EDM chords This one uses minor and…

This compact 4-track sequencer has 64 pads for direct access to the individual steps, but you have to make do with fewer controls than with the Beatstep Pro or an analog step sequencer like the Korg SQ-1. The SQ-64 is primarily designed as the control center for an analog hardware setup and modular systems, as a glance at the lushly equipped rear panel featuring 19 analog outputs in eurorack-friendly 3.5mm jack design shows. For each of the three melody tracks, there is a CV/Gate output and an additional Mod output; for the drum track, SQ-64 offers eight trigger outputs, each with its own status LED for visualizing outgoing signals. Compact and stylish With dimensions of 341 x 119 x 39 mm, the SQ-64 is a good deal smaller than the…

1 Reset clock counter Particularly in live performances, it is practicalto let the bar counter count from the very beginning. This way you can better estimate the time progression, among other things. To do this, hold down the Shift button on the Push and press Play. Now the bar counter jumps back to 1.1.1. You can also start it via the Arrangement View in Live. 2 Select clip without Start Do you want to „see“ into a clip while the sequencer is running, without starting it right away? To do this, select Clip View in Note Mode, hold down the Select button and select a clip using a pad. Now you can see the name of the clip in the display as well as the content, either the MIDI notes or an…

Test: Korg Drumlogue Korg‘s “X-logue” family is growing: Minilogue, Monologue and Prologue are joined by Drumlogue, a sophisticated drum machine. As with Minilogue XD and Prologue, Korg combines analogue sound generation with a digital multi-engine that can be fed with various algorithms. The Nano synth is supplied with a massive range of possibilities. In addition to the 4 analogue parts and the multi-engine, there are 6 more tracks into which you can load samples. Interview: Terence Fixmer Whether together with Nitzer Ebb singer Douglas McCarthy or solo. When Frenchman Terence Fixmer tackles something, interesting techno/electro sounds emerge that offer dance floor hits, but also something for demanding listening at home. On the occasion of Fixmer‘s new album „Shifting Signal“ we try to get to the bottom of the secret of…