How Ninajirachi built that tearing lead
The lead in 'WannaCry' isn't a wavetable. It's a noise oscillator FM-ing a square wave, and the patch is easier to steal than you'd think.
▶ FM-ing a square wave with Serum's noise oscillator
Set one oscillator to a square or saw, route the noise oscillator as FM source with a fast unsynced LFO on FM amount — you get the buzzy, fighting texture from Ninajirachi and Porter Robinson leads. A quick patch that works in Ableton Wavetable too.
◢ learn
▶ Lush string pads from Wavetable's Modern mode and a 1% fold
Two wavetables (String Three and Harmonica), split routing to separate band-pass and low-pass filters, and three 750 ms envelopes for long swells. The trick: 1% fold in Modern mode adds brightness without sounding obviously folded. Higher notes thin out automatically via key-tracking on sub, unison, and drive.
▶ Recreating Prospa-style drums using Ableton's stem separation
Use 'Separate to New Audio Tracks' on a reference to pull apart kick, clap, and hat. Consolidate a kick snippet, find a similar replacement sample via 'Show Similar Files', and A/B against the original with sidechain referencing. Layering clap + snare and low-cutting the drum stem into a top loop seed helps nail the groove.
◢ free & gear
A spectral sidechain compressor that ducks only the clashing frequencies(pwyw)
Free, pay-what-you-want, and it uses 32 dynamic bell filters (multiband mode) or STFT spectral processing to carve space for a kick without the broadband pump. Place it on the 808, route the kick to its sidechain input — the frequency overlap ducks, the rest of the bass stays put.
An oscilloscope that colours bass red, mids green, highs blue(free)
See exactly how a compressor shapes a kick, or whether your sidechain is opening enough space, with 22 tempo-locked divisions and 64x zoom. Free checkout (email key), no iLok. Inspired by s(M)exoscope, finally working on modern macOS.
◢ the word
A looper pedal with a drum machine inside, exports WAV stems
$599, four loop tracks plus a 4-track drum machine with varispeed that changes loop pitch while keeping drum pitch fixed. Export individual loop tracks as WAV files to microSD — useful if you start ideas on hardware and finish in a DAW.
Prospa — Prayer
the acid bassline that rolls in after the vocal break, all squelch and filter movement · Prospa's drum programming is broken down in today's teach item.
| ▼ #03 | DE SOFFER — Smalltown Boy (Extended Mix) |
| ▲ #07 | Franky Rizardo — Shinjuku (Extended Mix) |
| ▼ #87 | Souler (ES) — L.O.L.A (Original Mix) ▼ 74 · 1d · ▶ hear |
| ▼ #90 | Archie Hamilton, Life on Planets — Hypnotize Me (Extended Mix) |
| ▲ #17 | Filta Freqz — Dirtbox |
- 1. In Serum 2, set LFO 1 to a pluck shape, assign it to oscillator A’s amplitude, and set the rate to 16th notes.
- 2. Use the LFO’s Smooth control to soften the transient click.
- 3. Add a Downsample distortion module and set Drive to 21%.
- 4. Assign the same LFO to the distortion’s Mix knob so the grit arrives with each stab.
- 5. Tweak Smooth again if the distortion adds harshness.
🔮 Producer Horoscope (for fun) — Your hi-hats will attempt a jazz-inspired microtiming shift at 3 a.m. Let them.
Now go build that buzz.
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covered in this issue: ableton wavetable · polyend loop