How to create that fat EBM bassline?

[dan_s]

yea, by trying to emulate someone elses sound, through fiddling with the knobs and such, you'll learn what they do and you will come up with sounds like it, leading you to make your own sounds. (probably better then what you were trying to make!)

[BONES]

understanding why a supersaw patch sounds the way it does or why an fm bass sounds the way it does gives you the tools to create your own sounds by learning your way around a synth.

Don't you think the best way to learn that stuff is to just get in and do it? Sure, you need some basic information to get started, like which synths have the ability to do such-and-such, but once you're at that point, the best way to learn is to work through it yourself.
I've never really tried to mimic a sound I've heard from another artist. I might hear something I like and think "I like the way he has done this or that" but I've always taken it as a basic element. e.g. I hear a sound and what I take from it is the modulation of the cutoff or something specific like that, rather than the whole patch+effects. Even when I was learning the in and outs of synths, I spent so much time just tweaking controls that I was always able to understand what it was about a sound I liked and how to apply it to the machines I had available.
Supersaw is an excellent example. I had no idea such a thing existed until relatively recently, as I've never really been a fan of Roland synths and never followed what they were doing. I'd probably heard them used on many occasions but I'd always heard it as unison and was able to easily create a similar sound without a supersaw oscillator. As for FM bass, its around 25 years since I bought my DX-9 but I still have no freakin' idea how that krap works, but I can simulate it perfectly well using subtractive methods. I suppose its about the level at which you hear stuff, at least to some extent, and relying on others to help figure it out is probably not the best way to go. Synths are really simple at heart and once you understand the basics, its easy to work out how all the rest of it fits in.