How to Make Synthwave in FL Studio
In this video, I'm going to show you how to make synthwave in FL Studio using all stock FL Studio plugins, synths, and drums. Synthwave aka retrowave is a genre of music which has really grown a lot in popularity over the past couple of years. The genre is heavily inspired by 80's movies and video games.
In this tutorial I use a lot of presets which I made using GMS (Groove Machine Synthesizer). If you want to learn how I made certain presets in GMS let me know in the comments below which presets you want me to make videos on. I'm planning on doing at least a couple, but I can do more if enough people are interested.
*I'm not actually allowed to legally redistribute image-lines drum samples, so I can't give out the pack anymore. As I mentioned in the video you can find all these samples inside FL Studio anyway.
Check out part 2 (making the bass): • How to Make Synthwave ...
Check out part 3 (lead synth): • How to Make Synthwave ...
My free drum kit (Over 400 HQ sounds): bit.ly/2OKfoC0
My free ebook on getting better mixes: bit.ly/2Baql8g
How to make white noise sweeps: • How to Make White Nois...
Time Stamps:
overview - 0:22
drums - 1:25
start producing - 3:33
tempo - 3:44
laying down kick - 4:16
laying down snares - 4:32
laying down hi hats - 5:10
synths - 5:42
bassline - 6:00
sidechaining - 6:25
lead synth/melody - 8:06
white noise sweeps - 9:27
crash - 10:10
adding reverb to lead - 10:41
another hi hat/ride - 10:58
adding toms - 11:20
listen to progress in stereo - 12:03
found some nice flex presets - 12:17
laying down an arp - 12:57
time for a pad - 14:12
listen to progress in stereo again - 14:44
adding another arp - 14:58
arrangement - 16:01
final result - 16:52
Website: anothermonsterproductions.com
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#flstudio #retrowave #synthwave
Hope you enjoy the video! I'll be putting out some sound design tutorials for some of the presets that I used in this video. Leave me a comment below if you have specific requests that you want. Time stamps below. overview - 0:22 drums - 1:25 start producing - 3:33 tempo - 3:44 laying down kick - 4:16 laying down snares - 4:32 laying down hi hats - 5:10 synths - 5:42 bassline - 6:00 sidechaining - 6:25 lead synth/melody - 8:06 white noise sweeps - 9:27 crash - 10:10 adding reverb to lead - 10:41 another hi hat/ride - 10:58 adding toms - 11:20 listen to progress in stereo - 12:03 found some nice flex presets - 12:17 laying down an arp - 12:57 time for a pad - 14:12 listen to progress in stereo again - 14:44 adding another arp - 14:58 arrangement - 16:01 final result - 16:52
I really enjoyed this video and definitely will give the GMS synth a try more often. Thank you for creating and sharing your insights and examples. Have a great weekend!
Mark de Muze thanks for checking out video and leaving some feedback. Hope you have a great weekend as well!
many thanks! this is awesome and very inspiring :)
Awesome videos -- quick question for you. As someone who is trying to learn this software, specifically to create synth wave, what version of FL Studio would you suggest to follow along with this tutorial?
Great tutorial, it was simple and straight forward. I learned a lot. You got a really nice sound out of the FL Studio presets. Your sound designing skills are legit, thanks for uploading something like this. I hope to be able to add some of these synth wave elements into what I'm doing. Again thank you.
Nailed it! I love the synthwave sound. Thanks again for the awesome tutorials.
css172 no problem! Thank you for the support. I really appreciate it
Man, I got into a gear frenzy a few months ago and dropped way more cash than I should have on plugins. It'll all be nice stuff to have in the long run, but being so new to production, I should have been a bit smarter about learning first and buying later. But it's really nice to see and know you can use basic plug ins to get great sounding stuff. Great vid, appreciated just getting to watch someone construct a solid idea start to finish.
Thank you for including links to additional tutorials. Your an amazing producer.
Demi_Ectospazm I appreciate that!
Very cool piece to follow along and build up on your own. Thank you for sharing this.
The last delay arp is sick man good job!
