Logic Pro X - Sidechain Pumping Effect with an Aux Track + Compressor Video Lecture | Logic Pro X: A Practical Hands-on Course - Music

hello this is music tech help guy and
welcome to this Logic Pro 10 video
tutorial on creating a sidechain pumping
effect by using an aux track we're going
to use an aux track because it allows us
to group multiple instruments until one
side chain aux and then we can allow
other instruments that we don't want to
have sidechain to bypass that aux the
stereotypical way of doing this is to
take a kick drum use as a sidechain
source via a compressor and the
compressor only compresses when the kick
hits creating that stereotypical Zoar
vdm electronic pumping effect so let me
show you just a basic musical example
that we're going to use for this today
you
all right so it's pretty dry it's pretty
bland at this point I've just got this
little synth idea up here that's just
the chords I've got this base idea
backing up that synth idea
and then I have these are petty are
arpeggiated strings here
you probably barely even hear those in
the mix because they're getting drowned
out by the bass in the delay pad and
then I've just got a basic
four-on-the-floor ultra beat pattern
it's nothing special it's just three
samples a kick a snare and an ambient
clap so the way we're going to approach
this is we're going to keep the ultra
beat just the way it is but we're going
to add another track down here just for
the kick drum we're going to isolate a
copy of the kick drum from the ultra
beat kit so that's I'm going to do first
I'm just going to duplicate by clicking
here my Ultra beat track I'm just going
to call this kick SC I'm going to just
join all these clips together by hitting
J hold option and duplicate the clip
down here put it in place let's open
that up we're going to delete everything
that isn't a kick drum so I'm going to
click on the oh as you can see my snares
are on D here so I'll just click on D
and hit delete all my claps are on the
ambient clap around E so get rid of
those now the other thing is the
sidechain sort of effect that I want is
just a quarter note effect just boom
bump bump bump that's where I want the
compression to hit so there's this extra
little sixteenth note in the drum
pattern that we don't want so I'm going
to delete that roam it that and really
because it's basically the same thing
that repeats you know for eight times
it's seit the same eight bar pattern
that repeats eight times I'm just going
to take my marquee tool in in bar mode
and just sort of trim this up so I just
have this little tube our idea here hang
on let me get my cycler range situated
here I'll just solo that out so it's
just a kick drum just to keep drum on
quarter notes so we're going to do is
click on that and we hit command R to
repeat it and we'll join all those
together
all right now the thing about
side-chaining
is that you cannot use MIDI data or an
instrument track to sidechain compress
and again the whole goal of this is
every single time one of these kicks
hits the compressor is going to duck
down is going to compress the signal the
sidechain source has to be an audio
source so we have to convert this MIDI
data to audio so I'm going to right
click on it I'm going to go to bounce
and join and we go to bounce in place or
you can hit control B I'm just going to
call this SC kick create a new audio
track there we go so now we can get rid
of this MIDI track and we have this
sidechain kick here I'm going to go
ahead and mute the ultra beat just from
now there we go
just quarter notes so we're going to do
is we're going to take I'm going to mute
the arpeggiate strings for now I'm gonna
take the bass and the delay pad and
we're going to send them to a common
auxilary channel strip and then we're
going to compress both of these together
with that pumping effect with our
sidechain kick here so they just open up
my mixer and hit X and I'm going to go
to options create new auxilary channel
strip or ctrl n I'm going to call this
ox track SC group so sidechain group
pull the volume up whoops we just do
that it was picking up my microphone and
then what I'll do is I'm going to throw
the compressor on here a dynamics
compressor I did show how to do this in
another video in my main logic series
but the compressor was the old
compressor so it looks a little bit
different really all the controls are
the same it just looks it really just
looks different now you can use any of
the circuits that you want for this I
just like to use the digital one for
this because we're using the the
compressor not really for any like a
tone we're really creating just a
musical effect
and the digital circuit really is like
the most reactive I suppose probably the
most accurate it may not give it the
best vibe but it's a is the most
accurate so when I adjust the attack and
release times it's going to be pretty
accurate so I'm going to do is up under
