Thanks everyone for helpful answerspsmacmur wrote: Lately, I route all the "synth" parts to a bus that has a gentle sidechain compressor on it, and route the kicks and sometimes (if they're meant to stand out) toms or snare to another bus that serves as the sidechain input. (on that bus, I EQ down the bass) This is just a "mixing" routing, to make room for the drum transients. If I want one or two parts to noticeably pump, they get they're own dedicated compressor that hits harder and has a slower release. (Once, I tried making the shared bus pump hard, but got slammed for it in comments and voting.)
The ghost kick thing is pretty common in video tutorials etc., and makes sense in theory because you can both pump when the drums are silent and control the source frequency. I haven't done it lately though, as I have OneKnob Pumper for generating pumping independent of drums (when outside OSC), and I suspect there's a free equivalent.
)...good that you declare the current lead a placeholder, because it really harms the sound a lot. I guess the Rick Astley feel of the melody fits the genre, so that's probably fine, haha 
, but with your thick and fun arrangement, I would seriously consider taking the lead a little off center, take out resonance (uh, so ugly) and possibly return it a bit more into the mix. Maybe providing a backvocal like arrangement, subtle but noticeable, off to the other side and even further back into the mix, this would really get this a rich and authentic feel?! Just some ideas... 
. But here's what my ears can do so far - watch/listen to this space. 
. So here it is my entry: