20 Minutes from Class

 

Acid House Overview

In this session, we’ll take the unmistakable squelch and swagger of the legendary Roland TB-303 and build a complete acid house track from scratch inside Ableton Live. No vintage hardware or expensive gear required just your DAW and a willingness to push resonance to the limit.

Whether you want to build raw, hypnotic underground grooves or inject squelchy textures into other genres, we’ll break down the workflow step by step so you can instantly apply it to your own music.

How to Acid House Explore the history, attitude, and foundational elements of acid house, learning how a simple bass sequence, a driving drum machine, and a twisting filter knob can turn a basic loop into a hypnotic, unpredictable, and completely alive production.

808 and 909 Drum Programming Build solid, driving house grooves using classic 808 and 909-inspired drum programming techniques in Ableton Live. Learn how to tune kicks, layer percussive elements, and program punchy rhythms that lock tightly with your low-end sequences. (Custom 808 and 909 Drum Racks included in the downloads)

Modern 303 Sound Design Recreate the iconic, squelchy timbre of the TB-303 from scratch using Ableton’s native instruments, native or third-party emulations, distortion, resonant filters, and Max for Live devices to give a classic analog sound a fresh, modern edge.

Slides, Accents & Octave Jumps Master the MIDI programming techniques that give acid basslines their signature bounce and attitude. Learn how to program note lengths for smooth glide effects, utilize velocity for aggressive filter accents, and jump across octaves to create unpredictable melodic movement.

Live Automation Turn a static loop into a constantly evolving journey by mapping and performing filter sweeps, distortion drives, decay times, and resonance tweaks in real time, capturing movement that breathes life into your arrangement.

Acid House Arrangement Learn how to take your core loops, builds, and breakdowns and structure them into a cohesive, DJ-ready club track. Discover how to introduce tension, manage energy flow, and drop elements in and out to keep the dancefloor locked in.

No original 303 hardware or advanced music theory is required. We’ll break down each technique visually and build everything directly inside Ableton Live using only built-in tools, free plugins and Max for Live devices, giving you the practical skills to make your basslines squelch, shift, and scream.

This workshop is beginner-friendly and provides a great style to explore for producers of all levels.

 

Acid House Ableton Project from Class - Click Here to Listen and Check out the Ableton Project

Included with the session downloads is the project we made in class. Using only Ableton's built-in tools, free plugins and free Max for Live devices we built a full arranged Acid House track.

 

Acid House Ableton Template

There is also an included Ableton template. This template is loaded with everything you need to start producing Acid House in Ableton Live. Including locaters tagged with info text explaining how to arrangement and construct each section of the track.

Also included in the project are tape emulation max for live device, custom instruments, 909 & 808 drum kits, kick synthesizers, bass, stab, strings, pad and 303 instruments all ready for production.

Don't forget to hit File -> Save Live Set as a Template so you get a great starting point for your House and Acid House projects.

 

Call & Response Generator

An exclusive Max for Live device!

Call / Response Generator creates two connected MIDI phrases: a call and a response derived from it.

Choose how the answer relates to the original phrase—echo it, invert it, transpose it, simplify it, extend it or break away at the end. Lock the ideas that work, reroll everything else and write the finished result directly into an Ableton Live clip.

It is especially at home creating acid basslines, techno sequences, house hooks and short melodic riffs.

 

Drums Lofier

Originally from the Lofi Hip Hop workshop we use this rack on the group of drums (excluding the kick) to get a vintage 90's vibe. This Audio Effect Rack features a collection of effects aimed at deteriorating the sound of drums to a point where it sounds directly out of the 90's drum machines sound. The main effects used were filtering, EQing, Distorting and Compressing.

Side Brain's 909 & 808 Drum Racks (Inside the Template)

2 custom drum rack kits wiith full processing and Macro controls. Use as is for fat modern 909 and 808 drum machines or use as a starting point with Live's sound similarity feature like we do in class.

 

Basswave House Bass Instrument Rack

Included in these session is a custom Wavetable Instrument Rack that is inspired by the classic Polysix preset Fat Line that is perfect for bass support basslines for house and dance tracks.

What's Included with this session

• 2+ hours of Ableton Certified Training Video
• Acid House Ableton Template
• Call & Response Generator
• Drums Lofier Audio Effect Rack
• Side Brain's 909 & 808 Drum Racks (Inside the Template)
• Basswave House Bass Instrument Rack
• PDF with 303 Synthesis Recipes, Acid House Arrangement Map, Sub Genres BPM Ranges, Most Used Scales and a list of Free Plugins, Max for Live Devices & Tools.

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ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR

Yeuda Ben-Atar, a world renowned Ableton Certified Trainer, hails from Los Angeles, California. Yeuda’s passion for music led him to the United States, where he discovered his true calling with Ableton Live in 2007, embarking on a journey of mastery.

He approaches Ableton in a unique way; producing and performing with video game controllers under the moniker Side Brain.

One of Yeuda’s most remarkable qualities is his exceptional knowledge and speed, combined with his unparalleled ability to explain complex concepts in a simple and engaging manner.

With years of experience as a music production instructor and educator, Yeuda has contributed his expertise to prestigious institutions throughout the United States, including USC, UCLA, UCSD, Colburn Music School, Berklee School of Music, Cal Arts, NAMM, Skywalker Sound, Bedrock LA, Sonos Studios, Sweetwater Headquarters, 1500 or Nothing studios, Grammy U, Pensado’s Place, Vintage King, Museum of Making Music, Lynda.com (now known as LinkedIn Learning), and Perfect Circuit Audio, among many others.

His projects have included working with and teaching artists such as Timbaland, Ludacris, Lavel Kali(Beyoncé, Drake) DJ Numark and Jurassic 5, Beck, Skrillex, Flying Lotus, Ed Sheeran, Rick Rubin, Giorgio Moroder, Simi, Bootie Brown (Pharcyde), Dave Pensado, Madison Mcferrin and countless others.