Divide and Conquer Your Sounds!

When you start running your sounds through effects, you run the risk of killing some of the important frequencies within that sound.  The most obvious example is on bass sounds.  A lot of times I add distortions or reverbs on a bass and the sound either loses its low-end or becomes muddy.  If only there was a way to put my distortion on the higher frequencies and leave the bass frequencies alone so they can stay powerful...

Of course there is a way!  This technique, commonly referred to as "multi-band processing", allows you to split up the different frequencies of your sound (in our case Highs, Mids, and Lows) and affect each one separately.  So I've created a Free Ableton Live Rack that divides your sounds into three sections, Low, Mid and High (you can adjust what the frequency range of each section) and allows you to place effects on each band separately.

Check out the video below.  I've got a thick pad sound that has harmonic content throughout the entire audible frequency range.  I've added my Easy Multi Band FX rack to it, and put a different audio effect rack on each band. These 3 effect racks are included with the download. Because I can affect each frequency band differently, the original pad sound can be altered dramatically.  The video goes into great detail on how this works, and below the video is the free download link.  (If you like the drum sounds, you can get them over at Ableton Empire for free.)