Hiroyuki Sawano's (Attack on titan) Glitch Synth Sound?

At the beginning of Erwin's Charge I think we have a comb filter, which can make a sound a lot like feedback on an amp. I think there is some filter sweeping - adjusting the frequency and/or amount of the comb filter, or altering the cut off of a resonant low pass filter.

The glitching can be done by hand with a low pass filter, effectively turning off the sound, but is most likely either a gate (turning the volume on and off) or a sequencer set to play tiny note fragments with silence in between (either actually a gate or just an effect like one).

Does any of that sound plausible?

Feel free to ask for elaboration, or to tell me I'm way off!

There are several plugins you can use to glitch a synth - Izotope's Stutter Edit, Sugar Byte's Effectrix and Looperator, etc. For drums, and convenience, I use Audiomodern's Playbeat since it has percussion already built in while still allowing you to import samples if you wish. AFAIK, there is only one softsynth with built-in glitch effect - Dmitry Sches' Thorn. 2getheraudio's G8tor is another synth with glitch effects, but it's nowhere near as full-featured as Thorn.

This site provides a list of free glitch effects and some extra information.


In addition to low pass filters (with the resonance dialled up a bit) and comb filters, a flange effect could be in play. Flanging works basically the same way as a comb filter. A lot of synths will have one or more of these, but as @tressie5 said, not so many synths will have a built in glitch effect.

I would use any gate where you can draw in the volume, to give you quick on and offs. Cable Guy's ShaperBox is an example that can provide a lot of options.

There’s a cool synth that @doctoremmet introduced me to called DS Thorn that has a built in glitch section, it’s easy to work with and you can get some great sounds out of it

If you have a specific synth you already really like using and want to glitch it out the best plugin for that is of course going to be Stutter Edit 2, in my opinion it is the absolute best plugin for that application and it’s a staple of my own music

tressie5 said:

AFAIK, there is only one softsynth with built-in glitch effect - Dmitry Sches' Thorn

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Great synth and affordable as well. Meldaproduction MSoundFactory comes with all fheir fx built in, so it has MXXX in there which is the mother of all glitch effects. So there are more…

But yes, I’d definitely check out DS Thorn (over at Plugin-Alliance). Available for $31 if you subscribe to the FOREVER 29 plan for 1 month. Absolutely worth that price.

doctoremmet said:

Great synth and affordable as well. Meldaproduction MSoundFactory comes with all fheir fx built in, so it has MXXX in there which is the mother of all glitch effects. So there are more…

But yes, I’d definitely check out DS Thorn (over at Plugin-Alliance). Available for $31 if you subscribe to the FOREVER 29 plan for 1 month. Absolutely worth that price.

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I almost used my first code from the new subscription on DS Thorn but I decided to go with the BX True Peak Limiter instead since I use it on literally every master, so Thorn will be my pick for next month!

I think what you're identifying as "glitchy" is really a combination of high harmonics, distortions, and HP or BP filters.

For instance you can apply a heavy distortion to any waveform and then filter it with a HP filter so you only hear the added harmonics by the distortion. Or you can introduce harmonics with a comb filter like Bee suggested and then apply distortion, filter, etc. Maybe add a bit of noise before distorting.

Bee_Abney said:

At the beginning of Erwin's Charge I think we have a comb filter, which can make a sound a lot like feedback on an amp. I think there is some filter sweeping - adjusting the frequency and/or amount of the comb filter, or altering the cut off of a resonant low pass filter.

The glitching can be done by hand with a low pass filter, effectively turning off the sound, but is most likely either a gate (turning the volume on and off) or a sequencer set to play tiny note fragments with silence in between (either actually a gate or just an effect like one).

Does any of that sound plausible?

Feel free to ask for elaboration, or to tell me I'm way off!

Click to expand...

Yeah makes sense, didn't know about the comb filter. That's a new tool for the arsenal, thanks! About the glitching a gate is probably involved but I was mostly wondering about the sound source. Those wierd dubstep like noises that I can't seem to find in dubstep tutorials.