Again, thanks for highlighting an FL plugin I've been ignoring for years. GMS really is a lot more usefull than I think a lot of people realize.
ytiralc exactly. I’m just realizing again and again, the synths are in FL (and Logic too), are so good, at least for me, so I don’t really need to buy other expensive plugins.
Exactly I've been using it for most of my projects since I don't have serum or sylenth1 yet and I love it.
you can also use sytrus for the main synth: take the voyager preset and disable the OSC2 Envelope (ENV) on the bottom left
Great video man, thanks a lot! I love this series, hope you decide to do other genres!
Dunno how I missed this. I search for Synthwave videos regularly. VERY good!!
I make my Synthwave in Reason with the MPC Touch for my drums. Combo works great
Thanks for the tutorial, i'm now learning how to use FL STUDIO, i'm trying to create just a synthwave project
Awesome video dude, I learned a lot from this. Thank you for real!
awesome video! i hope i can learn to make synth wave music because i want to experiment with it, i’m still learning but i’ve been on the software for nearly two years now:b hope to see more vids bro
Thank you very much for this video. I think I'll spend several hours on it to learn how to do the same thing. ( I'm a beginner )
Awesome video, im new to music production but i want to make synthwave and this is going to help a ton!!
Thank you for your fantastic tutorials
David this is fire 🔥
I rarely comment, man your videos are so well explained plus the videos are so dam interesting to learn. Thanks bro! 😀
Turksta TRK np! Thanks for the comment. Really appreciate that!
Great tutorial, will definitely inspire my next working session
Super sick with stock pluggins crazy man
Epic Sound ever!!! Want to learn more about it. Thank u so much. More stuff like this soon?.
Thanks for the tips again!
love your video tutorials bro! Any chance for a undergound Deep House tutorial too? 🙏🙏
Love the song, thanks man!
Incredibly useful stuff.
Nice tutorial.. I've been using harmless and harmour for years... Now I will try GMS.. Sound better
This video is so helpful again. Just like all your videos. Thank you
Boba Attila glad it helped!
Love it! More content like this!!
Justin Daniel will do!
I hate to do sidechain, your bass trick is a game changer to me, thank you from Italy
Ill be getting into making synth waves, ill be sure to follow on how you play with the GMS, subbed bro 👍👍🤙🤙🤙 Edit: do you do mastering tutorials as well?
Awesome work bro!
i always call the running bass synth the "nernernerner"
No Nexus, No Serum, No external plugins ... Are you a God?!
Yoo great vid dude 👌 I'm just having some trouble with the side chaining. Not sure how to adjust properly 😅 how do you adjust it?
İt was very helpfull bro..ty for share! :)
sick! 🔥🔥🔥
ur the best for real....i just hope for more lofi tutorials or trap....thanks alot m8
Who Cares!! I’ll definitely be doing more lofi and trap soon. Thanks for the support
Pretty cool :D i really like those walkthroughs
Thanks for the tip! I’ve been producing without shortcuts for so long that it’s hard to get into the habit of using them. I know it would help me speed up my workflow and it’s def something I want to work on more this year
@@AnotherMonster Sounds great, please keep on going and helping others :3
Hey, I was wondering if you could make a tutorial on how to make that pad. I love how it sounds and I would love to use it. This is a great tutorial! I've been following along and it's come out amazing.
Its sounds like its just a Supersaw with a filter envelope and a chorus.
All stock plugins. I like that. And soooo retro. Not sure whet you based it on since you weren't born then, but well done. Totally realistic.
Cricri I was actually born in the 80s by just a couple days. I guess I just have it in my jeans hah
i mean if you watched a lot of older movies ( i have seen tons of old movies and shows ) plus listening to other synthwave tracks, you just get a feel for it.
For me GMS stands for Growling Mad Scientists... :D Great vid mate!
That's actually an awesome acronym!
thanks dude :) learned something.
Amazing tutorial
CAMBIT thanks!
I need FL in my life But I just can't afford it for now... Such a good video!!
i hope you got it and if not im sendin u posi vibes via rn af bb :* :* :*
Big thanks. Would love to understand how you built the bass preset as well as the lead "first contact"
Ok cool. I’ll definitely do those for you. Keep an eye out!
Hey David! Great video, great presets. I’m just wondering, what analog gear you will buy eventually?
