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I'm trying to recreate the bass synth Deadmau5 uses in his song, "Hey Baby", which can be heard from the start of the song.
I have the VST's Massive, FM8 at my disposal. (I have tried several times within those programs to achieve this but can never get it right.)
Any help in the right direction is appreciated.
Thanks, PD
Deadmau5 is one of the biggest names in Electro and Progressive House. What makes those genres is the idea of making Bass audible compared to earlier House genres. In Electro House this was achieved by layering higher Synths, mostly an interval of 3,4,5,7,or 9 Semitones with Sqare or Saw Waves. In Progressive house this was achieved by using Plucks that play Chords + Bassline + Leadline. Those plucks were made by Sawaves with a LP Filter Envelope.
In Hey Baby it sounds like a typical Electro Saw Bass. It is achieved by playing Saw waves in a low register. Over the time producer used several techniques to get a bigger clearer and fatter Saw bass.
Usually the sound is bade by 2 Sounds. One Sub bass synth (Deadmaus likes to use a minimoog here) that simply plays a Saw bass in a low octave. Sometimes it makes sense to filter this layer with a lowpass, depending on the layer you put above.
Ontop of this you want to layer the dirty,fat, distorted layer. To get this you can try the following things saw waves + a bit of noise slightly low passed. Then eq out the bottom end and boost by huge amounts at around 200-400 hz and a huge amount between 1000-3000hz then use distortion. Then add some modulation fx like chorus phase flanger and some reverb. Finish off with limiting the sound.
Deadmau5 uses a lot of analogue stuff like moog and virus. So he has a very warm sound to start up.
Its just a heavily compressed/distorted Saw Wave. If my ears serve me well its a D# in octave one or two.
What you want to do is either use some distortion plugins you have or go grab the Dada Life Sausage Fattener (£18?)
Then whack it on full on the bass bus then sidechain the amplitude after that to the kickdrum then whack it on again after that for some proper 'sausage'.
I mean you don't have to use the sausage thing. Any form of overdrive going straight into a brickwall limiter will give you that full sound. Just be sure to modulate the amplitude or filter it after to give it some life.
