Recreate The Synth Sounds of DAFT PUNK, NIN, & THE PRODIGY With Distortion Pedals

[@Emcfree2084]

That NIN section was some of the best I have seen, more of this please. How they create the weird and warm atmospheric pads and stereo delays, I would happily pay for more of this kind of content.

[@StephenLearson]

Ste McFreeman I was thinking of doing something like, Copy Of A. That tune is so cool

[@harleensingh2531]

Yes, more of this please!!

[@asdrofllmao]

This please :)

[@Len_M.]

More NIN. Always more NIN. 😬

[@kodaalijah5543]

Instablaster

[@JulesJenssen]

Yesss bro! That prodigy tone tho! 🎯

[@StephenLearson]

Jules Jenssen I totally forgot how awesome Prodigy was!

[@eross21]

Yes! finally somebody on youtube cover the tone for all my favorite bands! do more like this please. excellent!

[@StephenLearson]

eric ross I’m thinking KMFDM next

[@eross21]

oh yeah perfect. you should defiantly do that!

@@StephenLearson OH MY yessssssss. Along with Prodigy and NIN one of my favourites electronic (or kind of) bands

[@ericb9609]

I love your rendition of Da Funk. You nailed it

[@HoshiFanatic]

I love your channel! Also my secret weapon of choice for my synths in my music is the Demon Fuzz or experimenting with Helix Native which has many high quality modelers of famous distorion and modulation pedals for guitar. My go to for sure.

[@erwinrauter5502]

The whole you did in one line - without commenting - you are so good in combining - do it - without comments - perfect - you know what you're talking about - so - make a mix - and let the youtube people freak out.... I'm looking forw...

[@Kompoteek]

Distortion: on Syn: MEOOOOOW, MEOWMEOWMEOWMEOOOOOOOOOOW

[@ryangunwitch-black]

I'm a big fan of $40 Yamaha synths from eBay through a distortion pedal. Hella fun.

[@VEbeats]

what's the name of the 40$ synth

[@craigsurette3438]

I was part of a poor af goth/industrial/punk musical collective back in the early 90s, and almost our entire arsenal was cheap Yamaha and other home keyboards, run through a crapload of cheap guitar pedals, into a 4 track tape recorder. Those tones, cannot be beat for the price, and it was super useful as a musician to have to learn to make do with what we had and just create something. 2 of our collective later got signed to much bigger labels and made a name for themselves

[@craigsurette3438]

This person is probably talking about various 80s era Yamaha home keyboards, which often at least at one time ended up for sale used at very cheap prices. Most were preset machines, but some like PSR35 allowed rudimentary programming of its crappy 4op FM engine, and was thus highly sought after by people who couldnt afford a "real" synth. Sadly, folks on the internet have gotten wise to these old gems, and they are rarely if ever sold for 40$ anymore.. Here is an example of a PSR 35 in action kzbin.info/www/bejne/f5WVooSQrL9pnas

[@aerov2484]

The lead from Breakwater "Release The Beast" is a factory preset from the Prophet 5, like one of the first bank. Right in front of the ARP 26000 he's got a Prophet 5...

[@jonprosser2980]

That bass distortion was rad. I came here looking for a nine inch nails guitar sound though. Sometimes his guitar sounds like it's running through a synth or something. Any suggestions on a simple way to get that sort of broken up guitar lead sound that almost sounds like a vocal line with some vocal fry?

[@craigsurette3438]

There really isnt a simple way for a person to nail this tone, especially live. Trent Reznor spent a lot of effort recording guitar tones, then resampling them through effects, often with early computer based effects like Turbosynth, or inside his Kurzweil K2000 sampler and then layering the results meticulously to get what you hear He was also very fond of the Zoom 9030's distortion in particular

[@TheGonxaplayerV3]

Nothing like watching Alec Baldwin talking about synth tones

[@CalTN]

Careful where you're pointing that gun, fella.

[@rars0n]

I have a bunch of random distortion pedals, Behringer Vintage Distortion, WMD Geiger Counter, Analogman Astrotone, and some Recovery Effects pedals. The Geiger Counter gets REALLY out there in all sorts of bit-crushing ways. Great video, it makes me want to do some more experimentation! Subscribed!

[@CHONKERBOT]

Hey, Adam! Interested in Geiger Counter - what was your favorite pairing with this monster? I have recently played with MOOG Minitaur send thru the new Walrus EONS fuzz pedal and then but crushed with Meris Ottobit Jr.. Hell of a character!

