RetroBand
by Michael Kingston
by Michael Kingston
4.0 / 5
(1 votes)
RetroBand is 4 band analog distortion.
RetroBand is a distortion unit at heart, it goes from warming, sharpening, roughing up, softening and smoothing - or all these combined. It may desirably enrich sterile sound sources. Failing equipment can be easily simulated and this allows plenty of creativity. With some luck, it makes things sound "larger than life". The transient enhanced IM with mid-side stereo control can change or revive a stereo image, too.
RetroBand models several aspects of the interaction between gain stages and transformers of analogue gear, referred to as intra-modulation (IM), ie. Class A/B gain stage switching distortion. It also features several forms of transient shaping in-between the stages. As opposed to sterile but perfect digital sound, IM is a distortion that can sound good. It happens especially in less than ideal analogue class A/B gain staging, which means it's present in a plenty of vintage gear.
RetroBand is a distortion unit at heart, it goes from warming, sharpening, roughing up, softening and smoothing - or all these combined. It may desirably enrich sterile sound sources. Failing equipment can be easily simulated and this allows plenty of creativity. With some luck, it makes things sound "larger than life". The transient enhanced IM with mid-side stereo control can change or revive a stereo image, too.
RetroBand models several aspects of the interaction between gain stages and transformers of analogue gear, referred to as intra-modulation (IM), ie. Class A/B gain stage switching distortion. It also features several forms of transient shaping in-between the stages. As opposed to sterile but perfect digital sound, IM is a distortion that can sound good. It happens especially in less than ideal analogue class A/B gain staging, which means it's present in a plenty of vintage gear.
Downloads
Win 32 VST
(1.2 Mb)
Mac OSX VST
(1.2 Mb)
(4 / 5)
Can give interesting tone to your sounds. HOwever, I must admit it is a bit trial and error for me to find a good tone. Still good fun and I find it useful.
So uh Tim, this came out in 2006 and was just recently made free like last year or something. So somehow I don't think you'll be the first giving this a try. And there ARE other multi-band distortions out there. I haven't found a free one I like yet, but maybe this will be it. And for some money Ohm Force has Predatohm from 2002 for kinda cheap and Ohmicide from 2007 for... more. They're pretty nice.
A multi-band saturation control? I'm willing to be the first on this venture. I was working with a mix, and yeah, I added in some distortion on the bass, but I was unable to control the exact spot where the low frequencies were affected, and the bass sounded kind'a funny. I imagined this plug in, and am willing to be the first to give it a try.