Innehållsförteckning för December 2022 från Computer Music

> Step by step 1. Transient shaping with WA Production Puncher CM and LVC Audio’s Transector CM 1 Let’s start with simple. Load WA Production Puncher CM. This basic 3-stage plugin includes transient shaping and two compression stages with a handy before/after real time waveform display. Each process is a one-knob design so you simply turn up the dial to taste. 2 Take a regular snare and wind up the Transients control. It has five positions and the two highest settings emphasise the snare attack for a really clipped sound. If you then wind up both the Multiband and Parallel controls, you’ll find you’re adding body back into the sound. 3 Now try a kick drum. Here winding the Transients control up creates a “knocking” sound and if you try…

> Step by step 3. Realtime delay manipulation using PSP cmDelay from our Plugin Suite 1 Dub delay is one of the original effects that pushes the delay into distortion, transforming it to a centre stage feature. The smooth parameter response and onboard filters on PSP cmDelay are great. Load an instance on an auxiliary, setting the Dry level to minimum. 2 Set the delay to Sync mode, pick a delay time (we’ve gone for 3/16ths) and set the feedback (FB) to maximum. Now with the Feed control active, send a small snippet of audio to the delay using your DAW auxiliary send. We’re sending a snare sound. 3 As the feedback builds, ride the level using the feedback control, and control its tonality by adjusting the Filters. It’s easy…

> Step by step 5. Stereo image with Auburn Panagement CM and Joey Sturgis Tones/SideWidener 1 People have been pushing boundaries with stereo for more than 50 years. Nevertheless, if you find yourself slipping into predictable habits, just remember that your DAW provides immense flexibility not only to position but also to automate your panning, and this can lead to incredible and individual effects. 2 Looking for a plugin that can help you work the stereo image? The Computer Music Plugin Suite has a couple of excellent options. Panagement CM from Auburn includes three excellent ways to make the most of mono and stereo sources. Side Widener from Joey Sturgis Tones / Boz Digital is a simpler plugin with three flavours of widening. 3 SideWidener is great for adding width…

> Step by step 7. Exploring distortion with RP Distort CM 1 You can choose to distort any sound you like, but if you’re trying to break boundaries you might want to avoid obvious candidates like guitars and basses, and head for beats, vocals and synths. Let’s see what mayhem we can create with a simple plugin and beat loop. 2 Rob Papen RP Distort CM has five classic distortions – fuzz, overdrive, rectify, two-band overdrive and amp simulator. Load this up across a beat and you’ll find these five types offer an impressive choice of flavours. Nevertheless, the plugin has lots of parameters, so start by loading up the Default option from the preset menu. 3 Head for the distortion section and from the drop-down, choose Fuzz. You’ll have…

d16 group phoscyon 2 – 303 As happy accidents go, the Roland TB-303 received a pretty lucky roll of the dice back in the ’90s, becoming the must-have device for numerous forms of house and dance music. Fast forward to today, and its popularity remains undiminished, with used-unit prices extending beyond reach for most of us. 303 with benefits Consequentially, it’s the perfect device to emulate in software, and that’s not entirely because of the exorbitant price tag. The original 303 was always, essentially, a budget unit, and with those budgetary constraints came an interface that made sequencer programming something of a nightmare, while control of the synthesiser elements was relatively easy, but on the limited side. D16 Group have examined the 303 with a laser focus, presenting software which…

If you work in surround formats, this new analysis suite from Nugen Audio could be just what you need Halo Vision (AU, VST3, AAX) is a real-time analysis suite for surround and immersive audio compatible DAWs and supports up to 7.1.2. Its modular design and customisable interface allow you to open and rescale just the analysers you require, and most modules include user definable ranges, colours and so on. On the global front there are a bunch of presets which you access via the top bar. There are also a selection of DAW specific multichannel routing presets that can override the automatic option if required. Halo Vision follows the Dolby Atmos recommended naming for surround channels, but be aware some DAWs use their own labelling (Logic Pro for example). Halo…

Just what is it about the sound of a space that make human beings feel a certain way? It’s a tricky question to answer, but it’s a fact that the character of an instrument, a voice or the overall mix of a record can be enhanced by placing it within a particular environment. Perhaps it’s just psychology, or perhaps it’s down to how frequencies interact, resonate and bolster themselves in particular spaces via structural dynamics. Spatial effects like reverb, echo, delay and chorus are important components of mixing. It’s an avenue that Reverb Foundry (brainchild of plugin developer Matthew Hill, the man behind Cinematic Rooms and Seventh Heaven) intends to map out via a fine-honed plugin series, the latest of which we’re getting to grips with here. Incorporating both convolution…

