Creating Dubstep Growl in Bitwig Studio Without Additional VST Plugins

Tutorial | May 29, 2023

In this tutorial, I use a pulley grid in Bitwig Studio to create a growl sound for dubstep without any additional VST plugins. Using a complex waveform in the scroll oscillator, I filter specific vocal noise frequencies using two selling key filters and modulate them with the segments. I add overtones with a sine oscillator before experimenting with a second scroll and a phaser for added texture. I use an EQ plus to amplify these frequencies before using a voice stacking mode to add density and panning the voices. Finally, I use a peak limiter and auto level plugin to balance the levels and give the sound a polished finish. Overall, I hope to provide inspiration for creating unique growl sounds in Bitwig Studio.

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Questions & Answers #

Maybe you dont watch the video, here are some important takeaways:

Question 1: What is the main approach to creating a growl for a dubstep in Bitwig Studio without using any additional VST plug-ins? #

The main approach involves using a complex waveform in a scroll oscillator, along with an ADSR for the volume envelope using audio output. The complex waveform is created by adding a lot of dots, selecting all the dots and randomizing them until it sounds like a broken CD. Two filters are added, with a bandpass 8 pole being the ideal one because it offers a steep frequency cutoff. The filter is then set to modulate the frequency to get to the right vocal noise frequencies that create the growl effect. Additionally, with the help of an EQ plus, two frequencies are selected, and the amplitude of those frequencies is increased to bring out the vocal frequencies even more. The use of a bit crusher and peak filter is also advisable.

Question 2: How can one add more depth to the sound? #

One can use the voice stacking mode in Bitwig Studio and duplicate the patch up to five times. The pitch can be modulated slightly to add some differences between each voice stack, and they can be panned in different directions to create more depth. Moreover, the sound can be fed into the phaser, and the output of the segments can be plugged into the input of the phaser to have the same position of the phaser every time you get the key.

Question 3: What are some ways to make the sound more powerful? #

Using FX3 to limit the peaks of the lower, mid, and high frequencies can help, as well as using the Auto Level plugin to bring out all the frequencies for the low mids and highs at the same time, bringing everything up to 0 dB, which acts as an upwards compression and downward compression at the same time. A peak limiter can also be applied to ensure this setting. Additionally, using a tool device to make everything mono below 300 hertz can create a tighter sound.

Question 4: What are some factors to consider when changing the sound of the growl? #

Factors to consider include changing the scroll, changing the frequencies, how you modulate the frequencies, and whether to use an OTT, bit 8, distortion, or amplifier at the end. The use of the phaser can also be changed as per the algorithm used. Changing certain frequencies can also make a significant difference in the sound.

Transcription #

This is what im talking about in this video. The text is transcribed by AI, so it might not be perfect. If you find any mistakes, please let me know.
You can also click on the timestamps to jump to the right part of the video, which should be helpful.

