Korg M3: Programming industrial sounds with EXB-RADIAS
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Scenario

You want to create some industrial sounds with the EXB-RADIAS, but all the preset RADIAS combis and programs seem too "clean".

Procedure

The key to programming industrial sounds is to apply heavy distortion effects such as High-gain Wah. (Specifically, the Overdrive and Gain settings.) You can also get good results by using a Ring Modulator in addition to the distortion.

Using Sync between the oscillators also creates a lot of the 'sound' associated with synthesizers in industrial music. The 'ripping' associated with oscillator sync is used often with Industrial music, especially with the Saw waveform.

In the Driver/Wave Shape options, using the Decimator option can help to 'grunge up' the sound of the Radias. Many industrial artists are fond of the old Korg DW8000/EX8000 and similar synthesizers, so running the DWGS waveforms through this and setting the Decimator to the PreFiltA position can help imitate the sound of those synths. If you want to keep the Drive settings in your Radias program, you can use the Decimator that is in the M3's effects.

On the OSC1Pitch page, always set the Analog Tuning fairly high. Keeping it low contributes to the 'smoothness' of the Radias' sound. Also, on the same page when setting oscillators to be a few semitones apart (a fifth, for instance) using Transpose, also set it to a few cents off using Tune so that the tuning between oscillators is ever so slightly discordant.

Tips

Some of these techniques may work on many non-RADIAS programs too.

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