Kick and Bass Alignment

After a break and a few weeks of being tied up to a bed, I'm coming back with the last video from a series of technical tutorials! During this time, I had time to consider changing the approach of those videos, and I believe that I found a better way to share my knowledge with you.

The new approach will be much more practical, as I decided to continue working on my music, and after each session, I will record a video and explain all the processes I went through that session! Now, let's get back on one important topic regarding aligning kick and the bass.

When it comes to a kick and the bass, and we have both of them sounding nice, we need to go through the process of aligning the kick and bass, so that both of those sequences align together.

The main and only thing we need to fix and adjust is the area where kick and bass are summing together, and that is the area where the first note of bassline seats. This should be the only point where kick and bass are overlapping and summing together, and this area is usually problematic.

For most of my career, I was spending time trying to perfectly align the kick and the bass. This process requires some of the adjustments on the kick, and how I would do this process will depend on the keynote of the bass line. The only way we can perfectly align the kick and the bass is that we make the tale of our kick have the tail in the same oscillation length as our bass line. By reading this, you can already make a conclusion, that the keynote of the bass line will dictate how our kick will sound. If we make our track in F, F#, G, then this process can be really easy, as the fundamental frequency of those notes is around d 50hz, and 50hz is the "meat" of the kick, and I don't feel comfortable to change that frequency of the kick, no matter what key of the bass line is. I was looking for a solution, how can I align kick and the bass in that way so I don't need to change my kick. I love designing my kicks, and I'm putting a lot of effort into designing my kicks, and I do not want to change them just because I want to use some of the lower, or the upper keys. Regarding that task, I found a solution where I do not need to match the phase of the kick and the bass, and I believe I found a way where I can use both of those channels as they are.

Check the video below to see what techniques you can use to solve this issue.