How to Make Kloenk and PVC Kicks

I build the punch in Serum and distort it with Diode 1, then a compressor on multiband. What I liked about some punches I made is that I put the compressor before the distortion. That gives you that nice overdriven saw effect. You get a different sound either way, so just know you can do both.

For the filter I use a flanger, the bass variant. Boosting the bass alongside the mid frequencies is where you get the nice sound. If you don't, you get a way too mid-heavy punch.

Then I open the ring mod on the filter. The blend between the clean sound and the ring mod is really where you get that crunchy kloenk sound. There are places where the harmonics boost each other, and that's where you really want to go. It will depend on the note and on the FM level.

That's the basic idea behind these kicks. A static saw wave, or just something static, with a ring modulator or a flanger on it. If you don't use Serum, Fruity Flanger or LFO Tool work too.

Finally I layer this on top of a normal punch. Take a mid-intro punch, zoom in, remove everything except for the click and put it in the same channel. Then take a punch bass. It's basically just the bass of a normal EDM kick, and we have a lot of those in the sample pack. Put that underneath.

Make sure the click and the bass don't get too overwhelming. Otherwise you get a very attacky punch, and I don't like those.

A lot of people struggle with the gated tail, but it's easier than you think. Find a mid-intro kick, get that into your mixer and add Valhalla Room or any reverb you like. 100% wet, no highs. Then an inflator, a soft clipper to boost it, and distortion. Put an EQ in front of everything to get rid of the click, so it's just the rumble.

If it starts to sound like a resonant rumble instead of a clear sound, get Pro-Q with the stereo placement on side and put it after the distortion. I like to first cut the highs, distort it, and then do the sides.

Take Edison and record what you just made, but record the full tail. Normalize it and grab it into the playlist. I'm definitely not using the beginning, because it's very punch heavy. Then process it again with an inflator, a soft clipper and distortion. Prevent going into the extremely clipped sound, you want to keep those rumbles.

Render it again and you see it gets better each time. If it's a very muddy rumble, a very easy way to fix it is to take down the mids.