Who needs gear when you got GMS
nice
Best tips
Better explain 🙏🔥
thanks bro
Hey do you know Carter he makes Garage, your lighting is 👌🤣 He's on twitch and has a sound cloud. I'm gunna suggest your content, wish the best for you bro, keep making great videos for newbs.
Sir can we creat this very same drum patch with fpc if s then pls upload a vedio on it.... once again u r a great tuter
i love it stil i don’t know how did you put your kick directly in the track list
thanks for the vids tho but where i could find your presets ??
thanks a lot
Thnx a lot man, u gimme a big help w this
Riccardo Antonaci np. Glad it helped and thx for watching!
@@AnotherMonster but what's the stamp for this, i dont get it😅😅
Riccardo Antonaci what do you mean stamp?
@@AnotherMonster in the piano roll, for doing the melody, like aeolian, arabic. The scale
Riccardo Antonaci I don’t remember off the top of my head I’d have to play it out on the piano
This... Is actually mad clean! Lol
Zeeno appreciate that man!
I cant manage to get the same sound you got from GMS synths, how did you set it?
I know it's been a long time, but could you make a tutorial how to make this 80's heaven pad??? I'm really struggling with this one :///
I'm liking the all stock series..i dont have a computer ..am using g stomper on a tablets..works fine only if you keep it stock
Oh nice. I’m not really familiar with g stomper. You like it?
@@AnotherMonster it has great sounds.im telling you...i synthesized an 808 and fell in love with it... I'm upgrading soon but i wont stop using it
is your GMS preset are custom or already In Fl studon Stock??
What CPU do you use ? A buffer length of 2048 samples should be more than enough to cover it. Mix in buffer switch should be enabled. Also try to disable the ASIO input if it's not being used.
nice !
Man, I loved it! You should make a song! About FLEX yes, it uses too much CPU. I tried many ways to lower it but I couldn't. I also experienced many crashes, but what's funny, only in FLEX, while the rest of the stock instruments where just fine. Thanks for the video! Awesome!
JNB thanks!!
@@AnotherMonster I guess sample size is large for Flex. I suspect you can play with the buffer size to see if it alleviates some CPU usage, but it definitely requires some tweaking from Image Line. I think another advantage of using only stock plug-ins is learning to do stuff with what you have. That's why I have really loved this series. I am learning to rely less on the latest VST and more on actually learning how to do stuff in FL Studio.
They already made a new version of Flex available for download in the official forum which fixed the crashes for me.
Hoboken guy good to know! Thanks!
@@EmilHoboken Thanks!
I would also highly recommend to automate the cutoff of the lead and add some phaser to it and maybe automate that too, That would add a lot of movement imo
Y0nex good suggestion. Thanks for that
What about mixing and exporting? is there much to that when it comes to retro synthwave?
Why aren't you programming drums in the channel rack? Good videos btw. :)
Thanks! I do hi hats and other drums that I plan on bringing into the piano roll in the channel rack. Other drums like the kick and snare I put directly in the playlist so I can see the waveform and potentially chop the samples up really easily in the playlist. Plus it’s helpful to see the waveform if you’re doing volume automation for sidechaining the way I did it in the video or with fruity balance.
@@AnotherMonster Oh, I understand. Thanks! :)
can you share some gms presets please?
I have trouble in 5:53, I don't know if i'm missing something. It's just not making the sound like you did, please help!
Hi, how do I get the GMS Synth preset as shown in the video? Love the video so far!
Hamacho unfortunately they’re not released yet. Hopefully soon!
@@AnotherMonster Alright. Thanks for the quick response! : )
It's funny, Synthwave seems like the easiest music to make, but it's not! I have attempted a few different Synthwave tracks and just doesn't feel right. I'll just need to actually finish one instead of just starting new ones. I think the Tom fills will help. Thanks for the tutorial.
It massively helps. I used to scrap so many tunes before because i thought they were crap. Turns out i just needed to finish the drums.
bro how do you make that automation clip for kick
How did u make the preset in GMS
how do I get gms to sound like that? I copied all the settings in the video but it's not even close.
Can you share your GMS presets? Congrats on the tutorial though !