[@PetersPianoShoppe]

Awesome recreations, but remember that the Da Funk lead was either 1) resampled to create the formant shift as the line moves down, or 2) applied some kind of envelope to the keyboard such that the filter envelope decay would reduce the lower you move down the keyboard. Not sure which one they employed (and I don’t own an MS-20 so I’m uncertain if it had that capability) but it’s crucial to the final sound.

[@wolfsfroth]

pumpin that NIN bass line through my 2x10.... um yeah. subscribed.

[@LewisWrigglesworth]

this was the most satisfying video Ive ever seen in my entire life please could you make a part 2 with some more examples

[@ddrrr3799]

Give as more prodigy sounds Bro!!! Respect!

[@RedCloudServices]

Liam Howlett is just locked in to great tones. I would love if you could recreate “Take me to the hospital” 🤟🏻

[@SpiderofPnyx]

Great performances, cool tips. You deserve way more subs than you have.

[@StephenLearson]

Spider of Pnyx thanks for the kind words! I’m trying to get the view counts up so I can make it worthwhile for synth companies to lend me synths to do videos with. It’s such a specific niche and I’d appreciate any advice on how to spread the word. Thanks for watching

[@GNeuman]

Brilliant video, very well done, great playing and you have a great ear!

[@eddyray666]

What a great video. Hats off to you man. EDIT: My go-to filth tone is a Polivoks eurorack module through an Abominable Electronics Hail Satan fuzz. 🔥

[@chrisbarnette7137]

Thank you for this video I love to see experimental ways to new sounds and noise.

[@slothjohnson4724]

Awesome video!

[@calebm6187]

Nice video man! Definitely subscribed to this channel.

[@StephenLearson]

Caleb M hey thanks!

[@DaveS-Ace]

Brilliant vid

[@theinnermostsanctum]

Using a Roland Ax Edge with a Behringer HM300 Heavy Metal Distortion pedal into the Orange Micro Terror 20 Watt hybrid head preamp FX loop. 0 to 60 defonetly but still crushing...

[@markothe]

Great video. I just purchased the elektron distortion, will see how that goes.

[@StephenLearson]

Marko Petrovski sweet let me know!

[@NVSTRZ34]

Such good content. Every time I see some Nine Inch Nails videos of yours pop up, I instantly navigate to them lol

[@oliviaward4859]

nice work and thanks for sharing

[@StarRock442]

The Prodigy used a sample. I think that sample was originally a guitar but was heavily manipulated. Saw a tutorial on it years ago. Here on youtube. Some guy recreated it and it was spot on.

[@grontsager]

Amazing 💕

[@amphetamean66X]

This is good for live but honestly most DAW have software distortions that you can apply after you play whatever you want to write. For live though Boss DS-1 is a classic. Fun for vocals too if you want that Suicide Commando/Hocico sound.

[@pullthereins]

Awesome!!!

[@audiblevideo]

Just found you channels synth pedal series. I hope you got your 2600, cause now you can.

[@benmast7089]

SH01A with RAT pedal👍👍 It works also with the OG SH-101or the behringer clone.

[@simonemghilardi]

Nice video! Sorry to correct you but Breakwater's song features a Prophet 5, which has oscillator sync (ARP 2600 doesn't, I suppose it was used in the video just because it looks cool). Also, the sound is even one of the factory presets!

[@andrefelixstudio2833]

Great video, super cool and very well explained excellent!

[@budree4240]

Prodigy. Yeah this was awesome

[@Frozirra]

So that’s where he went after they finished Arrested Development! Btw I’ve only ever considered the Boss DS-1 usable after modifications.

[@amitomar7296]

What is the name of this composition > 2:28 ? I heard this song from McLaughlin somewhere in 1985 and I don't remember which album; Jean-Luc Ponty was also there Thank you in advance!

[@Alienoidz]

WOW nice ! very nice!

[@blairblainethepsychicmiscr9462]

God damn dude so goood

[@michaelsanders9147]

If you could do talk about what you're doing to create the base sound you're applying distortion to that would be helpful as well. Can you reproduce the beginning of Trip Like I Do by The Crystal Method? I've always wondered how they produce that Crystal Method sound.

