Hi Vince, I have one question regarding your approach to mono compatibility. I saw you only narrowed the low frequencies on the bass. What I am often struggling with when using wide pad sounds is to make the pads cut through when the track is played mono. Would you for a track like this normally switch to mono during the mixdown? In my experience the level of a wide pad usually needs to be brought up when yo listen to it in mono. I would be interested to see how you would approach the pads in this track (and what your recommended approach is to make a pad really wide but still have it cut through nicely in mono). Thanks!
Sorry, I meant that when Vince opens the DX7 - he loads a preset bank called “detroit techno” which has the Juan’s model preset in it
Oups ! Sorry, my bad not reading you correctly 
Those presets are included in the course resources download with the project.
Obviously if you’re using Ableton Live, you should be able to load the entire Project File and find the DX7 presets used in the course, then save them onto your own Arturia’s DX7 preset library. You’ll only find the presets used for this track of course ( 3 if I recall well ), not the full pack.
For the all pack itself, I think it’s a personal one made by @vincewatson himself among time, don’t think that it’s a 3thrd party Presets Pack that you can purchase, that’s what I recall after watching some parts of the tutorial.
Maybe Vince could confirm this. Thanks.
@riffmatrix Thanks…Yes the DX7 patches are ones that I created for the DnA LP.
@Debitae I dont have a religious process of always mixing everything in Mono, however I do it for establishing certain sound placement in the mix. For pads though, Im a sucker for really dynamic wide stereo pads so use my ears to place it rather than mixing those in mono. Luckily ive never had any issue with my mixes regarding that end of the spectrum.
Thanks all!
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Hi Mr Watson, thx for this highly inspiring tutorial, one of the best I’ve seen actually.
I wanted to ask you about one specific chord.
The second chord FAA#D from the pad seems to contain 2 notes (A and D) out of key (F min) Maybe I’m wrong I don’t know.
It sounds beautifully with all the rest, why does it not clash with any other notes ?
I saw your other tutorials and I understand how you move some notes around but here I cannot figure what it is. Is it a major chord from another scale to create tension, a sus chord, a chord without rules ???
I’m not overthinking about it because tension and slight dissonance is part of the beauty of this genre but I’d like to understand how to use “out of scale” notes the way you do !
Love and respect DnA is a fantastic piece of work
smooth!
This tutorial made me subscribe to SA. Vince Watson is an amazing artist and I’m looking forward to more tutorials from him. Also would really like to see more tutorials from underground artists. Some suggestions: Derek Carr, Marquis Hawkes, Stephen Lopkin etc
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Really enjoyed this tutorial. It was both informative and inspiring…thank you! The way you explained the reasons for your choice of sounds, your workflow including the mixing process etc, was really helpful. Highly recommend this to others…and yes I love Detroit techno even more!
Sorry for late answer. As a general rule, you should of course always check your mix in Mono anyway, but wide pads can be an issue sometimes…its just a matter of finding a balance between gain and width that your happy with in both Mono and Stereo…whatever you do, dont use compression on it, youll just kill the dynamics and that lush warm stereo image will die, so be careful but use your ears.
Thanks Mundelator, i think I need to do another tutorial with just the nuances and accidental harmonincs haha…but to answer your question, sometimes I myself do not overthink it and just play it without consideration of the note structure. Its only afterwards when I analyse I realise what I did, and thats absolutely the best way to go about finding these harmony’s…following the rules too much wont help you discover them too easily unless you are an extremely skilled player…which i’m not, but what I am good at is finding melancholy between harmony’s. Best advice I can give you is to just keep playing and playing and experimenting with roots v augmentation.
Thanks Flavvio, glad you enjoyed it
Nice one Michael, thanks
very cool and informative course
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Vince, great course! You are a very good teacher - even without your Sonarworks, lol
It’s terrific how you intro’d the genre. I live in Toronto, a mere 4 hrs drive from Detroit - and yet at age 46 I never knew Detroit Techno existed. How can that be? I’ve since delved into playlists on Spotify - and yes, I’m looking forward to listening to DnA and your other works!
Here’s my first take based on your tutorial - but certainly not the last!
https://soundcloud.com/marztecheque/2020vision
Thanks for doing a superb job highlighting this very cool retro genre that definitely seems classic and timeless.
You are a great teacher and I will now go back and spend more time too on your other Sonic Academy tutorials - keep them coming, Vince - and please send us pics of your new Garden Studio… lol
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One of the best courses on the academy. Being from Michigan, loves me some Detroit Techno!
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A question: Why don’t you group the channels? Instead of routing everything to a normal channel?
I think I mentioned it, perhaps it was on a previous course. It’s basically for UI purposes and so I reflect an analog console as much as possible in terms of steps.
amazing course, Vince - again, props to you and I like youR DnA album - i listen to it here in Toronto on spotify cheers and happy holidays etc
What a beautiful course, I learned a lot, great song!!
Great!!!