[00:00.000] Welcome back guys to another tutorial on this channel. Today I want to show you how to create
[00:06.280] some kind of growl for a dubstep in a Bitwig studio without using any additional VST plug-ins.
[00:14.720] And it's actually not that hard. So going for a pulley grid here, so you can explain
[00:20.460] this much better. In here we use a scroll oscillator, we use an ADSR of course, or the volume
[00:28.500] envelope using audio output. So this is how it sounds. So just the bass. So in this scroll
[00:39.420] we need a very complex waveform. When you watch some dubstep producers how they do this, they
[00:46.580] usually go to Serum and create some random noisy waveforms without any fundamental, but
[00:56.980] you can do this here in the grid with the scroll. Also pretty easy by just going here with
[01:02.540] a snap up to a point using this thing, creating a lot of dots, selecting all the dots, right-click,
[01:14.620] transform, double contents, we have even more dots. Then we select all the dots. Go with the
[01:23.620] value here, up to chaos, we randomize all that stuff until it sounds like a broken CD.
[01:33.180] Okay like this, doesn't really matter. So in here we need two filters and we go for selling
[01:46.060] key filter. Because they have bandpass with 8 pole here, which is nice, it's pretty steep.
[01:56.140] And we disable here the pre-code for the pitch because we don't want to change the pitch with
[02:03.180] the keyboard input. So and what we do now, we basically search for the vocal
[02:14.820] noise frequencies, the fixed frequencies of a monster, a grunt. So something around here right
[02:23.740] going up. And we modulate this with the segments. In here we make this a bit slower. Something like this,
[02:40.100] and then we modulate here the frequency. So that's the first frequency, and the second one here
[02:51.300] is a bit higher, maybe by one K. It's basically the same thing with that with the Dile Lama
[02:58.140] reconstruction in some of my recent videos. The same thing, it's just for bass. So it brings
[03:06.580] together centers to equal power. So here we don't want to go up with the frequency, we want to go down.
[03:13.540] Maybe we modulate all the resonance. So we need to find the right frequencies.
[03:39.620] Don't need to modulate that much of the second one. Maybe band pass 8 poles too much,
[04:01.660] maybe go for 4. So now we get more of the initial direct sound through the filter. Okay, that's
[04:18.300] nice. So we can also try here to amplify this even more with the peak filter. We have here the
[04:24.220] 6p filter, which features a peak, which is basically not a band pass. It's more like an EQ
[04:31.900] where you can push a certain frequency additionally. We will also disable this, and then we try
[04:38.540] out to find a nice sweet spot. That's too much. You can already hear it goes in the right
[05:05.660] direction. So what we need now is maybe distortion, maybe a bit crusher. Let's go with distortion.
[05:17.420] What is it? A cellulite display phase, data random oscillator, shaper. It's a shaper.
[05:30.540] Quantizer.
[05:38.300] That doesn't sound good.
[05:40.220] I probably also don't need this. So now that we have basically the rudimentary of the sound,
[05:52.860] what I usually do is to use an EQ plus because it's super easy and you can see what you're doing
[05:59.260] and how it ends up. So we need also two frequencies here, maybe,
[06:03.900] and you try to amplify these two frequencies even more. So we can take you at the output of
[06:10.140] the sequence and start with the first one, increase the frequency. Something like this,
[06:20.940] and also here we go down. It's all about
[06:38.700] bringing out these vocal frequencies. So now we need some kind of base. It's just overtones,
[06:45.900] and you can bring in a sign oscillator here and just skip the whole sequence here
[06:55.500] and blend this together in front of the ADSR.
[07:01.820] Right, this is the sign only. This is the top end.
[07:05.260] So this is something you can do. You can also switch on the retryquering of the oscillator.
[07:16.220] So you always have the same initial start point in the phase or in the cycle.
[07:25.020] You can also try to use the outcome here of this and put it into the phase input of the sign.
[07:33.740] So you distort the phase of the sign oscillator a bit with this.
[07:41.980] Or you can modulate here with the segments.
[07:46.220] Then modulate the skew.
[08:04.380] So you can decide if you want to have it more gnarly or grunty or growly.
[08:11.660] So it depends on what kind of sound you're going for.
[08:15.660] But you get the idea. Maybe I leave it like this.
[08:20.940] You can also try to use a bit crusher here, bit 8 on that.
[08:25.420] To give it more this kind of squealx feel, it uses a lot of bit crusher.
[08:34.220] Maybe go back here to mix 0 and then use the segments to mix this in.
[08:55.660] And with the bit crusher you get all these nice little digital overtones on top of that.
[09:01.820] So it sounds even more like you know these hypergirls.
[09:13.900] Now you go back to this.
[09:22.700] And then with the line here.
[09:26.380] Something like this.
[09:32.540] What you see these frequencies are pretty important actually to hit the right frequency.
[09:51.660] So it sounds like some animals doing some grunts.
[09:56.540] If you are a bit off from these frequencies it sounds completely different.
[10:04.540] So it's very important to dial in here the right frequencies.
[10:07.820] It's somewhere around 100 shards above and here it's around 1k modulating down.
[10:16.060] You can also try to use here a second scroll instead of just 1.
[10:28.540] So you duplicate this one and use a merge.
[10:33.900] Maybe bring in the second one.
[10:36.700] And then of course you take the output you have the segments as an input.
[10:41.420] Right so you move over here to the second one.
[10:45.900] And here you draw in some kind of different shape.
[10:49.980] And I reset the core fair.
[10:52.780] So you do basically the same thing as before.
[10:58.460] Just do this.