[@rogeliovaldez6594]

What kind of keyboard for the nin is that

[@StephenLearson]

Behringer Model D

[@SimersTO]

Please do more videos discussing daft Punk tones this video was great!

[@gtralive-2024]

I once saw a website that listed 200 of the Prodigys synths and instruments that they used!

[@StephenLearson]

GuitarVFXlive hook me up with that address!

[@gtralive-2024]

@@StephenLearson -This one is new but i had a pdf of 200 synths on my dead hard drive years ago. theprodigy.info/equipment/

[@IdeologieUK]

good good good man!

[@osmancan6132]

Very good content, thanks🤌

[@OttosTheName]

Damn I know what I'm doing the rest of the week. One of my favorite distorted synth sounds came from the Yamaha Reface CS. The Distortion in there is so mean! Run a slightly detuned saw wave sound with a sub oscillator through there and you get this really nasty, but pretty modern and tight sound, almost like a modern distorted guitar sound. If you look for 'Yamaha Reface Penta' on SoundCloud it should be the first thing you find. 'Gnarly Distorted Yamaha Reface CS Riff' is also pretty mean. That's the only reason I sometimes miss that synth. Haven't been able to replicate that distortion sound.

[@chemical3495]

What keyboards are you using?

[@DestinyAstara]

A light distortion from a BOSS MT-2 W metal zone waza craft paired with earthquaker devices astral destiny

[@jordanWAH]

i was hoping to hear the poly D with fuzz or distortion! I love the choices of prodigy and nine inch nails tho!

[@danielg.w5733]

I see joyo pedals, i click

[@zyonmdc]

amazing

[@jboren1200]

I enjoyed this video very much!!! I really liked that you went over a NIN song!! Any chance you could show how the bassline from that's what I get is made? Or Praga Khan track love u still... what is that synth from??? No one can tell me!!

[@amazeus1980]

If Im not wrong...that prodigy distortion is from some roland rack synth...seen some guy on YT here who was talking about it....forgot his name as well xD

[@kerney1981]

I've just seen one of the greatest videos in my entire life. Thank you! Right in the fucking feels!

[@smellymala3103]

With the tracks labeled as such do these register as a cover performances? 🤔

[@StephenLearson]

Daft Punk hasn’t come knocking on my door yet. I dunno, I don’t have ads on my channel so maybe no one cares

[@smellymala3103]

@@StephenLearson I was just curious because I had been researching PROs and learned that cover performers are compensated through royalties and so I was wondering if this type of demo would be one method of generating that sort of income. Since I have now wasted a little of your attention I will add that I learned a lot and even though I thought I was a circuit bending noise head the distortion pedal would typically be the last thing I reached for in preference of a verb or delay. I’m walking home from work and I’m going to wipe the dust off my MXR 90 and stick something from teenage engineering into it!

[@Skiroy]

How do you have your Sydney’s sitting on top of your Rhodes?

[@StephenLearson]

I thought Sydney was down under?

[@Skiroy]

@@StephenLearson lol. Sorry. Synths

[@GP1055]

Cool video. Can you show us how youre making these sounds?

[@JacobAndJamal]

All were spot on except The Prodigy synth . I’ve been looking for a while to re create a similar sound with some more “oomph” to it

[@DJRY360]

Da Funk is notactually done with a distortion pedal but the resonance cranked on the high pass to the point it breaks down the signal.. One of the reason ppl seek out those original ms20s. When those filters start to self oscillate they can get really dirty! But the Boss pedal did a pretty good job also. Plus everyone has a DS-1!

[@benkovrishkin8956]

What gear did you use to pair the pedals with the synths? Or did u do it directly?

[@computeevangelist]

Daaaaamn, thats good stuff. Any chances of sharing Behringer path for Head Like a Hole?

[@StephenLearson]

Andrzej Łapiński it’s not too complicated. Just use all 3 oscillators - Square, Pulse 1, and Pulse 2. Then detune Osc 2 a hair sharp and Osc 3 a hair flat. Filter all the way open

[@philippezsiga1125]

this is not the arp 2600 but a preset from the prophet V !!!

[@alexeykurilo4381]

Hello there.. looks like i had not enough power in my synth output and distortion pedal does't do a good job, for example my low ends completely disappear and i cant increase it using pedal settings. Should i use addition preamp to boost my signal before it comes into distortion/overdrive pedal?