Hit me up on ig
hi, it remind me when i made my synthwave track "NightRider" with amost only "fl studio Ogun"
MDM nice!
@@AnotherMonster thanks
After I finish Hi-hat, it doesn't appear in the playlist, and I can't hear any hi-hat while playing the whole song. What should I do with that?
Can you help me? Because I don't how you make the pad...
Can you give yours presets ?
wheres the link to the folder for synthwave drums
good
I've never had any CPU issue with FLEX even tho having 7 or more tracks loaded with this plugin and effects.
I'm pretty sure it was the multi-tap delay with pitch-shifting he applied at 12:40 that caused the CPU to struggle. Listen to how many "echoes" are playing at once and all at different pitches. Modulated delay feedback requires a lot of number-crunching. You used to have to spend thousands of dollars on a Eventide Harmonizer to get effects like that using its onboard DSP chip. It's slightly more complicated than a simple echo/delay! In general Flex should be relatively low in CPU use, as it's using sample playback (like a ROMpler) rather than algorithmic calculations for its basic waveforms, isn't it?
But how do i get the first synth sound???
Bringing down a group of notes 1 octave can be done with ctrl + down. Now please tell me the button combination for copy pasting like you did with the automation at 7:23 :'). Right now I'm just selecting the things I need "pulling" a copy out with shift.
Dion Peters I’m so bad with using shortcuts. I got in the habit of producing without them years ago and now I’m trying to rework them into my workflow. Thanks for the tip. I know about it just need to start using it. I think what you’re seeing is just an edit in the video. I’m basically just copy pasting everything with ctrl + c and ctrl + v and I’m pretty sure there’s a better way to do that.
@@AnotherMonster Oh okay, as an FL Studio producer I'm always a little jealous of Ableton users who can just press a button combination repeatedly and get a whole sequence of music 5 minutes long, right on the grid, while we're out here dragging them on the grid 20 times super precisely. XD
@@AnotherMonster Really good video btw, just got into this type of music and this will give me a head start!
Dion Peters thanks!
@@AnotherMonster ctrl + b for faster copy pasting
Does anyone know where i can get this Synthwave Pack at 2:36 ??
in regard to flex,are you using fl studio asio?,if you are,maybe thats why it glitches,asio4all is still the best,otherwise,cool synthwave rendition,brings back memories
I doubt its FL Studio asio driver. It has to of been flex not being optimized.
@@darrenhirst9900 i have drop outs with FL studio asio but not with asio4all,so i always use asio4all now
@@ronnyb5890 Well as long as it works for you. I use to use it but now I use nothing but FL Studio asio and never have any problems.
@@darrenhirst9900 like you said darren,as long as it works
drop a more chill chillwave tutorial
As a beginner i found you clicked on things way too fast haha! Ha to pause a lot but great tutorial, you really helped me learn some basics
Nope! Can't get passed the high hat part. I'm doing exactly what you show but mine is a completely different temple, much slower. Are you doing shortcuts and not showing us?
Where can I download the free drumkit.. it seems it is not available anymore
Just use these from the 80s www.drumkito.com/sample-packs/linndrum-sample-pack/
how can I get your presets
great video! but where's the synthwave kit?
luka I got an email from image-line to take it down because technically it’s illegal to redistribute their samples which makes perfect sense. Sorry about that. All the sounds are in FL studio anyway. You just have to find them
@@AnotherMonster oh okay, thanks for letting me know!
where are these presets?
Do anyone know what's the name of this sound effect at 5:59 or any plugin for LMMS to get it there?
That's just modulation
I always do it like that . Cpu crashes, i render audio.
Flex is awesome but it definitely devours my CPU!
It's not just you Flex uses a lot of cup and ram like a lot
Sir can you give the flp please...
I Can't Download The Drums Presets. Can You Help?
Use these 80's ones www.drumkito.com/sample-packs/linndrum-sample-pack/
where is the link "synthwave kit" help me please!
You can just try the stock GMS or Harmless , i use both for synthwave
Flex wrecks my CPU too. Almost feels like it's not quite fully optimized yet.
benvsreality yeah I’m sure image line is working on some sort of fix.