[11:01.580] Select everything right click and double.
[11:05.900] And then select everything again.
[11:12.380] Just randomize.
[11:13.740] Maybe use the new one.
[11:36.540] We can play around with the second scroll of the second oscillator to move into a different waveform.
[11:43.740] It's not really important but can give the sound a different edge.
[11:52.860] Right click reset.
[11:55.980] Right or we can load in here some kind of saw.
[11:59.420] I have some different rolls already here.
[12:09.260] It's also just a random waveform here.
[12:11.420] It's nothing special so you can experiment with that.
[12:16.700] But the really important part is basically the filtering here,
[12:19.420] hitting these right frequencies.
[12:21.980] What you also can try is to use a phaser.
[12:27.820] Because the phaser here is kind of the same thing.
[12:35.660] You can hear the phaser on the background.
[12:41.980] So here the thing is, we have an LFO inside of this phaser.
[12:51.420] You can change the LFO speed with the setting here.
[12:57.260] And sometimes this is fine.
[12:59.100] We have like a polyrhythmic movement in there or a polymeter movement in there.
[13:04.940] But I really like to take the output of the segments into the input here of the phaser.
[13:09.820] So now this one is disabled in the LFO.
[13:12.220] It's basically, yeah, uses the msec here as an input.
[13:21.020] So now we have the same position of the phaser every time we get the key.
[13:29.180] And then we can even switch on here the stereo mode.
[13:33.900] And then mix it then here with the rest.
[13:40.220] So this is basically the rough idea about doing a growl or hypergrowl or however you want to call it.
[14:05.660] And if you're not happy with this and you want to have it more dense,
[14:09.660] then you can always go here to the voice stacking mode, right?
[14:12.700] Or not voices, voice stacking here.
[14:15.100] To duplicate basically this patch five times, we go to the voice stack thing here.
[14:23.100] Then we can take minus one to plus one.
[14:25.980] It uses here to modulate the pitch of everything that's inside.
[14:29.180] Just a tad.
[14:36.860] Don't feel like this.
[14:38.060] And we can maybe also try out, let's see, yeah, maybe the filter frequencies.
[14:45.180] I don't know if this makes sense.
[14:47.580] Just a tad to have some differences between each of these voice stacks.
[14:59.020] And then you can try out and move this into different pan settings.
[15:23.420] So we have minus one plus one, okay?
[15:25.260] So we can take this here and spread this across the panorama.
[15:28.940] Oh, we need now is basically a peak limiter and what people usually do is they use some
[15:48.700] kind of odd on this one here, it's the old version.
[15:59.340] But what I prefer basically is to use the FX3.
[16:07.820] And in here you can take the peak limiter.
[16:14.700] It doesn't, which just limits basically the tops of the lower.
[16:20.300] The mids and the high.
[16:23.020] Which is okay.
[16:27.420] You can also try out and instead of a peak limiter, you take here dynamics thing,
[16:34.060] which is more like an odd way, you have an upwards compression and downwards compression.
[16:41.580] But I don't really like this at all, in my opinion, like it's too much hassle to set this up
[16:50.860] and it doesn't sound that good. What you can try is to use my auto level plugin,
[16:57.260] we constructed also in some of my recent videos. So this one here,
[17:04.540] let me set this up. So there's an auto level now in every,
[17:09.980] oh, that's the wrong position.
[17:15.180] So instead of limitars, we have now in these three boxes here, an auto leveler.
[17:20.460] So it tries to bring out all the frequencies for the low mids and highs at the same time,
[17:34.060] bring it up to 0 dB, which is kind of an upwards compression and downwards compression at the same
[17:40.860] time and also put your fancy level on there at the end.
[17:48.780] And then we use a macro and use this here for the fall time
[17:59.980] and see what comes out of that.
[18:11.100] So this is something you can do. Also FX2 instead of FX3 and here we take care of the bass
[18:34.700] and use a tool device and make everything mono. So everything below 300 charts.
[18:43.580] And also a peak limiter to make sure this is speaking here.
[18:47.900] And so maybe too much.
[18:54.060] And also peak limiter at the top.
[18:55.900] And here we can cut out some frequencies from the middle.
[19:11.340] But there, when you cut all this stuff out here, it's basically removing everything that's
[19:16.140] important for the growl. So it doesn't make really sense here. I usually do this kind of stuff
[19:22.380] on these bass lines makes more sense there. But on these growls, you need to persist
[19:29.580] at all cases. These growl frequencies to make it sound like a growl. That's the main takeaway
[19:37.020] from that.
[19:49.900] Sounds kind of okay for me. So you can do all kinds of things with this. You can change the
[19:57.900] scroll here. You can change the frequencies, how you modulate the frequencies.
[20:02.620] If you feed all this stuff into the sign oscillator here with the phase modulation,
[20:09.260] if you use a phaser, how you use the phaser, which kind of algorithm you use. So there are
[20:13.420] kinds of things you can change to make this a different sound. Also you're then of course
[20:18.780] in the effect chain if you use an OTT, if you use bit 8, if you use distortion. It all changes the
[20:25.660] sound in different ways. Maybe an amplifier here at the end.
[20:56.620] Just changing the slightly certain frequencies makes it the whole different sound.
[21:07.260] So I want to show you this, how you can approach certain sounds or these kind of sounds for
[21:11.740] dubstep to make growl sounds in bit with studio without any external devices. And I want to show
[21:17.740] you this and make a tutorial about this and give you some ideas for the right direction basically.
[21:24.060] So that's it for today. Thanks for watching. Leave a like if you like the video,
[21:27.420] subscribe to the channel and I'll see you in the next one. Bye.