How to get that massive amount of treble in Dubstep?

[guitarskills]

I can not figure this out for the life of me. Look at any great dubstep song's spectrum. The treble doesn't die off at all! Classical music doesn't even have this much treble. The spectrum just seems to have a line of sound around -40 db once you get past 500 hz, and it goes all the way to 20khz. I know distortion helps with a lot of it, but it's a CONSTANT in some peoples drops, ignoring the fact it should happen alongside the synth's notes. I sometimes even notice this in music that isn't dubstep, Like FIAB's Conquest. Where do these people get all their treble?

http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/2209/dubstepimbluespectrum.png
LOOK AT ALL THAT TREBLE DKJNSKJN

[bartekko]

high passed white noise

hats

good things for filling out the highs

[the4thImpulse]

high passed white noise

hats

good things for filling out the highs

Hats and cycmbals do a great job at this, use a large variety with varying decays and velocity.
A very sharp snare, one the cuts through the mix can fill in the high end.

Depending on the bassline synthesis you could try eqing in a bit of the mid and high end.

[guitarskills]

high passed white noise

How do you get that to fit into the song? I can't think of anyway that would work well....
And my newest song has a bunch of hi hats it doesn't make it look constant...
My snare does take up the whole spectrum, at least

[the4thImpulse]

high passed white noise

How do you get that to fit into the song? I can't think of anyway that would work well....
And my newest song has a bunch of hi hats it doesn't make it look constant...
My snare does take up the whole spectrum, at least

Have you tried sidechain filtering and big reverb/delays (0% dry) so it doesn't sound like static and just smooth. A spatial enhancers could help. Eq a bit off the very top so its not too harsh.

[Versilaryan]

A lot of dubstep tends to use buzzy, gritty synths. The reason those synths sound so buzzy and gritty is because they have a lot of high-frequency stuff going on. No matter where the fundamental is, they always have a lot of harmonic content filling out the sound. A lot of the time, something not sounding full isn't just a mixing or compositional problem. It's a sound design problem, where the synths you're using just don't sound full.

ESPECIALLY those wobbles. Bass wobbles actually have A LOT of high frequencies, and even when you're lowpassing them, it's usually too fast and there are usually too many other elements for spectrum analyzers to show any noticeable difference in high frequencies.

[guitarskills]

Is there any tutorials or anything to go about getting better at dubstep synth design? sure, you have the thousands of people who teach you how to make a wobble, but none that go into how to make a sound fuller. I've spent all week working on a drop, and I can not get it to sound full at all...
http://www.mediafire.com/?rv8n86v5259v8b5
Look at how far away the basses sound...
Nobody else has to use a pad to fill up space...

[Versilaryan]

http://mrbillstunes.com/2011/05/11/the- ... ass-sound/
Even if you hate Skrillex, this is probably the absolute best tutorial I've found online. He uses a large variety of synths to create a large variety of sounds, and then walks you through how to use other plugins to make everything sound better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_XUEBOb31U
This is more of a general walk-through on how to make the wobble sound, but he does a good job of it. And then part 2 goes into resampling techniques, which is really handy.

[guitarskills]

I already watched through the skrillex one. Maybe I'll rewatch it....

[Versilaryan]

Past that, it's really just experimenting and messing around until you get a better sound. Try adding sub-basses, or layering a really similar bass under it. Or use a multiband stereo enhancer to widen the treble portion of your wubs. Just throwing some ideas out there.

[guitarskills]

How do you get treble back into something that is being low passed with Wow? Where could I get a multiband stereo enhancer? Right now there is no treble on anything that is being low passed... minus any distortion I had. I have a pretty loud sub bass. Would it be reasonable to make 2 copies of a wobble, and make 1 be high passes by wow, and the other low passed with the same settings, so it actually takes up the spectrum? I actually have 2 Wows on the treble talking synth.

I'd also like to know how everyone is doing that squeal synth. It's driving me insane. I can not get it. And why can't I make a catchy drop like everyone else...

[Versilaryan]

Ask ArtAttack about that squeal synth. There's a tutorial he showed me about how to do it, but I don't remember where it is. The basic principle behind it is that you have an oscillator that's really nasty in the low register, like a square or sawtooth wave. Couple that with ones that sound kinda gritty in the high register, distort, EQ, etc. Lightly modulating the pitch with an LFO might help.

And for the wobbles, after the synth, add distortion. Then, add more distortion. Then, add more distortion. Add a bitcrusher, maybe. EQ. Distort. Distort. Etc. Process the synth sound as much as necessary, and you'll end up making up for the lowpassed highs.

You'll have to make your own multiband with parallel EQing to affect only parts of a sound at a time. If you look on YouTube, I'm pretty sure there are tutorials on it. Though, admittedly, that's getting pretty advanced.

[guitarskills]

Oh, I never thought of parallel processing for stuff...

Anyways, my song is now ABOVE -40 db, and my "squeal" actually brings it up to -30 db at parts. But this doesn't have that constant wall of treble that you see in all the other songs. It disappears for very little moments, and it varies, unlike Omni's or Alex S.... It makes me really think that people are using a white noise with a high pass... I don't see how that would make your instruments be more upfront and in your face.

Oh, and I actually asked art already, I'll see if he responds.

Also, I'm really bad with using distortion correctly. I have predatohm, but I can't get it to sound good, or bring treble up that much....

[Versilaryan]

Get CamelCrusher. It's free and /really/ easy to use.

The idea behind distortion is to make it sound as good as you can without distorting too much. Then, have another distortion thing and do the same thing. And then, instead of distorting a lot in one instance of the plugin, distort a little in a million instances of the plugin. That way, you end up with something really gritty without making it sound gross.

There are probably a lot of things they're doing in terms of mixing and stuff to make their music sound so thick. I'd have to actually run your stuff through a spectrum analyzer to figure out what's wrong.

[guitarskills]

My distortion only seems to make my synths louder... As if it can't really get anymore distorted, which is a lie. Is camelcrusher better than the Ohmforce stuff?

[guitarskills]

Art can't remember the video for the high pitched screech/squeal synth.

Okay, one more question. How do you go about getting the awesome snares you all have for stuff like this? I went and got Vengeance's Electroshock, volume 2, but all the snares are oriented around that clap, it seems. How are people getting that bassy snare with these? I know they have compression, but I don't know past that.