KEM said:

There’s a cool synth that @doctoremmet introduced me to called DS Thorn that has a built in glitch section, it’s easy to work with and you can get some great sounds out of it

If you have a specific synth you already really like using and want to glitch it out the best plugin for that is of course going to be Stutter Edit 2, in my opinion it is the absolute best plugin for that application and it’s a staple of my own music

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thank you! I'll check it out

Fraxer01 said:

Yeah makes sense, didn't know about the comb filter. That's a new tool for the arsenal, thanks! About the glitching a gate is probably involved but I was mostly wondering about the sound source. Those wierd dubstep like noises that I can't seem to find in dubstep tutorials.

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Hmm. Maybe a formant filter? Giving it a vowel sound, and allowing the vowel to be changed. If it isn't a resonant filter sweep, I think a shifting formant filter would be my next guess. On what sounds like a wavetable oscillator/-s.

Of course, it could be a full on vocoder, but it sounds more like a wavetable to me.

Fraxer01 said:

Yeah makes sense, didn't know about the comb filter. That's a new tool for the arsenal, thanks! About the glitching a gate is probably involved but I was mostly wondering about the sound source. Those wierd dubstep like noises that I can't seem to find in dubstep tutorials.

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Here's a very quick try with two tracks of Pigments. I designed a patch running distortion to a flanger to a comb. There is some modulation including a resonant low pass filter that on the higher, more sustained notes is moving more slowly than on the lower, more rhythmically played ones.

Bee_Abney said:

Hmm. Maybe a formant filter? Giving it a vowel sound, and allowing the vowel to be changed. If it isn't a resonant filter sweep, I think a shifting formant filter would be my next guess. On what sounds like a wavetable oscillator/-s.

Of course, it could be a full on vocoder, but it sounds more like a wavetable to me.

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Yeah the kinda pitched noise gives it away as a wavetable or even a sample. Those kind of vinyl scratching effects could be produced by changing the pitch of a sample.

I think the formant filter you hear could be a notch/band reject filter, which is super common in dubstep sound design.

I guess Serum, PhasePlant, or even Pigments with the surgeon filter would do the job. I'm not very much into this type of stuff but I'd go with PhasePlant.

At least for the lead sound in the intro of the first video. For the high pitched sound in the second video around 0:40 it sounds like a BPs filters on some noise with some distortion after the filter. Maybe instead of noise it's also a wavetable with lots of harmonics.

Edit:

Also maybe Vital.

Pier said:

Yeah the kinda pitched noise gives it away as a wavetable or even a sample. Those kind of vinyl scratching effects could be produced by changing the pitch of a sample.

I think the formant filter you hear could be a notch/band reject filter, which is super common in dubstep sound design.

I guess Serum, PhasePlant, or even Pigments with the surgeon filter would do the job. I'm not very much into this type of stuff but I'd go with PhasePlant.

At least for the lead sound in the intro of the first video. For the high pitched sound in the second video around 0:40 it sounds like a BPs filters on some noise with some distortion after the filter. Maybe instead of noise it's also a wavetable with lots of harmonics.

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I was hoping you'd pop by to help out! Thanks!

Fraxer01 said:

Hi, any comments on how you would go about getting those Hiroyuki Sawano glitchy synths or any libraries/packs/tutorials you'd recomend? I'd really love to learn how to use this in my work. Hiroyuki uses them all over the place in attack on titan but here are two specific examples:

Erwin's charge / apetitan (intro)


ətˈæk 0N tάɪtn ＜WMId＞ (0:40)



Thanks!

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Hey fraxer, sawano for glitch sounds use heavyocity evolve, evolve mutations, and evolve mutations 2, also use the storm drum 2 and 3 from eastwest that they also have glitch sounds, but in apetitan particulary, he use 2 patches from Omnisphere called, "Rad Drug" and "Power Blowout", in the intro sounds 2 more sounds (4 in total) that i couldn't find to this day, that sounds like a chainsaw i think xD, but well one day maybe I will find them... and in ətˈæk 0N tάɪtn i think that glitch drum bass, is from Damage with a lot of overdrive, but if you want to create your own glitch sounds just follow the things that they told you up there. I hope this helps you

Those tracks are truly wicked in the best sense of the word.

I think some of the synth wild filters almost sounds like the old Quad Fromage. How old is the track?

Check out the "beat demo" especially towards the end.


Edit: Or maybe the predecessor to quad fromage, Ohmnicide