I’m working on a new track and trying to get a fuzzy synth sound to sidechain in the mix properly, but for some reason I just can’t seem to get the ‘pulsing’ sound timed just right. I’m trying different attack and decay values but can’t get it right. I was wondering what techniques people had on getting a ‘good’ sidechain sound in their tracks. I’m aware that this is something that is done badly more often than it is done well, and would really appreciate any ideas or tips people have.
I’m sidechaining from a simple 4/4 kick drum by the way - nothing fancy.
Put your attack at zero or close to it. Release at zero or close to it. Make sure your compressor is looking at peak level instead of rms. Turn the ration all the way or up or close to it. Pull your threshold down really far.
Also if your using your kick for the signal, make sure it is one 1/16th note long. This is how i like mine. However, if your kick is only 1/16th note long then your kick sounds like ***, so set up a dummy signal.
hope this helps, if it is confusing let me know. This is how I side chain in logic. My songs pump. Oh yeah, to set these parameters have a straight line of a note playing.
Excellent stuff - I’ve copied and pasted your ideas for future reference! Out of interest, do you bother with ‘knee’ for sidechaining? Or would this be more for general compression?
My bad man, I left knee out. I do it to taste. Sometimes I will put knee at 0 if it is just a straight line and it pumps really hard. If my line is not straight and is chopped up i use a softer knee where my notes can be heard longer. You may know this you may not, but the more knee the smoother the side chain and the less knee the harsher the side chain is.
Navajo and Abrakadabra (navajoandabrakadabra) on Myspace our work is incomplete
Nice one - much appreciated. It is sounding better already! 
You are welcome, we just like people who say thanks.
Soz double post
Most of what samuelalbritton says has been covered in various SA tutorials but its cool to see it all summarised in 1 post.
One thing I noticed Phil do in 1 tutorial was change the lookahead in the compressor to 0ms.
Which basically sets the amount of time that the input signal will be delayed.
Also don’t forget to select the right kind of kick for the kind of pumping you want. For example one kick set to 16ths might decay much faster than another and that can drastically change the pumping.
Finally switch on the eq within the compressor and experiment with various settings within that. Again that was covered by Phil in a tutorial.
I’ve watched all of the SA tutorials regardless of genre or my taste because everyone of them has included something new for me to learn.
Thanks - I’ll have to take a look. I remember some of what was said above being covered but not all of it - I’ll have to check. Do you remember specifically which lesson Phil discusses EQing sidechain compression? I can’t remember that one - I wonder if its one I’ve missed (I’ve not got round to the Mark Knight one yet for example).
Again - thanks for all your help. I’m going to going a-fiddlin’ now.
I can’t remember offhand what tutorial covered eq sidechaining but i if i stumble upon it i’ll post here and let you know
it wasn’t covered in great depth as such I just remember Phil saying he wasn’t happy with the way a particular instrument wasn’t pumping right and something about letting certain frequencies through. Don’t hold me to that i literally view hundreds of tutorials on youtube so it could be one of them but i doubt it as i can hear Phils accent discussing eq sidechain in my memory lol
note to me lay off mr green if i want my short term memory back
Nice one - much appreciated. Phil, if you stumble across this post - can you remember where you mention it?
Found it 
I am glad I did coz now its committed to memory.
Its at the start of the noise sweep module (tech-house)
Phil wasn’t happy with the release of the pad due to the kick having such a low bottom end, its at that point the eq in the compressor is employed.
[url]http://sonicacademy.com/news-item/How-to-Sound-Like-No.-4---Tech-House_359.aspx[/url]
You’re a legend! Thanks for taking the time to find this for me - I’ll take a look tomorrow. :D:D:D:D:D