The Pultec EQP-1A is a classic tube-based program equaliser that needs little intro. IK Multimedia’s plugin emulation is a long established part of their impressive T-RackS (AU, AAX, VST, VST3, Standalone) plugin system and normally retails for €80. There are many EQP-1A emulation plugins and IK’s is undoubtedly one of the best, so it’s a real treat to be able to offer you this excellent plugin completely free. The plugin is based on two real world units and uses their DSM (Dynamic Saturation Modelling) and SCC (Sonic Character Cloning) technologies to achieve something that’s sonically pretty close to the original. In typical T-RackS style it also incorporates flexible channel operation including Mid Sides, and can also be used within the T-RackS standalone framework. In order to grab your free copy…

/ experts Our resident music production gurus walk you through their specialist fields every month SYNTH MASTERCLASS HOW TO GET A PLAID EFFECT Read the full article on p42 PRODUCTION MASTERCLASS HOW TO FIX PHASE ISSUES Read the full article on p44 COVER FEATURE: EXTREME EFFECTS Read the full article from p18 How to use reverbs and create crazy convolutions How to create the deepest dub delays How to create dramatic transient shaping Use the Plugin Suite for extreme pitch manipulation Use your free plugins to create amazing granular effects YOUR FREE PLUGIN! How to download, explore and use IK Multimedia’s amazing EQP-1A EQ Read the full articles from p84…

Yes, believe it or not, Mafro is still being hailed as a talent to watch out for, even though he has quite clearly arrived and is doing the business. Starting with Radio 1 he has already picked up dance legend Pete Tong’s ‘Essential New Tune’ for his debut single Shaken, a track that Tong’s fellow Radio 1 cool-cat Jaguar cited as a ‘Dancefloor Moment’. Then he helped rack up over a million Spotify plays with TSHA on the track Giving Up, before notching up his first soundtrack for Channel 4’s series I Hate You. Enough? Not quite. There’s the small matter of co-producing Diplo’s single Let You Go and reworking the Sean Paul and Dua Lipa track No Lie for the Baywatch movie. Indeed there’s so much to talk about…

> Step by step 2. Granular processing with Inear Display Litote CM 1 Litote CM is a full-on creative plugin that will transform any sound into a new texture. It’s got a straightforward interface with key granular settings on the left, timbre and global settings on the right and a handy visualiser in the middle. Use the Mix control to blend processed and original audio. 2 Grain size is the key parameter, and with larger sizes you’ll be able to better distinguish the source sound. Speed meanwhile influences pitch, shifting it either higher or lower than the source. To get a feel for how this works, load Litote CM as an insert, open the preset INS_Divide and set the Mix to 100%. 3 We particularly like using Litote CM on…

> Step by step 4. Audio pitch manipulation using Zplane Vielklang 2 CM 1 Vielklang 2 CM is a plugin designed to create harmonies from audio or MIDI, but it also includes pitch correction features that are great for extreme effects. It actually works as an instrument, so to get started, load an instance on a fresh instrument track. 2 Import some audio (WAV or AIFF). We’ve loaded a snatch of vocal, but anything monophonic works. If you want creative effects rather than subtle pitch correction, you tend to get a more interesting outcome if there’s some decent pitch variation in the original audio. 3 As you load the audio it will ask you to confirm reference pitch and tempo. Adjust this if required. The display should indicate the analysed…

> Step by step 6. Transform a synth sound into a tearing lead part using Reverberate CM 1 Convolving sounds with other sounds is a powerful concept. Here we’ll show you how extreme sounds are within easy reach using two regular plugins and a handful of easily available samples. To get started, load up an instance of Dmitry Sches’ Thorn CM and insert Reverberate CM across the track. 2 To keep things simple we’ve loaded a sequence preset (Seq Spider), so all you’ve got to do to play this trancy arp is hold down a note of your choice. The sound has some filter sweep in it and plenty of delay and reverb, which you can mute if required, but the underlying synth is pretty clean. 3 Now let’s look…

