I had a few people ask me to do a video comparing modulation hardware against modulation plugins. I don't have much by way of hardware but I do have plenty of chorus pedals. So I just put out a video comparing chorus pedals to chorus plugins. I hope everyone enjoys it. th-cam.com/video/qBoP1H3ocLY/w-d-xo.html
My theory is that with modern reverbs we spend and lot of time reducing their bandwidth with post eq to get them to sit, then add saturation maybe in post etc yet a reduced bit rate piece of hardware with its physical preamp is doing all that softening and shaping for you.
When I was a kid, I bought the kit version of the Radio Shack "reverb" I did all kinds of experiments with it. It used a Reticon SAD1024 CCD delay chip. I made phasers and flangers and got some really messed up sounds. I learned so much from that kit at helped me in my electronic music career for life. Anyway, time to hook up my cheap processors and pass some electrons through them.
All these years later, and your ears are far more discerning than they once were, so you can hear what "could be" musically - maybe even from that Radio Shack thing!! Tweaked nicely in a mix, and even a tiled bathroom has a tone of mojo. Really nice work man!! Thanks for the share!!
A lot of this is horses for courses but I've been mixing in the box for years and using all sorts of reverbs and delays even ones that are trying to emulate old outboard gear. However for some reason when Im bothered and hook up some of my old outboard do you even just an old guitar Intellifex modulation unit this is just a clarity and depth to the reverb and in some cases an easy to access sonic character that seems to be close enough to what I'm after then with a little tweaking sits nicely in the mix. This video is great I love when people pull out all gear and do some shootouts and become surprised with the outcomes. To be honest with this style of song I think that spring reverb is absolutely perfect and to me finds a nice creamy list shop and brittle as opposed to the valhalla's top end and really lends to the genre and gives the vocal and the song a real down-to-earth retro feel. Love it.
my Midiverb II, Rev 1 and SRV2000 sit side by side to my EMT252, Sony DRES777, Bricasti M7 and Quantec QRS. I love the „smaller ones“, they have so much character. Plugins just don’t give me that depth. Big part of the hardwares sound are their analog circuitry around their ADDA converters. Just measure THD on something like an ART 01A or Sony DRE2000 and you’ll start to understand. Its those imperfections that HELP to set the reverb tail apart from the source sound, so more depth, more realism, less perfection…
I think that spring reverb is just magic! I must have grown up listening to a lot of spring reverb. Hearing that yamaha rev 7 brought me back to 90's country! super nostalgic sound.
I'm a huge Alesis fan. My main recorder is a HD24 , 24 in 24 out. ZERO cut and paiste , pitch correction...or anything to make it not true....if the take sucks.....we do it again. Love the Microverb series too. Love the channel Billy. I'm binge watching them all.
Thanks, this was rally entertaining and just shows what you can achieve with limited gear if you learn it well. Look forward to checking out some more of your videos.
I have the 4 tank Fairchild Reverbertron 2 Model 659 and a lot of times on vocals, in the mix, it blows away most that Lexicon, Yamaha etc can throw at you, not for everything, but a lot of times. This is the vintage hardware which I bought 35 years ago from another studio for, at that time, 200 Dollars.
I mean... isn't this showing the process of how all of the famous verb units became famous over time? As in it's the quirks and oddities of those units that made them stand apart in a mix, not the fact they had perfect emulation and "clean" tails. When an engineer / producer discovered those quirks and oddities and made a hit track using them, it's only then that those units became desirable and famous. There's a reason plug in makers have painstakingly tried to recreate these units in exact detail, which is to get those specific quirks and oddities. Watching you "discover" the quirks and oddities about your old verb units is demonstrating that process and how something that shouldn't work turns out to be brilliant in the mix and becomes a "go to" gem. Great video :)
The wedge does something I always look for in reverbs: it fits. It just sits in like a puzzle piece, its hard to explain. It's not building up weird low mids, its not washing out everything, it just works. I thought the midiverb was really cool on the drums in the full mix. The Rev7 is something I'd normally like, with the big 80s high end, but there is something seriously weird about the phase with that one. Vintage verb is what I currently use and I'm pretty happy. Also that spring reverb is so vibey and cool. I think in this musical context especially, it sounds like a big old western canyon.
Yes! I used that Wedge on a lot of records before I went totally In The Box. The Yamaha did have some weird stuff going on but I wasn't sure if it always sounded like that or because it's older than the hills., but it still has a cool sound for certain things.
You had everything perfectly balanced in level. This is key, to make sure everything is easily comparable and there is no 'louder is better' business, going on. I am a big hardware fan myself. Also have a Midiverb II which I love, as well as a Yamaha SPX990 and a Boss SE-70.
The Rev7 is a great sounding verb but the sound of the spring unit blew my mind. As an engineer that cut his teeth in the early 80's I've had a hard time finding verb plugins that really excite me like the dedicated hardware did back in the day. Especially when it comes to plates. I was lucky enough to mix on a lot of good plates...boy do I ever miss them in my home studio.
The EeeMmmTtt patch on the Alesis wedge is my favorite on vocals. It just sounds so good. I really liked how warm both Alesis units sounded in your video.
I have one of those Master Room spring reverbs...exact same unit! Never thought of mono/stereo reverb differences too much but when you copied it and offset the duplicate to make a stereo track, that was cool. I'm going to try this myself. It did sound good on the vocal.
New viewer here, great content… as someone else said, it was clear after about 60 seconds that you’re “in the biz” for real. Reminds me of many fun days spent shooting out gear with my teachers and mentors. In the mid 2000s I started buying hardware verbs for my studio because the reverb plugins available at the time sounded mediocre and were incredibly taxing on CPU. Times have changed but my Wedge, PCM70 and M300 still have this special magic, especially when mixing on a console and summing the returns analog. Thanks for the vid!
Great Video! Thanks for taking the time to make it. I saw an Alesis Quadraverb 2 at my local Music Go Round. It was only $129 so I gave it a try. IT'S SO GOOD!! I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I didn't know it also had Chorus, Delay, Pitch Shifting and Gated FX! I'm definitely going to snag more rack gear soon.
Personally i love convolution reverb. I have a library with IRs taken from the classics, Bricasti & Lexicon classics, EMT plates, Grampian spring etc. It sounds lovely, and with current plugins you can sculpt the length of the tail and such very precisely. Sometimes i put a very short ambience reverb from an algorithmic reverb beforehand just so that the tail isn’t exactly the same every time, which is the problem with convolution reverbs. (You can really hear it on sampled drums.) You can use that trick, i’m not a person who keeps my tricks a secret. I want everyone to make good sounding music.