[@StephenLearson]

Alexey Kurilo what pedals/synths are you using?

[@alexeykurilo4381]

@@StephenLearson after shock + modal craft 2.0... things started to be better when i use mono inputs with preamps in my mixer ( soundcraft notepad).. but when i use it without mixer panel it sounds like a crap.

[@StephenLearson]

Alexey Kurilo hmm I never used the Aftershock before. You might want to invest in a radial re-amp. Lots of pedals can cut the bass of synths. It’s a tricky business

[@alexeykurilo4381]

@@StephenLearson yep, not so smoth as reverb/delay pedals..

[@adamkrasneski3679]

I cant say im overly impressed with the final outcomes. That being said, I think u r putting more effort into a fairly niche topic that I happwn to be very into and, for that, uve just got urself another sub. Keep it up sir.

[@cooldude-qp1nf]

Can you make me some nin type beats it’s just really pathetic when I search them up, and they sound nothing alike. I would be glad to buy them off you

[@StephenLearson]

cooldude200009 hit me up www.learsonpeak.com/contact

[@purpled4864]

Could you do skinny puppy's assimilation? Can't get my head around it

[@CKT1138]

What about Assimilate are you trying to figure out? I'm a pretty huge SP fan, I might be able to give you some info

[@Kruse1]

"Daft Punk didn't actually play this one, it was a sample by..." like all their stuff.

[@RedPhroggz]

Not all. For Random Access Memories they HIRED people to play real instruments.

[@christopherrusch]

@@RedPhroggz hired?!? no way, they’re geniuses

[@thedoberman7535]

How about overdrive pedals through synths ?

[@StephenLearson]

The Doberman The Joyo American Sound and JHS Colour Box are technically overdrive I suppose. The Strymon Deco is my new fav for overdrive saturation. kzbin.info/www/bejne/oJWrapuVadWnarM

[@lordundhimself1310]

Damn dude, where did even find THAT Breakwater video?

[@K1ngalex]

Actually the Breathe melody was played on piano. You can even hear noise from sustain pedal.

[@StephenLearson]

Alex King woah, that’s wild

[@K1ngalex]

@@StephenLearson Liam talked about recording this melody in a book.

[@StephenLearson]

Alex King it wakes sense that it’s an acoustic instrument. That sample sounds so alive. Thanks for sharing

[@GP-iv8py]

It’s actually the James Bond theme chopped up and processed 👍

[@zootheory9647]

Do more distortion pedals on synths! I bet Prodigy used a bunch of different pedals

[@StephenLearson]

ZOO THEORY check this one: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oJWrapuVadWnarM

[@mickeythompson9537]

Boss SE-70 was much used by them at the time - multi effects, including filter, distortion, and cab-sim.

[@brendongriffin4164]

Indobox rocks!

[@euricobrandao7918]

now u can have the ARP 2600, everyone does xD

[@T.d.Mack74]

I’m all bout that vibe🎛

[@brianambelis5869]

this was sick and sexy. subscribed!

[@robertsteinberger5667]

I dont have an arp 2600, who does? Have you ever heard of Behringer?

[@fbowie21]

Do you play the guitar as well

[@StephenLearson]

Yes but my skills are limited to power chords and blues scales

[@fbowie21]

@@StephenLearson are you a fan of a flock of seagulls?

[@StephenLearson]

Who isn’t?

[@fbowie21]

@@StephenLearson they used the Korg Delta a lot on their first two albums

[@StephenLearson]

Fred Hand cool I didn’t know

[@skaterocker666]

Why do you have so little subs? Hope the youtube algorithym blesses you one day!

[@SteelyEyedMissileDan]

Head Like A Hole tone sounded a little too gritty. Too aggressively sawtooth I think? I don’t fucking know, I play guitars.

[@tacticalcenter8658]

your version of Head Like A Hole, was better than the original! where can i get the track to listen to later?

[@craigburton4447]

Would have been nice if you'd shown us how instead of just showing us you can can do it.

[@stevenaustin4591]

sadly, its nowhere near close enough to the original sounds

[@xityarxip]

Robot Rock or wtf is it's called I hate the most because it's uninspired and repetitive to hell. Wish they expanded on it instead of just repeating the hell out of one key over and over again.

[@sandwich-breath]

That was the point… and it still grooved. It’s minimalist to an extreme and conceptual. They were pretty brilliant and inventive.