Kettama's chord stabs start from the sample
That huge stab you keep chasing probably isn't a chord progression problem. Kettama's guide points to the actual start.
▶ Kettama's chord stabs start from a rave sample
The stabby feel comes from keeping top voicings fixed while the root moves. Layer a dry supersaw over the audio stab, keep the sample's reverb short, and make every other element smaller so the stab stays in front.
◢ learn
▶ The sidechain mix knob is a loudness trap
Split the kick into punch and tail before you shape anything. Duck bass around the full kick and mids/highs only around the punch, and keep the sidechain full — partial ducking leaves overlap that trips the limiter early.
▶ The opposite game turns an 8-bar loop into sections
For a B section, list one element's characteristics and write the opposite. Duplicate the loop, chop sustained chords into a quarter-note rhythm, and mirror that into the bass.
◢ free & gear
Grain Freezer holds the audio you just played(free)
Free with no account wall. Hold keeps the frozen texture while you hold the button, Preload grabs the audio that just passed, and Balance fully up can run louder than the dry signal.
UJAM's Detunicorn hypersaw saves patches through your DAW(free)
Two supersaw oscillators, a sub, and up to four unison layers. No factory presets, so patch-save lives in the host; claim before Nov 18 and it stays usable after.
◢ the word
TONIC 2 now sends detected scales and chords to the DAW
Detection isn't changed, but Fold Keys maps scale notes to white keys and Narrow mode keeps chords inside the selected octave — that's the reason to compare it against Scaler Detector on a weird sample.
Mixed-jack patch bay for synths, pedals, and modular
The Mulch Box is a $175 pedal-sized patch bay that routes, splits, loops, and combines quarter-inch and minijack signals across synths, pedals, and modular.
Ron Allen, profiled as a foundational element
The piece traces his history and contribution to house rather than walking through a track.
Larry Heard — Can You Feel It
The warm chord stab that opens and just hangs there while the rhythm slides underneath. · Pairs with the chord stab lead.
| ▲ #15 | Stanny Abram, D-SOUNDS — Fire in my Veins (Original Mix) |
| ▼ #04 | Larry La Birt, Corey Holmes — It's All About The Love For You |
| ▼ #100 | De Biasi & Durante — Street Groove (Extended Mix) ▼ 61 · 1d |
| ▲ #34 | Bonafique, Yuvèe — Profill (Original Mix) |
| ▲ #12 | Sidwho?, Yuksek — Shake (Your Body) (Yuksek Extended Remix) ▲ 78 · 7d · ▶ hear |
- 1. Load Neon (Steinberg Classics).
- 2. The filter envelope is permanently patched to the filter at full depth — you can’t change that, but you can work around it.
- 3. For a track of short notes, turn the filter Attack so slow that the envelope never ramps up before the note ends (crank it clockwise).
- 4. Alternatively, pull envelope Sustain all the way down to set the cutoff floor, accepting the short decay spike.
🔮 Producer Horoscope (for fun) — Your hats are fine, but the synth is jealous.
Save the patch, not the idea.
one of these lands every morning.
for working house producers with a track already half-finished.
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covered in this issue: kettama