Fascinating video, Billy. Thank you! Whilst none of the hardware verbs might be super high end (lexicon, bricasti...) I def preferred all of them over the plugins. To my mind I think there's something to be said about reverb being processed by a dedicated unit because of how these units will be able to keep the time coherence in the effect - especially reverb tails. A thought that keeps popping into mind is that DSP processing is essentially linear, so how is it possible to have multiple (parallel) effects going at the same time without introducing some sort of phase issues with the mix - and this is especially so regarding reverb? I dunno, I can't wrap my head around this idea. Anyway thanks again for a great video
Audio on computers generally is well buffered, so everything should be predictably coherent - ie no phase issues. It is not 'live' in the same way as analogue equipment. You can tell - at different soundcard buffer sizes you can have significant differences in CPU usage. One of the great features of external effects is the subtleties of the analogue electronics and the ADC and DAC. This even includes how component noise can affect an audio signal as well as differences between opamps, transistor types and capacitors and good pcb layout. Much of the great gear has 'character's - some gear is used for its transformers, buffers etc and not for the supposed effect itself. In purist terms you might think that is bad, but it's all about colour.
@@l3eatalphal3eatalpha Thanks for the reply. I do understand the benefits of hardware character and colour, and how that would affect the tone of the hardware reverbs. I also understand what you mean by buffering but I still wonder how that buffering is processed. I am not a technical DSP wiz and so I struggle to wrap my mind around how, even including the buffering, the audio samples are processed to be "released" with exactly the right timing. There is so much going on under the hood with multitudes of effects that, as good as the DSP engineering is, I still can't fathom how some sort of subtle phasing wouldn't happen especially with specifically time dependent effects such as reverb. My brain struggles to comprehend :)
@@owlmuso Because on computers the effects aren't done 100% live, they are buffered so in fact the audio is prepared, phase correct, in advance. The buffer is the look ahead time that the processors have to assemble the audio. Small buffer=very little time=harder on the processor. If you have a dsp outboard unit eg digital reverb there is nothing that you can do in these that cannot be done in a DAW - just need to reproduce the algorithms and have enough processing power. The timing is so short it appears live, but if you have a buffer of 512 samples @ 48kHz that is a delay (ie latency) of 512/48000 = 10.7ms, so you barely notice. Except maybe whilst tracking. Another element with latency is within plugins. Different plugins have their own latency. But this is registered with the plugin, so the DAW can time align them all perfectly. A simple effect may only need eg 32 samples latency (or 0, even, so it actually is live) whilst a complex task may need eg 2048 samples. A DAW will account for all of these in its signal paths (really data paths). I hope that is any help at all. Just keep plugging away - it will all make sense some day and then you will be unable to remember why you didn't get it in the first place.
In the early days of Protools there was no latency compensation. You had to put short delays on each track and delay them to match the track with the most latency. pain in the ass. But they soon made it automatic.
I am particular to the Yamaha, perhaps it is the clarity, but I agree with you more suited to background vocals. We used an SPX90 for years and it was a treasure.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane. I remember using a Midiverb III back in the day (the successor to the Midiverb II). Later, I bought an Alesis Microverb and then an Alesis Wedge for my own equipment inventory. Hearing the Wedge again on this video brought back a lot of memories of using it as the primary reverb on lead vocals back then.
Yes, I used the Wedge on a bunch of Lil Jon mixes in the late 90's - early 2000's before I went totally in the box. This was at my home studio called The Zone and I was so embarrassed by the fact that I was using an Alesis reverb that I made a big label that said "X42 Y45 Device" that I put over the Alesis logo so that anyone seeing it would think I had something special.
@@Hugoknots A HW digital reverb is a digital algorhithm in it's own little computer. in other words, a plugin in a box. The myth that "since it is hardware it MUST sound better" does not apply here. Maybe you have bad plugins though. I mostly use the Lexicon PCM Native suite, which is 99,9% the same code, except one bug the developer fixed in the software version. In other words, the same. And even in this case, people still rant on around the internet that the hardware sounds better, but they are deluded.
@@asor8037 I'm with you. I never said anything about what your saying - "HW must sound better" etc etc. I'm only saying that in this instance the HW did sound more open than the plugins. If the HW was a plugin, I'd say 'that' plugin sounded better than the others. Another thing to be mindful of is the inputs, JFET or not, and how you drive them into the HW algorithm. This can add non-linear effects that would vary from what a plugin may emulate although you can model some of the non-linearity in the plugin too.
I’m still rocking a PCM 91 and 2 MPX 500s. I just never could get on with reverb plugins (and I’ve bought a ton of them) I also prefer printing the effects to separate tracks for automation. It’s really opens up what I can do at mix down.
Plugin wise I tend to go for things that emulate plates or vintage digital lexicon units. On a whim, I just scored a Quadraverb, the idea was to use it with my guitar rig, but as a possible studio piece. I'm amazed at how great it sounds, and really didn't expect it to. At first listen the reverbs and delays sound clean, but not when comparing to many plugins and modern guitar pedals. There is just something about the filtering and grain to the reverb tails that sets it apart from the other options I have, despite it being a budget piece even for the time. "better" ain't always better. The reverb seems to combine with the signal just perfectly, like it's an organic part of the sound. I can get close enough to cop the mood of the quadraverb, but it just sounds so inspiring, and I can't wait to use it in a bunch of mixes. I get a lot of clients that want 80s flavors on their mixes, and this is just the ticket.
You're right about the Quadraverb, it's just got a sound. I have 2 of them and am going to get them hooked into my system so they're easier to use at a moments notice.
Love the video. Noticed you have a QuadraVerb in the rack. Used to love that thing. Extremely versatile. Fairly high signal to noise ratio for studio, but man that thing was great for live shows.
I own several multieffect racks, 2 REV500 Yamahas and a MPX500 Lexicon. I also have 2 Eventide H9 Max pedals. It's a very interesting exercise to compare high end plugins to older gear. There is a definite edge of feel from old stuff. But, as always, horses for courses.
I have a lexicon mpx1 in my rack right now, haven't used in years I was just thinking about using it the other day when I was frustrated with all my plugin reverbs, they all sounded so dense, I think tommorrow I will make a spot in my patch bay, when I heard you testing these old units it all came flooding back that's the sound! I thought I was remembering wrong but no! That is the sound I am looking for, so transparent
Maybe it's due to me coming from the era of sampling drums from vinyl, but I liked the Yamaha the most. It had a crispy crunch, that kind of reminds me of 12 bit samplers. All of the others just kind of had a typical reverb sound. The Yamaha seems like it gives a signature color, which is cool in my opinion.
Well... don't throw them away! I think they all have so much character, not easily done with any of the plugins. It makes me happy for some reason. So much 'real' space.
Might need to clean a pot on that midiverb 2. I liked the wedge more too. Alesis and yamaha had some damn good programmers. That spring reverb sounded the best out of every scenario as a best match.
10:15 to my old analogue sound guy/digital engineer/bass player/Gen X ears, that Rev 7 is spot on.. gives a little sparkle and action to those drums. And that old spring reverb JUST DELIVERS genuine sound..
I love my Midiverb II and Quadraverb! They earned spots in my rack as more of an interesting character reverbs. I’ll tend to use realistic room verbs or delay for the rest.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume yes vintageverb sound fantastic......nothing freaky......but even for mastering,it sound the best....... I have supermassive.......i think it is their stripped down tool for making their algorithmes for their reverbs........you can make your own reverbs with this......
I think the spring analog is more tireless. It hits your soul more. I feel like i am in a studio in 1960s or 70s with a Bob Segar or any of the soul styles singers
Didn't like the altiverb, the Valhalla was neutral and unobtrusive so useful, the rev7 was a bit off kilter, liked the wedge sounded real, would have maybe reduced the room size a bit on the drums but an interesting comparison. Have the Lexicon LXP-1 it is my go to verb/delay, just don't like ITB verbs that much, EQ and comp good in the box for me, I mix down through 1/4" 2-track for texture and mix cohesion, if needed, but going full outboard is a lot of maintenance and space used up, so just stick to some FX and keep it simple. thanks for the comparison, confirmed my thoughts on outboard verbs!
love my tc.electronics M2000. Once I made an as natural as possible room with it for a radio broadcast. It was stunning. When it's on, it sounds like the person was in your room. It wasn't an effect at all, it was the secret ingredient which “holds the room together”.
Your gear is really nice, and that first song is very beautiful, great vocals! I had a nice Ibanez DD 1000 unit years ago, loved it (It almost did reverb lol). Since I got REmatrix and most of the convolution packages from Overloud I never use any of my other verbs. REmatrix has both convolution and algorithm as well. I simply do not even seek better verbs, REmatrix is it for me.
Very interesting. And fantastic music too. I've been buying hardware reverbs myself after trying a Bricasti, comparing it to the Liquidsonics Seventh Heaven - its very different. The hardware reverb gives a sense of space, without really being noticable, the plugin seems glue itself on top of the audio, is very noticable - yet the space is less satisfying. This convinced me to first try an MPX1 - since it was so cheap...it was so much better than any reverb I had as a plugin, that I then went and bought a PCM90, which I'm looking forward to arriving any day. I do happen to have the Alesis Midiverb you have, it was left in my studio - it works fine but its quite a noisy box and you cannot do anytihng with the presets, even so - still sounds kind of interesting in a way that plugins do not. Your tests, have convinced me, I'm making some good investments. I preferred all of your hardware reverbs over the plugins. The Altiverb, sounded kind of lifeless, the REV7 was great, the wedge and the Alesis midiverb - all had something going for it that I preferred. The spring reverb was beautiful on the vocal - amazing singer and song of course, but it evoked something. I am beginning a search now for the unit you have here. Enjoyable vid, will subscribe for the music alone!
First time here. I like your vibe dude. Nice song too. I'm a hardware man :-). BTW I like very much your mixes I wish you the best, thanks for your videos
The better reverb &/or multi fx units that really still have a edge, in these plug in days... Are the Ensoniq DP4 or DP2's, Lexicon PCM or MPX units... & TC Electronics rack units like the Fireworks, as good examples of the time.
Impresive😳 Still have my TC M2000 i loved for live use, in dualmode, and a TC M one, maybe i should hook it up to my DAW🤔🤔 i also like the effects in my MIDAS MR18
I just looked through and old bin of music knock knacks and found a wedge, totally new and unopened. I bought 2 when they came out and never opened the second. So I pulled it out and took it to my buddy's place and put it on my mic. Totally fine for live.
From the preset names it seems the Wedge had all the Midiverb4 algos. MV4 was my first hardware reverb and I still like the character, despite it sitting in a rack with a Lexicon PCM-70 and 80, MPX-1 and Vortex (for the Bleen). Another fun lofi reverb is the Zoom 1201. I would still buy an Alesis Quadraverb if one came by. I don't really care about VSTs, but when doing quick ideas, I use VintageVerb and the Valhalla Room.
The Rev7 is a great bit of kit. Hard to find one in good condition because most people hammered them. I still use my old Digitech Studio Quads for pretty much everything that doesn't need to sound super spacey. That's Valhalla Supermassive's job.
I have a hard time comparing the reverbs. On one hand you have a 24bit digital signal that's oversampling and working with 32bit float... that's sharing computation cycles on a CPU that's doing loads of other work as well. Then you have dedicated devices that are working at 16 bits, no float, with whatever converters, processors and memory that fit in their price point (for the 80's and 90's). As with samplers of the time, those limitations impart a sound and quality all their own. For me, being able to keep everything in-the-box with absolute total recall is the winner. Though sometimes I miss my old Quadraverbs. The flanged echoes presets on drums was pretty awesome.
I'm with you. As I've said before, it's hard to do a fair and scientific comparison between gear and plugins. And also, because of my work flow and the amount of different projects I need to switch between I need to be In The Box most of the time.
I have the REV4 and MidiverbII. I think they're dandy, and if you like those I would recommend you try a TCElectronics M3000, which is an even better device imo. For plugins I'm pretty happy with Arturia's Intensity. Thanks for the video.
I liked the comparison and your ability to walk through the different verbs. They each had a different character which definitely stood out. But the best part was the beautiful song. Truly a beautifully recorded and written track done by musicians with genuine talent and great voices. The reverb just added that layer of sparkle on those great performances. Loved it. Song was an instant classic! I miss hearing real songs like this. ❤😢
I'm listening on some crappy speakers at work. The EOS reverb has a resonance around 300-400 that sounds like it's just about to shake the speaker off the shelf.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume I hope they make a plugin version soon. The devs have been sleeping on it for some reason. And imagine a MIDIVerb with adjustable parameters?
Man there is just something I love about 16 bit digital reverb. I found I missed it when I went to ITB plugins and just couldn’t find reverbs that I liked (of course there are plenty of good ones) I have a wedge too. But Boss’ BR series of recorders have reverbs I love. If it’s 16bit I’m on it
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume One is 1s and 0s and the other is 1s and 0s but with chips that sound amazing for some reason. But even the cheap spring reverb unit sounds incredible and if you know how to build one you can do it for less than a price of a plugin.
This is great Billy. I actually liked the Rev7 in that snare example (as it didn't murk the waters in the fundamental). It had less of the fundamental of the snare note, which if tuned to the song, would be waaaay different.
Billy: any advice on keeping outboard gear (outside of gentle use/keeping it clean)- controls well maintained. I've got every rack ever bought but a few need cleaning of pots etc. Saw your console rebuild & that sokition I wondered if youd thoughts about what to not use it on or what else to perhaps use. Ty.
The cleaning solution I used in the Ghost Console video has been my favorite so far. But I couldn't say what over cleaners to not use. There is a difference between them as far as what they are designed for (fader cleaner VS contact cleaner) or which is safe for different types components on the circuit board. You'll just have to do some studying.
I still amaze at how much better I think my old physical Yamaha 16 track recorder and it’s dual , built in effects units sound…. And I find I can record a song so much faster,… the only thing you lack is the ability to copy and paste which to me ,..makes it more fun,… so when you repeat a verse or chorus ,it’s not a carbon copy from earlier in the song. I still play with the DAWs but man something about the older recorder just has a more full and live sound.
What's funny is that every once in a while I'll be doing something with real physical hardware or tools or something and for a second think about copying the settings or setup. Wish I could.
Hi, have you ever used a Furman reverb before? 'Silly question', you might be thinking when you read this, but hey... YES!! Furman (the same company who makes the power supply units) used to make spring reverbs and my brother went to our local thrift shop and brought home a Furman RV-1 spring reverb unit, which's next to me in my rack as I'm typing this. It's such a great unit! Of course it's not Hi-Fi, but it's got such a character! If you ever come across one of these (or the RV-2 (stereo version)), pick it up!!! :O I've got a lot of Hi-End stuff here in my little recording 'studio' (room), but that little unit... It sounds cool on anything and again, it's not a plate, but when used wisely and for the right purpose, it's such a nice sounding reverb! :D
I noticed that you have an Effectron II - I have 2 of these in my studio, and I use the CV input to control the delay time from my DAW (for recalls and to allow modulation, etc). It would be nice to see you do a comparo between the Effectron and your plugin delays
What made me curious, I have an old ART rackmount with multiple effects. Back in about 90 when I got it, I thought it sounded cool. In the guitar world, plugins crush it. I seem to remember it having some good delays and reverbs however. It might be fun to break it out. I put it away when I got the amp I was trying to simulate in 99.
So This was the first video of the day. Makes me wonder why youtube took so long to recommend your video. Instant sub. I can't tell you the last time i watched a video from start to finish. I miss the road and hanging around like minded folks. I learned in the day from just talking shop. Now all youtube feeds me is some goober with the secret sauce to killer kicks or some shit. Im gonna have to watch this again. Interesting the old verbs seam wider and sit in the mix better. Thanks again for posting this.
Thanks! I miss the road and talking shop too. You might like my videos about not using reverb on vocals and using 2 reverbs on vocals: th-cam.com/video/YfpLnvfw3GQ/w-d-xo.html and th-cam.com/video/SUohmVkYhOg/w-d-xo.html
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume Will go check it out now.. I need to watch things the get me thinking in the morn before i start my day. Looks like you got about 160 videos. This should keep me going for a bit.. I also had the CD and Dat player just like yours. The dat player died and never fixed it. I need to, and my son is now 23 and was 4ish when the cd burner ejected the CD. he some how slipped on a stool and pulled the tray out it and broke it. and his sippie cup lid was not on and went on my console.. It just dont seam like that cd burner would have been that old and out of service that long. I guess so.. shit we are getting old.. Dam it..
That yahama sounds pretty good, the problem is the song your using it’s too busy with guitars in stereo so it’s hard to hear the reverb That spring reverb amazing
I had a few people ask me to do a video comparing modulation hardware against modulation plugins. I don't have much by way of hardware but I do have plenty of chorus pedals. So I just put out a video comparing chorus pedals to chorus plugins. I hope everyone enjoys it. th-cam.com/video/qBoP1H3ocLY/w-d-xo.html
Glad you changed your mind about the Rev7 on the snare, cause it sounded good to me immediately in the mix!
They all sound good, but the Rev7 sounds "ready". And in a recording situation, this is gold.
I have the REV5 - it's Symphonic preset is gold.
My theory is that with modern reverbs we spend and lot of time reducing their bandwidth with post eq to get them to sit, then add saturation maybe in post etc yet a reduced bit rate piece of hardware with its physical preamp is doing all that softening and shaping for you.
Exactly!
My exact same thought!
It's mostly the converters!
Very cool video, thanks for posting. I love me some Lexicon plate, even the plugin.
The only bit of old gear I've ever bought twice was the Alesis Quadraverb, it still sounds wonderful! 😎
When I was a kid, I bought the kit version of the Radio Shack "reverb" I did all kinds of experiments with it. It used a Reticon SAD1024 CCD delay chip. I made phasers and flangers and got some really messed up sounds. I learned so much from that kit at helped me in my electronic music career for life. Anyway, time to hook up my cheap processors and pass some electrons through them.
Great video, to my ears the Wedge and Rev7 sounded really pro
All these years later, and your ears are far more discerning than they once were, so you can hear what "could be" musically - maybe even from that Radio Shack thing!! Tweaked nicely in a mix, and even a tiled bathroom has a tone of mojo. Really nice work man!! Thanks for the share!!
A lot of this is horses for courses but I've been mixing in the box for years and using all sorts of reverbs and delays even ones that are trying to emulate old outboard gear. However for some reason when Im bothered and hook up some of my old outboard do you even just an old guitar Intellifex modulation unit this is just a clarity and depth to the reverb and in some cases an easy to access sonic character that seems to be close enough to what I'm after then with a little tweaking sits nicely in the mix. This video is great I love when people pull out all gear and do some shootouts and become surprised with the outcomes. To be honest with this style of song I think that spring reverb is absolutely perfect and to me finds a nice creamy list shop and brittle as opposed to the valhalla's top end and really lends to the genre and gives the vocal and the song a real down-to-earth retro feel. Love it.
I don't know I really love the MidiVerb. It sounds like it would be amazing on Hiphop and RnB vocals. Thank you for this demo!
Ha ha! Crazy right? I remember the first time I hooked that thing up after years of not using and I was really surprised.
Roland srv 2000 is the best of the lot on snares
my Midiverb II, Rev 1 and SRV2000 sit side by side to my EMT252, Sony DRES777, Bricasti M7 and Quantec QRS. I love the „smaller ones“, they have so much character. Plugins just don’t give me that depth. Big part of the hardwares sound are their analog circuitry around their ADDA converters. Just measure THD on something like an ART 01A or Sony DRE2000 and you’ll start to understand. Its those imperfections that HELP to set the reverb tail apart from the source sound, so more depth, more realism, less perfection…
I think that spring reverb is just magic! I must have grown up listening to a lot of spring reverb. Hearing that yamaha rev 7 brought me back to 90's country! super nostalgic sound.
I love how the spring kind of 'follows' the vocal, intensity-wise, and just sits around it
I'm a huge Alesis fan. My main recorder is a HD24 , 24 in 24 out. ZERO cut and paiste , pitch correction...or anything to make it not true....if the take sucks.....we do it again. Love the Microverb series too. Love the channel Billy. I'm binge watching them all.
Thanks, this was rally entertaining and just shows what you can achieve with limited gear if you learn it well. Look forward to checking out some more of your videos.
I learned most of what I know because I had a limited amount of gear. Too many choices can slow you down and actually deter creativity.
I have the 4 tank Fairchild Reverbertron 2 Model 659 and a lot of times on vocals, in the mix, it blows away most that Lexicon, Yamaha etc can throw at you, not for everything, but a lot of times. This is the vintage hardware which I bought 35 years ago from another studio for, at that time, 200 Dollars.
Wow!
Just looked that up. I'll bet is sounds cool.
I mean... isn't this showing the process of how all of the famous verb units became famous over time? As in it's the quirks and oddities of those units that made them stand apart in a mix, not the fact they had perfect emulation and "clean" tails. When an engineer / producer discovered those quirks and oddities and made a hit track using them, it's only then that those units became desirable and famous. There's a reason plug in makers have painstakingly tried to recreate these units in exact detail, which is to get those specific quirks and oddities. Watching you "discover" the quirks and oddities about your old verb units is demonstrating that process and how something that shouldn't work turns out to be brilliant in the mix and becomes a "go to" gem. Great video :)
Thank you!
The wedge does something I always look for in reverbs: it fits. It just sits in like a puzzle piece, its hard to explain. It's not building up weird low mids, its not washing out everything, it just works. I thought the midiverb was really cool on the drums in the full mix. The Rev7 is something I'd normally like, with the big 80s high end, but there is something seriously weird about the phase with that one. Vintage verb is what I currently use and I'm pretty happy. Also that spring reverb is so vibey and cool. I think in this musical context especially, it sounds like a big old western canyon.
Yes! I used that Wedge on a lot of records before I went totally In The Box. The Yamaha did have some weird stuff going on but I wasn't sure if it always sounded like that or because it's older than the hills., but it still has a cool sound for certain things.
Fantastic comparison. Thank you for taking the time to do this! For fun I would've loved to have heard Dverb compared as the stock ProTools plug-in.
The Rev 7 is special. Incredibly musical.
Sounded rather harsh and shrill alone but sat great in the mix.
That spring reverb hardware unit is the real secret weapon! Even in mono, absolutely perfect
You had everything perfectly balanced in level. This is key, to make sure everything is easily comparable and there is no 'louder is better' business, going on. I am a big hardware fan myself. Also have a Midiverb II which I love, as well as a Yamaha SPX990 and a Boss SE-70.
the Boss is insane
The Rev7 is a great sounding verb but the sound of the spring unit blew my mind. As an engineer that cut his teeth in the early 80's I've had a hard time finding verb plugins that really excite me like the dedicated hardware did back in the day. Especially when it comes to plates. I was lucky enough to mix on a lot of good plates...boy do I ever miss them in my home studio.
Man, I've thought about building a plate reverb. Burt the spring reverb surprised me too, I hadn't listened to it in a long time.
The EeeMmmTtt patch on the Alesis wedge is my favorite on vocals. It just sounds so good.
I really liked how warm both Alesis units sounded in your video.
I need to try that patch.
What a great blast from the past! I just subbed! Looking forward to watching more great content from you, Billy.👍
Thank you!
I have one of those Master Room spring reverbs...exact same unit! Never thought of mono/stereo reverb differences too much but when you copied it and offset the duplicate to make a stereo track, that was cool. I'm going to try this myself. It did sound good on the vocal.
I liked the Rev 7 on the snare...not sure if that's what you were referring to as the surprise.
New viewer here, great content… as someone else said, it was clear after about 60 seconds that you’re “in the biz” for real. Reminds me of many fun days spent shooting out gear with my teachers and mentors. In the mid 2000s I started buying hardware verbs for my studio because the reverb plugins available at the time sounded mediocre and were incredibly taxing on CPU. Times have changed but my Wedge, PCM70 and M300 still have this special magic, especially when mixing on a console and summing the returns analog. Thanks for the vid!
Thank you! I sure wish I had a PCM70!
Great Video! Thanks for taking the time to make it.
I saw an Alesis Quadraverb 2 at my local Music Go Round. It was only $129 so I gave it a try. IT'S SO GOOD!! I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I didn't know it also had Chorus, Delay, Pitch Shifting and Gated FX! I'm definitely going to snag more rack gear soon.
The Quadraverb rocked!!!
I have several of the old Quadraverb with 2.0 software. My main reverb for 20 years. Only the Bricasti beat it eventually
I bought the Alesis Q20 and it sounds goood! Very similar to Quad 2
Rev7 sound amazing!
Cool video man the textures analog bring
Personally i love convolution reverb. I have a library with IRs taken from the classics, Bricasti & Lexicon classics, EMT plates, Grampian spring etc. It sounds lovely, and with current plugins you can sculpt the length of the tail and such very precisely. Sometimes i put a very short ambience reverb from an algorithmic reverb beforehand just so that the tail isn’t exactly the same every time, which is the problem with convolution reverbs. (You can really hear it on sampled drums.) You can use that trick, i’m not a person who keeps my tricks a secret. I want everyone to make good sounding music.
Yes! I have Altiverb and use it a lot. I've even created some of my own IRs.
would you be awesome and share your IR's?
I would need to export them from Altiverb I suppose. Never thought about that.
Old school Bro, Its the way too go Love to hear the difference of the plugin to a Lexicon Lark
Fascinating video, Billy. Thank you! Whilst none of the hardware verbs might be super high end (lexicon, bricasti...) I def preferred all of them over the plugins. To my mind I think there's something to be said about reverb being processed by a dedicated unit because of how these units will be able to keep the time coherence in the effect - especially reverb tails. A thought that keeps popping into mind is that DSP processing is essentially linear, so how is it possible to have multiple (parallel) effects going at the same time without introducing some sort of phase issues with the mix - and this is especially so regarding reverb? I dunno, I can't wrap my head around this idea. Anyway thanks again for a great video
Thanks! I too have wondered why the hardware units sound better. But I think you've got a good theory as to why.
Audio on computers generally is well buffered, so everything should be predictably coherent - ie no phase issues. It is not 'live' in the same way as analogue equipment. You can tell - at different soundcard buffer sizes you can have significant differences in CPU usage.
One of the great features of external effects is the subtleties of the analogue electronics and the ADC and DAC. This even includes how component noise can affect an audio signal as well as differences between opamps, transistor types and capacitors and good pcb layout.
Much of the great gear has 'character's - some gear is used for its transformers, buffers etc and not for the supposed effect itself. In purist terms you might think that is bad, but it's all about colour.
@@l3eatalphal3eatalpha Thanks for the reply. I do understand the benefits of hardware character and colour, and how that would affect the tone of the hardware reverbs. I also understand what you mean by buffering but I still wonder how that buffering is processed. I am not a technical DSP wiz and so I struggle to wrap my mind around how, even including the buffering, the audio samples are processed to be "released" with exactly the right timing. There is so much going on under the hood with multitudes of effects that, as good as the DSP engineering is, I still can't fathom how some sort of subtle phasing wouldn't happen especially with specifically time dependent effects such as reverb. My brain struggles to comprehend :)
@@owlmuso
Because on computers the effects aren't done 100% live, they are buffered so in fact the audio is prepared, phase correct, in advance. The buffer is the look ahead time that the processors have to assemble the audio. Small buffer=very little time=harder on the processor.
If you have a dsp outboard unit eg digital reverb there is nothing that you can do in these that cannot be done in a DAW - just need to reproduce the algorithms and have enough processing power.
The timing is so short it appears live, but if you have a buffer of 512 samples @ 48kHz that is a delay (ie latency) of 512/48000 = 10.7ms, so you barely notice. Except maybe whilst tracking.
Another element with latency is within plugins. Different plugins have their own latency. But this is registered with the plugin, so the DAW can time align them all perfectly. A simple effect may only need eg 32 samples latency (or 0, even, so it actually is live) whilst a complex task may need eg 2048 samples. A DAW will account for all of these in its signal paths (really data paths).
I hope that is any help at all. Just keep plugging away - it will all make sense some day and then you will be unable to remember why you didn't get it in the first place.
In the early days of Protools there was no latency compensation. You had to put short delays on each track and delay them to match the track with the most latency. pain in the ass. But they soon made it automatic.
I am particular to the Yamaha, perhaps it is the clarity, but I agree with you more suited to background vocals. We used an SPX90 for years and it was a treasure.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane. I remember using a Midiverb III back in the day (the successor to the Midiverb II). Later, I bought an Alesis Microverb and then an Alesis Wedge for my own equipment inventory. Hearing the Wedge again on this video brought back a lot of memories of using it as the primary reverb on lead vocals back then.
Yes, I used the Wedge on a bunch of Lil Jon mixes in the late 90's - early 2000's before I went totally in the box. This was at my home studio called The Zone and I was so embarrassed by the fact that I was using an Alesis reverb that I made a big label that said "X42 Y45 Device" that I put over the Alesis logo so that anyone seeing it would think I had something special.
Seems as soon a real gear is turned on, some kind of 3D is activated… love the music you produce
Thanks so much!
placebo
@@asor8037I don’t think it’s placebo. The spaces do feel more open. I’m sure you can EQ the plugins to be the same
@@Hugoknots A HW digital reverb is a digital algorhithm in it's own little computer. in other words, a plugin in a box. The myth that "since it is hardware it MUST sound better" does not apply here. Maybe you have bad plugins though. I mostly use the Lexicon PCM Native suite, which is 99,9% the same code, except one bug the developer fixed in the software version. In other words, the same. And even in this case, people still rant on around the internet that the hardware sounds better, but they are deluded.
@@asor8037 I'm with you. I never said anything about what your saying - "HW must sound better" etc etc. I'm only saying that in this instance the HW did sound more open than the plugins. If the HW was a plugin, I'd say 'that' plugin sounded better than the others. Another thing to be mindful of is the inputs, JFET or not, and how you drive them into the HW algorithm. This can add non-linear effects that would vary from what a plugin may emulate although you can model some of the non-linearity in the plugin too.
I’m still rocking a PCM 91 and 2 MPX 500s. I just never could get on with reverb plugins (and I’ve bought a ton of them)
I also prefer printing the effects to separate tracks for automation. It’s really opens up what I can do at mix down.
Twas interesting. Thanks for the mix and great vibes.
Thanks for the terrific comparisons. That's a lot of work. Appreciated.
Thanks!
Plugin wise I tend to go for things that emulate plates or vintage digital lexicon units. On a whim, I just scored a Quadraverb, the idea was to use it with my guitar rig, but as a possible studio piece. I'm amazed at how great it sounds, and really didn't expect it to. At first listen the reverbs and delays sound clean, but not when comparing to many plugins and modern guitar pedals. There is just something about the filtering and grain to the reverb tails that sets it apart from the other options I have, despite it being a budget piece even for the time. "better" ain't always better. The reverb seems to combine with the signal just perfectly, like it's an organic part of the sound. I can get close enough to cop the mood of the quadraverb, but it just sounds so inspiring, and I can't wait to use it in a bunch of mixes. I get a lot of clients that want 80s flavors on their mixes, and this is just the ticket.
You're right about the Quadraverb, it's just got a sound. I have 2 of them and am going to get them hooked into my system so they're easier to use at a moments notice.
Wow..... Rev7 sits in the mix perfectly w/ vocals. I wasn't expecting that!
Exactly! I remembered liking it back in the day, but listening to it now.... what a vibe!
Love the video. Noticed you have a QuadraVerb in the rack. Used to love that thing. Extremely versatile. Fairly high signal to noise ratio for studio, but man that thing was great for live shows.
Thanks! I used it as a guitar fx rig back when I played live a lot. Cool unit.
awesome vid! thank you for being so active to the community, we all truly appreciate everything that you share with us! all this is helpful
I appreciate you watching and sharing!
I own several multieffect racks, 2 REV500 Yamahas and a MPX500 Lexicon. I also have 2 Eventide H9 Max pedals. It's a very interesting exercise to compare high end plugins to older gear. There is a definite edge of feel from old stuff. But, as always, horses for courses.
Spring reverb on fiddle can be great. I ran it live back in the day and it was pretty great as long as it didn't feedback!
They all sounded great i really like that spring reverb
I have a lexicon mpx1 in my rack right now, haven't used in years I was just thinking about using it the other day when I was frustrated with all my plugin reverbs, they all sounded so dense, I think tommorrow I will make a spot in my patch bay, when I heard you testing these old units it all came flooding back that's the sound! I thought I was remembering wrong but no! That is the sound I am looking for, so transparent
Yes, use it. Let me know how it sounded.
I loved that wedge on the Drums
Rev7 is/was a beast.Nice work mate
Thanks!
Maybe it's due to me coming from the era of sampling drums from vinyl, but I liked the Yamaha the most. It had a crispy crunch, that kind of reminds me of 12 bit samplers. All of the others just kind of had a typical reverb sound. The Yamaha seems like it gives a signature color, which is cool in my opinion.
Crispy Crunch is a good way to describe it.
Well... don't throw them away! I think they all have so much character, not easily done with any of the plugins. It makes me happy for some reason. So much 'real' space.
Might need to clean a pot on that midiverb 2. I liked the wedge more too. Alesis and yamaha had some damn good programmers. That spring reverb sounded the best out of every scenario as a best match.
10:15 to my old analogue sound guy/digital engineer/bass player/Gen X ears, that Rev 7 is spot on.. gives a little sparkle and action to those drums.
And that old spring reverb JUST DELIVERS genuine sound..
Hello/ my ears hear the greatest panorama and depth of reverb from the plugin L480. Thanks
I love my Midiverb II and Quadraverb! They earned spots in my rack as more of an interesting character reverbs. I’ll tend to use realistic room verbs or delay for the rest.
I miss having a live chamber. I keep thinking of building one out here.
Really liked my alesis quadraverb........in ableton now i just come always back to vintageverb.......so good .......
I LOVE Vintage Verb. You might want to check out their free plugin called Super Massive. Incredible.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume yes vintageverb sound fantastic......nothing freaky......but even for mastering,it sound the best.......
I have supermassive.......i think it is their stripped down tool for making their algorithmes for their reverbs........you can make your own reverbs with this......
The old spring reverb sounds much more lively to me. I still love the verbs in my old Roland SE 50
I think the spring analog is more tireless. It hits your soul more. I feel like i am in a studio in 1960s or 70s with a Bob Segar or any of the soul styles singers
What a great voice!...it all works..
Didn't like the altiverb, the Valhalla was neutral and unobtrusive so useful, the rev7 was a bit off kilter, liked the wedge sounded real, would have maybe reduced the room size a bit on the drums but an interesting comparison. Have the Lexicon LXP-1 it is my go to verb/delay, just don't like ITB verbs that much, EQ and comp good in the box for me, I mix down through 1/4" 2-track for texture and mix cohesion, if needed, but going full outboard is a lot of maintenance and space used up, so just stick to some FX and keep it simple.
thanks for the comparison, confirmed my thoughts on outboard verbs!
love my tc.electronics M2000. Once I made an as natural as possible room with it for a radio broadcast. It was stunning. When it's on, it sounds like the person was in your room. It wasn't an effect at all, it was the secret ingredient which “holds the room together”.
Very cool!
TC electronic stuff is great I have the unity card in my Yamaha O2R amazing sound.
Your gear is really nice, and that first song is very beautiful, great vocals! I had a nice Ibanez DD 1000 unit years ago, loved it (It almost did reverb lol). Since I got REmatrix and most of the convolution packages from Overloud I never use any of my other verbs. REmatrix has both convolution and algorithm as well. I simply do not even seek better verbs, REmatrix is it for me.
Thanks! I loved those Ibanez units.
Thank you!
Very interesting. And fantastic music too. I've been buying hardware reverbs myself after trying a Bricasti, comparing it to the Liquidsonics Seventh Heaven - its very different. The hardware reverb gives a sense of space, without really being noticable, the plugin seems glue itself on top of the audio, is very noticable - yet the space is less satisfying. This convinced me to first try an MPX1 - since it was so cheap...it was so much better than any reverb I had as a plugin, that I then went and bought a PCM90, which I'm looking forward to arriving any day.
I do happen to have the Alesis Midiverb you have, it was left in my studio - it works fine but its quite a noisy box and you cannot do anytihng with the presets, even so - still sounds kind of interesting in a way that plugins do not.
Your tests, have convinced me, I'm making some good investments. I preferred all of your hardware reverbs over the plugins.
The Altiverb, sounded kind of lifeless, the REV7 was great, the wedge and the Alesis midiverb - all had something going for it that I preferred. The spring reverb was beautiful on the vocal - amazing singer and song of course, but it evoked something. I am beginning a search now for the unit you have here.
Enjoyable vid, will subscribe for the music alone!
Thanks! You're so right. And you're going to love that PCM90.
I feel the same. I have a Rev-5 and a PCM-81, and it's 'in there' in a way I can't describe.
First time here. I like your vibe dude. Nice song too.
I'm a hardware man :-).
BTW I like very much your mixes
I wish you the best, thanks for your videos
Thanks for watching and being here! Just put out a new video.
The better reverb &/or multi fx units that really still have a edge, in these plug in days... Are the Ensoniq DP4 or DP2's, Lexicon PCM or MPX units... & TC Electronics rack units like the Fireworks, as good examples of the time.
Thanks! I think I need to do another video about this.
Impresive😳 Still have my TC M2000 i loved for live use, in dualmode, and a TC M one, maybe i should hook it up to my DAW🤔🤔 i also like the effects in my MIDAS MR18
I just looked through and old bin of music knock knacks and found a wedge, totally new and unopened. I bought 2 when they came out and never opened the second. So I pulled it out and took it to my buddy's place and put it on my mic. Totally fine for live.
Wow! So cool!
I have the wedge as well and I love all the "wooden" presets. The manual is incredible for anyone wanting to learn aBout reverb
From the preset names it seems the Wedge had all the Midiverb4 algos. MV4 was my first hardware reverb and I still like the character, despite it sitting in a rack with a Lexicon PCM-70 and 80, MPX-1 and Vortex (for the Bleen). Another fun lofi reverb is the Zoom 1201. I would still buy an Alesis Quadraverb if one came by. I don't really care about VSTs, but when doing quick ideas, I use VintageVerb and the Valhalla Room.
I have become a Valhalla fan too.
These are great examples of how fantastic some of those old racks can revive the "mojo" you may be looking for in your mix.
cheers!
Thank you!
The Rev7 is a great bit of kit. Hard to find one in good condition because most people hammered them.
I still use my old Digitech Studio Quads for pretty much everything that doesn't need to sound super spacey. That's Valhalla Supermassive's job.
Supermassive is amazing!
please dont do this. rack gear is really cheap right now
Sorry!
Lol
Like the comments but dunno, not here in the uk. People still asking crazy money.
My lexicon PCM70 cost me £145 four years ago, now it’s £1000 plus….
@@youcantno3963only 175? Wow. Alesis racks were super cheap at one point
@@youcantno3963thats because theres no user agreement, its the price of freedom.
I have a hard time comparing the reverbs. On one hand you have a 24bit digital signal that's oversampling and working with 32bit float... that's sharing computation cycles on a CPU that's doing loads of other work as well. Then you have dedicated devices that are working at 16 bits, no float, with whatever converters, processors and memory that fit in their price point (for the 80's and 90's).
As with samplers of the time, those limitations impart a sound and quality all their own.
For me, being able to keep everything in-the-box with absolute total recall is the winner. Though sometimes I miss my old Quadraverbs. The flanged echoes presets on drums was pretty awesome.
I'm with you. As I've said before, it's hard to do a fair and scientific comparison between gear and plugins. And also, because of my work flow and the amount of different projects I need to switch between I need to be In The Box most of the time.
I have the REV4 and MidiverbII. I think they're dandy, and if you like those I would recommend you try a TCElectronics M3000, which is an even better device imo.
For plugins I'm pretty happy with Arturia's Intensity. Thanks for the video.
TC Electronics is the sh__t!
I liked the comparison and your ability to walk through the different verbs. They each had a different character which definitely stood out.
But the best part was the beautiful song. Truly a beautifully recorded and written track done by musicians with genuine talent and great voices. The reverb just added that layer of sparkle on those great performances.