> Step by step 8. Making creative effects with Hyperspace CM reverb 1 Modifying reverb tails is a great way to personalise your sounds. Here we’re using two very different techniques to process first snare and then kick. For the snare we’re going to set up a massive spacy reverb, capture it and then edit it. Start by loading an instance of Hyperspace CM on an auxiliary. 2 Make sure the wet/dry levels on Hyperspace CM are wet 100% and then send some level to the reverb. You want a reasonably long reverb so you can edit a suitable section. We’ve loaded up the Cathedral preset. Once you’re happy with the sound, bounce just the reverb return as audio. 3 Now load the reverb audio back onto a track and…

izotope ozone 10 mastering suite As iZotope’s long-established suite gets an update, we look at the new layers of Ozone and ask if it’s still the master of its domain? To the uninitiated, mastering can often appear to be something of a dark art, and for good reason. Mastering engineers will always call upon their favoured monitors and processors to achieve that post-mix sonic perfection. For those of us on more modest budgets, however, help is at hand with an increasing number of products, and that’s where iZotope Ozone 10 Mastering Suite comes in. Sum of parts The process of mastering should be considered a sum-of-parts; at the very least, you’re going to need EQ and compression, and most likely numerous elements to control imaging or add saturation and colour.…

Infiltrator 2 (VST, VST 3, AU, AAX) from Devious Machines is the latest incarnation of their highly creative multi-effects processor. Devious Machines describe it as a turbocharged version of its predecessor, and with 54 effects modules versus the 28 in version 1, they’ve clearly been busy bees. Even so, the interface is very familiar and, rather excellently, it’s a free upgrade for existing users. Infiltrator 2, like its predecessor, has 10 effects slots, user editable multi-segment envelopes and assignable macros, and you can use multiple instances of the same modules if desired. But what really sets it apart from more typical multi-effects is the amount of real-time control you have. Each effect now has two dedicated envelopes with a synced length of up to a whopping 128 bars. As before,…

Alliant Audio Neo Soul Essentials Vol. 2 £14.95 More butter business from the camp with an ear for neck snapping drums and golden age rap samples. Among the 415MB of sounds, you get some killer keys and chords, ripe for flipping. And some well shuffling breaks, programmed deftly to nod heads and make your speakers rock. A nice range of one shot LFO notes are given their space, too. All channeling boom bap low-end theories from the early ’90s hip-hop scene. So, if you’re a fan of that New York era, then boot up these beats, baby baby. www.loopmasters.com 7/100 Ghost Syndicate Sharks: Drum & Bass £19.95 Deadly new DnB sample pack to get your jaws into. Dive deep into the 1.4GB of content under the surface here, and you’ll…

Tame your software with the best control! It’s time to master your music software with the best hardware and touch controllers out there. We look at how to do it, reveal the best products on the market, and also examine the future of touchscreens, MPE and everything else control-based. Take back control of your music software now! (Or next month) PLUS! Free plugin! XILS-Lab 3 CM – an iconic Plugin Suite synth updated! Reviews Eventide Physion Mk II, Synchro Arts RePitch and much more! The Guide! Analyse this! A Back to Basics guide to analysers and more…

NEW RELEASES • COMMENT • INDUSTRY HAPPENINGS Most hardware music gear manufacturers must shake their fists like angry cartoon characters whenever they see emulations – or those approximations with weirdly similar names – of their gear being made by software developers. “I’ll get you, you little scamps,” they probably shout, as the young developers leap over the walls of the orchard, clutching stolen apples beneath their jerkins. Moog Music have taken a different approach. Rather than chasing those tikes from the software orchard (yes, we’ve gone too far with the analogy but can’t stop now) they’ve become them, emulating their own gear in software. And doing it bloody well… And actually, Moog have been doing great software for some time, with much of its success on the iOS platform. There’s…

Spectral Plugins have announced a new modular reverb/delay called Spacer which they claim is like nothing else out there. Yeah, we might just have heard that one before, but Spectral could be right as they seem to be throwing everything into Spacer. It has three types of reverb (algorithmic, convolution and granular) and two delays (simple and granular) and you get to put the whole lot together and decide the order. That’s a lot of plugin for just $69 and you might just (wait for it, Eurovision fan in-joke alert) ‘wanna go home’ to try it out right now. Or wait for our review. Sorry again… https://spectral-plugins.com…

Most music sits within tried and tested boundaries. This makes perfect sense as the vast majority of listeners don’t want their senses battered or their musical expectations tested whenever they listen to music. But despite these limitations, recorded music history is still littered with examples of people searching for something new that pushes the boundaries musically. In this feature we’ll go beyond the everyday common sounds that make up the vast majority of music production, to look at the extreme ends of the spectrum. But extremes come in many shapes and sizes so although we’ll be looking at ways to create banging beats and tearing leads, we’ll also take time to focus on more creative territory, including how to get the most from reverbs, delays and the stereo image. Before…

Celemony Melodyne 5 from €99 Mac/PC – AU, VST3, AAX, standalone Pitch manipulation is available in so many forms, and everyone has their favourite tools for specific tasks. Nevertheless, the range of manipulation available using Melodyne is really in a league of its own, and if you opt for the more fully featured versions you’ll get direct note access for polyphonic instruments. www.celemony.com CableGuys Shaperbox 2 $99 Mac/PC – AU, VST, AAX This excellent bundle of eight creative plugins includes much of what you need to reshape, mangle and generally repurpose your audio. Particularly handy are CrushShaper with its bitcrush, lo-fi and multiband enhancer, and also TimeShaper 2, which includes glitch-ready stutter, half-time, reverse, scratch and tape-stop effects. www.cableguys.com Zynaptiq Wormhole €199 Mac/PC - AU, VST, VST3, AAX If you’re…

Creative Intent Temper Mac/PC - AU, VST, VST3, AAX Free distortion plugins are pretty abundant, but this example from Creative Intent includes both a rich saturation stage and its own unique phase distortion algorithm. Throw in a variable saturation curve, resonant low pass filter, adjustable feedback level and before and after visuals, and it’s a highly flexible processor. www.creativeintent.com Tritik Krush Mac/PC - AU, VST, VST3, AAX If you want a freeware bitcrush and downsampling solution then look no further than this excellent plugin from Tritik. The main controls include Drive, Bitcrush and Downsample, followed by a high or low-pass resonant Filter. Add in syncable LFO modulation for all parameters with handy halo indicators on the target parameters, and you’ve got a very well-equipped freebie. www.tritik.com GlitchMachines Hysteresis Mac/PC -…

waves harmony Whether it’s due to a powerless vocal at a key point in your song, or just an all-round thirst for more colourful vocal life, tapping up a harmoniser plugin can be a quick and easy godsend for those of us lacking the nouse to track stem after stem of differently pitched vocals. With the likes of Antares, Eventide and Melda regularly furnishing us with their dense vocal-expanding portfolio, we wonder how much an additional entry into this well ploughed field might bring. Waves, however, have more than a little experience in the vocal manipulation field – their stable does include Waves Tune, Vocal Bender and Renaissance Vox after all, which stand tall among the most useful vocal tools money can buy. Unlike those more wide-ranging vocal re-shapers, though,…

Over the last ten years or so, there’s been a considerable explosion in classic studio-modelled plugins. From Ocean Way to Abbey Road, the spatial character of these semi-mythical places, and their legacy recording equipment can spatter the sort of sonic magic sauce that is imbued in those legendary hits onto your music. With FAME Studio Reverb, IK Multimedia have utilised their proprietary Volumetric Response Modelling (VRM) technology to realistically model one of soul’s most celebrated locales – FAME Studios. Based in the recording studio heartland of Muscle Shoals, Alabama, FAME saw the likes of Aretha Franklin, Little Richard, Wilson Picket and many more track the tunes that defined an era within it, with the studio’s unique atmosphere being imbued forever into their beloved cuts. I want to live forever IK’s…

Audiotent Mutate £21 Morph and mould your synth sounds with these seven super powerful processing racks for Ableton Live. As you tweak and twiddle your subs, bass, keys, pads, and FX, each easy-to-use rack adds startling levels of boom and bluster to proceedings. From thick as treacle bottom end weight, to room-filling width and womp, you’ll be wondering how you lived without this secret weapon before. Get creative with the reverbs, compression, saturation, and distortion, and turn any old weak beat into a menacing monster in seconds, before your very ears. Poweful stuff. www.audiotent.com 8/10 Zenhiser Flicker £37 Pounding pack of chest-rattling techno. Built from the ground up with the single-minded goal of owning your soul, outright. These giant, full flowing sounds and insanely tough drums do their best to…

Back in issue 169 we were pretty extreme too, so we thought we’d dig up the samples we gave away then for you now! And what a collection we have unearthed! Here’s what we said… Few things stick in the mind better than a good lead line, and here you have everything you need to make plenty of them. This huge collection of sounds includes loops and multisamples that can be used in most soft current samplers. Cyclick 40 loops 40 multisampled instruments Cyclick’s selection of lead sounds was created using a range of hardware synths and guitars run though stompboxes – often in parallel chains for interesting stereo effects. As well as the main hardware-produced sounds, layered soft synths were also sent out of the box through outboard gear…