Quick tip

How to Stack Distortion on Hardstyle Leads in Serum 2

If you're designing hardstyle leads in Serum 2, make sure you're stacking your distortions.

My notes from this Short

01

Five distortions instead of one tube

Here's my dry lead. Usually people only add some tube distortion. I add a diode, some stompbox, some tape saturation and finally some hard clipping.

02

Change the order of the stages

Once I have my five distortions in place, I play around with the placement, because there's an order of things. If I first put the diode, that sound then gets tube distorted. This is the reason stacking them makes a very big difference.

I add stages of character and build the lead up with a lot more precision.

Serum 2 FX rack on bus 2 for a hardstyle lead: a filter, five distortion modules in a row and a reverb
Five distortions stacked on bus 2, ready to move around.
What I use in this video

Serum 2

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