Pitching Kicks With Extra Processing

A method on how to pitch your kick without screwing it up, and even make it sound better. It's for pitched rawstyle drops, but you can use it for euphoric hardstyle as well.

In this tutorial

    My notes from this video

    01

    Set the pitching method to E3 mono

    Watch 2:43

    This is standard pitching. Duplicate your kick, separate the bass from the tok and make the bass unique, so you only change the pitch of the bass. I go three up, then five up, then two down.

    Then I put the pitching method at E3 mono, otherwise it sounds bad. On Auto it sounds off. E3 mono is where it's at. Nimble Kick is better than this though. You just drag and drop your kick into it.

    FL Studio channel settings for the kick with the time stretching Mode set to e3 mono, for pitching a hardstyle kick
    Time stretching Mode on e3 mono in the channel settings.
    02

    Stretch the pitched kick and render it

    Watch 5:23

    Everyone pitches kicks that way and it works. But your kick sounds like a finished kick, then you add the lead to it and it loses its power. It's really static.

    So take the bass line of your drop and pitch the kick that way. Then I open Stretch in Nimble Kick, stretch the whole sample and find the sweet spot for this particular sample. It's really weird but it's dope. Render it with File, Export, Wave file and load it back into your playlist.

    Nimble Kick on Time Machine (Stereo), root E2, separate tail on and tail Stretch at 168%, stretching a pitched hardstyle kick
    The tail Stretch knob in Nimble Kick, here at 168%.
    03

    Boost the key of the song in the bass

    Watch 6:32

    Make an automation clip of the gain to remove the tok, so only the bass tail is playing. Render the tok separately. Now you can change the bass separated from the tok, and that's what really starts changing your kick for the better.

    I look up the key of the kick, in this case E, and boost E5 and E6. I automate it, so during the kick these frequencies open up. That adds drive. If your song is in G, you boost G. Then I remove some 300 Hz because it's really muddy, and automate the sub so the first punch has no bass and the end gets more bass.

    Fruity Parametric EQ 2 on a hardstyle kick bass, band menu at Key, E: E5 at 659.3 Hz and E6 at 1318.5 Hz
    Right-click a band, then Key and E. E5 is 659.3 Hz, E6 is 1318.5 Hz.
    04

    Distortion and two reverbs on the punch

    Watch 9:21

    For the punch I boost the key too. I find E5 and add distortion. What you always want to add is a snare. That gives it a rawstyle effect.

    Then I render reverb for the punch and create two. One is a soft one, a little bit mono, with volume automation so I can choose where it opens up. The other one is really distorted, in the key of the song.

    05

    Finish the kick with the melody on top

    Watch 13:17

    When you have your kick finished, don't say it's finished. Pitch the kick, render everything, separate the tok and the bass one more time and create buses for it. You want to make a kick that fits with your melody.

    I think only really good producers like Atmozfears or Devin Wild know when their kick is ready. For most people, including me, you notice when you create the melody on top of it. Because you made a preset for this specific kick, you can still change it and play around.

    What I use in this video

    FL Studio·Nimble Kick·Kontakt·Fruity Parametric EQ 2·Fruity WaveShaper·Fruity Limiter·Fruity Stereo Shaper·iZotope Ozone 8

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    Galactic Hardstyle Vocals Vol. 1 artwork

    Galactic Hardstyle Vocals Vol. 1

    The kick I pitch here comes from a template in this pack.

    View the pack