the sidechain menu up here we're going
to go choose our SC kick track that we
just created by bouncing that MIDI to
audio now you may see a whole list of
audio tracks appear if you have more
than one audio track in your session but
notice that none of the MIDI your
instrument tracks are listed here so
that's so saying before your sidechain
source has to be an audio track so we
click on that and we're going to do just
for now is I'm going to set the
compression ratio to one to one which
basically means we have no compression
let's group both of our delay pad and
the bass the delay pen the bass together
into this aux track so I'm going to
create an input for this aux track I'm
going to call it I'm going to use buss
one so buss one's going to input into
the SoCs track and these two instruments
are going to output to bus one so when I
hit play both of these instruments are
going to play through the sidechain
group so we just mute everything else
for now
alright so I just turned the limiter on
there just to keep us from clipping so
now what I'm going to do is I'm going to
engage that sidechain kick here's the
cool thing about sidechain with like a
kick drum like this is the sidechain
source actually does not have to be on
it can be muted and you can still hear
the effect for now I'm going to keep it
on but what we're going to do is we're
going to start to dial up our ratio our
the amount of our compression dial down
the threshold and you'll start to hear
this that stereotypical pumping effect I
was talking about
now our synths are getting a bit too
hang on let me turn off that reverb for
now it's just getting a little annoying
I'll turn it back on later you'll notice
that the cents are getting kind of
drowned out by the kick drum now but you
are hearing that pumping effect that I
was talking about one thing we can do is
pull the make up gain up to make up for
that loss in volume
now the amount of that pump that you
want to hear is really going to be
determined by how low the threshold is
and how high the ratio is so if we go
all the way up and all the way down
every single time that kick hits it's
really really hitting what we can do is
we can adjust the attack in the release
time to control how fast the the
attenuation takes place I'm going to
pull them both all the way down I'm
going to pull the threshold up a bit
pull the ratio down just a bit and I'll
tie with it until I get the sound I like
all right so what I was saying earlier
is that the sidechain source the kick
drum here doesn't actually even have to
be on to hear the effect so let's mute
the sidechain kick and let's see what
that sounds like just with the effect in
there
all right so the sidechain source is
just going to remain muted then we can
pull in our arpeggiated strings and our
ultra beat and let's see what that
sounds like
all right so basically I just I bumped
up the base a little bit in the in the
base instrument
I threw the the reverb back in on the
the delay pad added a limiter just to
the sub the sidechain group just to sort
of keep it from clipping the other thing
is you know now that the strings are
actually coming through a lot better
because the the bass and the pad are
being ducked every single time the kick
drum hits now one last thing is that the
when the sidechain kick is not present
you won't hear that effect at all you
won't hear any compression at all so
this opening right here where the chords
are just sort of open without the
sidechain effect or with anything else
playing you won't actually hear the
sidechain affect you'll only hear the
effect when there's a kick trim down
here so one mistake a lot of people make
is they say okay I want to repeat this
section so they repeat the section but
then they like forget to repeat the
sidechain kick so in let it you got to
make sure that you repeat your sidechain
source wherever you want to hear that
effect so let me just play this one last
time and then we'll be done
as you can hear because the the
sidechain compression are using is so
heavy
well when the sidechain source isn't
there the the volume here is very very
loud so you may actually want to
consider you know duplicating this
putting it on its own track the non you
know the the uncompressed parts and
pulling the volume way way down just to
compensate for them alright so I hope
you guys enjoyed this video this is a
great way to send multiple instruments
to an aux track and and compress them on
kick hits or really any instrument or
any sound whatsoever
I've used this even in rock tracks just
to send the guitars and the bass over to
an aux track and then just sidechain the
kick trim just slightly just so that
when when the kick hits the guitar and
the bass get out of the way so it's it
can be used as a musical effect like
this but it can also be used as just a
mixing mixing technique as well
so I hope you guys enjoyed the video and
thanks for watching