Track analysis: which technique / process was used here?

[moggadeet]

Hi everyone,

I was analyzing a track I am adding to my reference tracks and I found this inspecting the waveform of the kickdrum,

I am clueless about what kind of process was applied to the track / drums group / master. It looks like the kickdrum was clipped but not horizontally? Does anyone know about a technique / process that could do this to the wave shape?

Thanks in advance and best regards,
Carlos

[bitley]

Anything from saturation to distortion and just add the classic DM ingredient: Get the balance right

[Loque]

The main sound looks noisy which could be in high frequency area. I speculate a LPF was applied or the opposite: the noise was mixed or modulated in.

[aeox]

You talking about the first part only where the fundamental frequency is saturating? Use saturation knob for that. The other half looks like higher frequencies coming in, riding the lower fundamental vibration So is this sound from another full track? that would explain those higher frequencies

[moggadeet]

Yes, that is a "1" during the song where the kickdrum hits. The kickdrum is quite clean, during its first moments, I assume side-chain compression is ducking the high frequencies around it. But the clipping in the kickdrum, I do not think that could be saturation, right? Why would saturation affect the wave like that? Adding harmonics would be understandable, but that is a clean diagonal cut to the sine. It is almost like a clipper that attacks the wave dynamically?

[Loque]

Yes, that is a "1" during the song where the kickdrum hits. The kickdrum is quite clean, during its first moments, I assume side-chain compression is ducking the high frequencies around it. But the clipping in the kickdrum, I do not think that could be saturation, right? Because if it was saturation, would it not affect too the raising part of the KD's wave exactly the same? And I meant specifically that the sine part of the kickdrum is being clipped but not to a constant threshold like I would expect from a clipper, but in a diagonal way.

It could be something else like a pure sine wave and waveshaping can form such curves too.

[moggadeet]

Yes, that is a "1" during the song where the kickdrum hits. The kickdrum is quite clean, during its first moments, I assume side-chain compression is ducking the high frequencies around it. But the clipping in the kickdrum, I do not think that could be saturation, right? Because if it was saturation, would it not affect too the raising part of the KD's wave exactly the same? And I meant specifically that the sine part of the kickdrum is being clipped but not to a constant threshold like I would expect from a clipper, but in a diagonal way.

It could be something else like a pure sine wave and waveshaping can form such curves too.

Thanks, I think I will experiment with Europa and its waveshapers to see if I understand more about the waveshapers.

[Sterioevo]

Fm?

[aeox]

It could be something else like a pure sine wave and waveshaping can form such curves too.

Thanks, I think I will experiment with Europa and its waveshapers to see if I understand more about the waveshapers.

The reason I mentioned saturation knob is because I checked with an oscilloscope and it does the same thing to sine waves.

[moggadeet]

Thanks, I think I will experiment with Europa and its waveshapers to see if I understand more about the waveshapers.

The reason I mentioned saturation knob is because I checked with an oscilloscope and it does the same thing to sine waves.

Thanks for the information, I will check it out!

[aeox]

The reason I mentioned saturation knob is because I checked with an oscilloscope and it does the same thing to sine waves.

Thanks for the information, I will check it out!

It's a free rack extension in t he shop

[selig]

I am clueless about what kind of process was applied to the track / drums group / master.

We are all clueless as to what was applied because we are not seeing the original kick drum. You're asking for a before/after analysis, which is impossible in cases where we only see the "after" (unless we make assumptions).
For all we know, the original waveform was a square. Or it could have been a sine. Or a triangle. Who knows for sure!
All we can do is describe the relative changes we see to the waveform over time, which to me looks like we start with a simple sine wave and morph to a square then add some sort of more complex audio signal (maybe even noise?).
Hearing it would instantly be FAR more revealing and informative than looking only at the waveform IMO.

[aeox]

Hearing it would instantly be FAR more revealing and informative than looking only at the waveform IMO.

[moggadeet]

It was one of the kickdrums (>0:20) in this track, which I made a reference for my productions.

I am getting something similar with the Softube Saturation but not kind of "clean" diagonal clipping. Maybe it is indeed a sine being morphed into a square and not any kind of FX.

[selig]

If you look at JUST the kick from towards the end (see below), it's based on a simple sine wave, with some saturation maybe. I think you've taking a "look" at the kick with claps from earlier, and thus you're getting a lot of additional information (and why I wanted to hear it before really commenting.
Sorry, the image is zoomed in so looks "pixelated"!

[moggadeet]

I did not consider that, many thanks for the help!

[selig]

I did not consider that, many thanks for the help!

It's useful in two ways, #1 you now have a "clean" version of the kick to better analyze, and #2, you see how much other sounds contribute to every note in a beat and how having certain sounds hit with the kick actually create a "new" sound (like when the hat/kick together vs kick alone, etc).

Listen near the end of the track and you'll find an exposed kick on the off-beat (not the kick on the down beat).