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Sidechaining with “The Stomp”

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After doing all the post production, polishing, and arraigning of all other logistical details for the release of the “Live For No One” EP, I’ve gotten back to exploring new production and performance techniques in Ableton Live. The most crucial of all of these has turned out the be the “sidechaining” of certain effects from some tracks within a song to other tracks, especially with compression. It is a technique that can range from extremely subtle and barely noticeable to quite pronounced and also can really change the feel and character of a song. More importantly, it makes the drums cut through the mix like a beast! In Ableton version 8, you can use this effect with Compression, Auto-Filter, and Gate, all of which can produce extremely cool sounds. The main technique I have been working on is grouping all the “ambient” tracks and applying sidechain compression to anything coming out of the drum tracks. Then I do the same with the Bass tracks but with slightly different ratio, attack, and release parameters. The result produces a pronounced movement between all the tracks, driven by the drums, which adds another element of rhythm to the music that is separate from the notes and sounds being played. This video “The Stomp” has a ton of compression sidechaining in this way and also a little of gate sidechaining which produces another great sound all together. In this track I am also live looping synths on my iPhone and mixing in a live produced beat using the Akai Mpd 24.

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