Loved it. Song was an instant classic!
I miss hearing real songs like this. ❤😢
Thanks so much!!! I always try to find the best music for my videos and I'm lucky enough to have worked with some great artists.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume I was 100% sincere. Praise is just as important as criticism as they say.
I'm listening on some crappy speakers at work. The EOS reverb has a resonance around 300-400 that sounds like it's just about to shake the speaker off the shelf.
I used to have an alesis wedge. The cedar room is awesome
That room sound seems to be one of the favorites.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume I hope they make a plugin version soon. The devs have been sleeping on it for some reason. And imagine a MIDIVerb with adjustable parameters?
Man there is just something I love about 16 bit digital reverb. I found I missed it when I went to ITB plugins and just couldn’t find reverbs that I liked (of course there are plenty of good ones) I have a wedge too. But Boss’ BR series of recorders have reverbs I love. If it’s 16bit I’m on it
I'm not familiar with the Boss reverbs. I'll have to check them out.
Your face expression while following the lyrics lol. The passion.
The passion is strong. Sometimes too strong ha ha! Hope you are well.
Fantastic video. Even the cheap units compared to all of the plugins are night and day...
Yes! And it's been decades since some of the hardware unitas was built. I just don't understand why they can't make plugins as good.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume One is 1s and 0s and the other is 1s and 0s but with chips that sound amazing for some reason.
But even the cheap spring reverb unit sounds incredible and if you know how to build one you can do it for less than a price of a plugin.
@@NikosPage I've been thinking of making a spring or plate reverb. I just need the time.... But it might make a good video.
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume Please do and I'll make one with you :D
@@NikosPage Any suggestions on good instructions or videos about making one?
So good. Thanks Billy. 🙌🏻
Thanks for being a part of this.
Had the pleasure of using a real stereo EMT140 recently, and holy smokes was so blown away. Nothing can beat that. Couldnt take it home sadly haha
They are kinda big...
yep lol, magical machine though@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume
Great stuff. You’re an artist and an inspiration
Thank you!
This is great Billy. I actually liked the Rev7 in that snare example (as it didn't murk the waters in the fundamental). It had less of the fundamental of the snare note, which if tuned to the song, would be waaaay different.
Thanks!
you should try the Abbey Road Saturator after the reverbs on the returns.
Billy: any advice on keeping outboard gear (outside of gentle use/keeping it clean)- controls well maintained. I've got every rack ever bought but a few need cleaning of pots etc. Saw your console rebuild & that sokition I wondered if youd thoughts about what to not use it on or what else to perhaps use. Ty.
The cleaning solution I used in the Ghost Console video has been my favorite so far. But I couldn't say what over cleaners to not use. There is a difference between them as far as what they are designed for (fader cleaner VS contact cleaner) or which is safe for different types components on the circuit board. You'll just have to do some studying.
I still amaze at how much better I think my old physical Yamaha 16 track recorder and it’s dual , built in effects units sound…. And I find I can record a song so much faster,… the only thing you lack is the ability to copy and paste which to me ,..makes it more fun,… so when you repeat a verse or chorus ,it’s not a carbon copy from earlier in the song. I still play with the DAWs but man something about the older recorder just has a more full and live sound.
What's funny is that every once in a while I'll be doing something with real physical hardware or tools or something and for a second think about copying the settings or setup. Wish I could.
Before you interrupted in that section I was pre commenting that I thought shorter verbs would be a better suit for this track haha.
Yeah that spring reverb was the feels right there on that vocal
Hi, have you ever used a Furman reverb before? 'Silly question', you might be thinking when you read this, but hey... YES!! Furman (the same company who makes the power supply units) used to make spring reverbs and my brother went to our local thrift shop and brought home a Furman RV-1 spring reverb unit, which's next to me in my rack as I'm typing this. It's such a great unit! Of course it's not Hi-Fi, but it's got such a character! If you ever come across one of these (or the RV-2 (stereo version)), pick it up!!! :O I've got a lot of Hi-End stuff here in my little recording 'studio' (room), but that little unit... It sounds cool on anything and again, it's not a plate, but when used wisely and for the right purpose, it's such a nice sounding reverb! :D
You're reminding me that I once owned one. But now I don't know what happened to it.
Oh my GOSH - we used to have TWO identical Effectron ll's in our live PA rig...
I noticed that you have an Effectron II - I have 2 of these in my studio, and I use the CV input to control the delay time from my DAW (for recalls and to allow modulation, etc). It would be nice to see you do a comparo between the Effectron and your plugin delays
The Effectron doesn't work. The signal indicator shows input but nothing at output. Haven't gone beyond that in figuring out what's wrong.
What made me curious, I have an old ART rackmount with multiple effects. Back in about 90 when I got it, I thought it sounded cool. In the guitar world, plugins crush it. I seem to remember it having some good delays and reverbs however. It might be fun to break it out. I put it away when I got the amp I was trying to simulate in 99.
I have an SPX90 that is amazing on snares. I have a Rev5 which is the best reverb I have ever used on vocals. It is simply amazing
It's crazy how many records had an SPX90 on the snare. Everyone I knew used them.
So This was the first video of the day. Makes me wonder why youtube took so long to recommend your video. Instant sub. I can't tell you the last time i watched a video from start to finish. I miss the road and hanging around like minded folks. I learned in the day from just talking shop. Now all youtube feeds me is some goober with the secret sauce to killer kicks or some shit. Im gonna have to watch this again. Interesting the old verbs seam wider and sit in the mix better. Thanks again for posting this.
Thanks! I miss the road and talking shop too. You might like my videos about not using reverb on vocals and using 2 reverbs on vocals: th-cam.com/video/YfpLnvfw3GQ/w-d-xo.html and th-cam.com/video/SUohmVkYhOg/w-d-xo.html
@@FreakingOutWithBillyHume Will go check it out now.. I need to watch things the get me thinking in the morn before i start my day. Looks like you got about 160 videos. This should keep me going for a bit.. I also had the CD and Dat player just like yours. The dat player died and never fixed it. I need to, and my son is now 23 and was 4ish when the cd burner ejected the CD. he some how slipped on a stool and pulled the tray out it and broke it. and his sippie cup lid was not on and went on my console.. It just dont seam like that cd burner would have been that old and out of service that long. I guess so.. shit we are getting old.. Dam it..
Oh man... I haven't thought about sippie cups in years. Now 2 of my boys want to be in a band with me. Time flies...
That yahama sounds pretty good, the problem is the song your using it’s too busy with guitars in stereo so it’s hard to hear the reverb
That spring reverb amazing
Great video! Subscribed 🙌🏻
Thank you!
Thank you for this video.
I still use the FX900. Never really enjoyed plugin verbs, but the Luxeverb that came with the FL update is usful to me.
Good comparison. Pros and cons in each camp.