Sidechain compression

[bjornvije]

I'm using a Helix floor as a bassist in my band. We are playing in-ear and we have a clicktrack that is working in Logic on a laptop.

Now we want to play dancemusic with that pumping sidechain effect that is used in many dance songs.

Now i saw this video:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sVOiSGSb9g&t=578s

 

This guy is making this pumping sound with a Helix floor but as the sidechain he uses a pulse that is in the Helix itself. Not very usefull in a live situation because the pumping of the sidechain compression has to lock in place with the base drum.

So could this effect be archieved on the Helix floor using an external sidechain pulse? As we work with a clicktrack in logic it could be possible to make an audiotrack with a kick on every beat and feed that into the helix. But it could also be an miditrack that sends a pulse each beat.

 

This would be a great feature because that way you can recreate that pumping sound live that is normally only heard in produced dance songs.

Thanks for thinking along.

[bassbene]

Chad Carouthers is probably the most out-of-the-box-thinking person in terms of Helix. Check ou his other videos like using the Helix as a synth without any guitar for instance. Just brilliant to show what is possible with the Helix unit.

In terms of side-chaining with the use of an external source (like fx return or alike), there is currently no chance to implement it without an external device (aka a compressor with side chaining capabilities). I would love to have that option as well. Maybe it is worth a shot on Ideascale.

[craiganderton]

On 9/8/2022 at 9:07 AM, bjornvije said:

But it could also be an miditrack that sends a pulse each beat.

 

Then it's doable, but you need to be able to map the MIDI note driving the kick to a continuous controller.

 

An easy way to test this out is to turn off Helix hardware compatibility in Preferences. Then, use a keyboard's sustain footswitch (controller 64) as a controller to trigger the compressor. My favorite for this application is the Ampeg Opto Comp. Trigger the Compress parameter, with Min Compress at 0.0 and Max Compress at 10.0. Every time you hit the footswitch momentarily, you get the pumping effect. Adjust Release to taste. (If you want to keep hardware compatibility enabled, choose a switch controller other than 64 that Helix doesn't reserve as a global controller.)

 

I haven't tried triggering from note data, though. Ableton Live can use Max routing to trigger CCs from notes, but I don't know what can be done in Logic. However, MIDI Solutions' hardware Event Processor can map just about any MIDI event to any other MIDI event. You can download the programming software without buying the unit to see what it does. Or just contact the company and ask them if it will convert note data to continuous controllers, they've always been helpful in the past.

 

Once you map the kick drum note to a continuous switch controller and map the controller to the compressor, you should be good to go. Again, I do this with a footswitch. So, I know that you can achieve that sound, but I haven't gone through the process of converting a MIDI kick drum note to a switch controller.

 

Hope this helps! In any case your question helped me, because it was a reminder to include the "footswitch pump" tip in a future revision of my Helix book :)

[craiganderton]

It just occurred to me...maybe the kick drum pedal could be hooked up to a switch that would duplicate the sustain footswitch function mentioned above. Then you wouldn't need to do any conversion of kick notes to controllers.