SubBoomBass 2

To say that contemporary electronic dance music is a bit heavy on the bass would be an understatement. With the advancement of powerful sound systems and music production technology, any song that doesn’t feature at least a mildly earth-shattering bass can’t really be considered dancefloor-worthy.

So once you start working on your track and create a powerful kick and a catchy drum pattern, the next thing you’ll probably want to work on is the bass. While your DAW may come with many instruments and tools that can help you achieve that, you could also employ external plugins to help you with this task. One example a bass synth called SubBoomBass 2.

Created by Rob Papen, SubBoomBass 2 lives up to its name – which is really just made-up of three words that refer to bass. At its core are two oscillators that can generate many types of waveforms and an even greater number of samples. There are many knobs to turn in each section, but if you wish to achieve a “bassy” sound quickly, then you’ll want to turn up the sub-oscillators a little bit.

Alternatively, if you like to see less knobs in your plugin window, you can always activate the “Easy Page” view and see how that works for you. When you’re ready to compose and actual bassline, just use the synth’s step sequencer; in that same area you’ll find two string oscillators, an envelope/LFO, the modulation matrix, and a section for controlling the X/Y screen.

Although this one can definitely be considered a bass synth, it’s certainly able of creating much more, including ambient or percussive sounds. The thousands of presets are here to prove it, as are the countless modulation options. More importantly, SubBoomBass 2 sounds great, which is reason enough to recommend it.