Chord Sound Design

Sk1nZ

Ableton Addict
Its probably been a year ive been trying to make my chords sound as large, clear and powerful as i hear in professional tracks and im not getting them to how i want them to sound. Its really frustrating when you can hear in your head how it should sound but cant make it happen

Im focusing on electro and many tracks use chords which have a powerful sound and id describe mine as thin and tinny. Ive read and watched so much on the subject and still havent found what i want. Ive played with chord arrangement, voicing, chord layering, inversions, triads, 7ths, 9ths etc etc... and still i cant get this clear big sounding chord lead that so many tracks have.

Ive played around with processing the sound such as compression, saturation etc and it gets it a little better but i feel im still missing something. My sound design is the worst part of my production so it may come down to this, i dont know.

Has anyone got any advice, reading material or videos that cover getting professional sounding chords?

Thanks
 
To make chords stand out, the most important thing is to really come out of the One Key "comfort zone". The more theory you learn about chords and scales, the better you will understand, however you chord progressions will sound duller. Chords do need to be borrowed from other keys, but not any key. Keys that have share similar tones e.g. Bb major and Eb major are different scales but share many keys. Borrowing chords from each others scales will immediately make you sound stand out.
Check out the below video and also the link for more details.

 
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