Rupert Neve Designs' pulled plug-ins are back at v1.0.7, with the warning still up
On 15 September Rupert Neve Designs announced its first plug-ins released under its own name, developed with McDSP: the Portico II Master Buss Processor at $199, and the…
AudioThing's Materia rebuilds samples from 96 partials and stores the model in the project
AudioThing released Materia on 12 October, an additive re-synthesizer. Load a sample and it analyses the sound into harmonic partials, each…
Cableguys' TimeStop draws tape stops as automation, and can keep the beat
Tape-stop plugins usually work like a trigger: press a button, and a slowdown plays out according to a couple of timing sliders. TimeStop,…
Inharmonic partials: why a bar or a drum has a less certain pitch than a string
Release time: why the same fast release distorts the bass and leaves the mids clean
Linear-phase EQ: what the latency buys, and why the ringing moves in front of the note
Stereo linking: the control that decides which channel pays
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Rob Papen's Quad-2 gives its new ribbon a modulation matrix of its own
The original Quad started life as a Rack Extension, which Rob Papen describes as the first synth built from the ground…
Falcon 2027 turns the movement in an audio file into a modulation source
UVI released Falcon 2027 on 8 October, a free update for registered owners that adds four oscillators, ten effects and…
Cherry Audio's Pentaphonic revives a synth that solved tuning with microprocessors
Cherry Audio has released Pentaphonic at $59, a recreation of the 1981 Gleeman Pentaphonic. Cherry Audio says fewer…
Baby Audio's HyperWarp chops the signal and lets you redraw the order
Baby Audio has released HyperWarp, a granular multi-effect whose interface is a graph rather than a rack of controls.…
Softube's Limit Pro can release the kick slower than the snare
A limiter that releases quickly on a bass-heavy mix runs into a timing problem. One cycle of a 40 Hz note lasts 25…
Imaginando's COLAPSO builds its partials from measured atomic emission lines
Most additive synths let you draw partials or derive them from a waveform. COLAPSO, which Imaginando released on 7…
CARBON Q splits a reference track into four stems and EQs your mix against each
Matching your mix to a reference track by comparing the two full spectrums has a basic flaw. The reference has a…
UA's new Volt range sells onboard compression and extra I/O at the same $299
Universal Audio replaced its Volt interfaces on 1 October with six bus-powered USB models, on sale from retailers the…
Spitfire and BT's Phoenix lets any sample act as an FM operator
Spitfire Audio is known for sample libraries, and Phoenix, released on 29 September with the composer BT, is a…
BLEASS and KERN both shipped reverbs that listen to the dry signal
A long reverb tail and the sound that made it compete for the same frequencies. The usual fixes are blunt:…
Maschine 3.7 adds two kinds of note probability and a Euclidean sequencer
Native Instruments released Maschine 3.7 on 23 September as a free update for Maschine 3 owners, through Native Access.…
Scaler EQ Pro turns the notes you play into EQ bands
Scaler Music released Scaler EQ Pro on 23 September, three weeks after announcing it. Like the original Scaler EQ, it…
Leapwing CenterOne 3 adds multiband control and a sidechain to the phantom centre
Turn up the Mid channel on a finished stereo mix and the vocal comes forward. So does a good part of everything else.…
Lunacy's NOVA is a free host for instruments that live in the cloud
Lunacy launched NOVA on 17 September, described by the company as a growing library of instruments that live in the…
Acoustica 8 drops the noise-profile step from DeNoise and DeHum
Acon Digital released Acoustica 8 on 10 September, and the change with the clearest effect on how the editor is used is…
MiniFreak V 5.0 takes your samples and converts them to 12-bit
MiniFreak V is the plug-in version of Arturia's MiniFreak hardware synth, and version 5.0 arrived on both at once: the…
LUNA 3.0 puts stem separation in the free tier and caps it at four tracks
Universal Audio released LUNA 3.0 on 15 September for macOS and Windows, and split the DAW into two editions: LUNA Free…
Digital Performer 12 separates stems in-house and renders Atmos inside the DAW
MOTU shipped Digital Performer 12 on 15 September. The two headline additions are stem separation and Dolby Atmos…
AudioThing's Orbita runs eight rhythmic cycles that refuse to line up
AudioThing released Orbita on 28 August, a sample-based drum machine whose sequencer works by distribution rather than…
Xils Lab MemoryTone joins a crowded field of Memorymoog emulations
Emulating a specific vintage flagship synth usually goes one of two ways. Either the developer expands on the original…
TONEX Board merges TONEX and AmpliTube into one floorboard
Amp modelers keep solving the same problem in slightly different boxes: one engine for capturing tones, another for…
Cherry Audio's Memorymode 2 doubles voices, adds MPE support
Six-voice polyphony with three oscillators per voice was the Memorymoog's whole pitch back in 1982, and also its whole…
Arturia's Pure SUB keeps the fundamental out of the distortion path
Arturia has released Pure SUB, a bass instrument built around one structural decision: the fundamental is kept separate…
Polyend Keys turns a mechanical keyboard into a three-octave MIDI controller
Polyend Keys is a mechanical QWERTY keyboard where the number row and function row double as a three-octave piano…
DAWs, honestly reviewed: six of them, by someone who has used them all
Your DAW isn't why your tracks sound amateur Choosing the right DAW for your genre is the first real decision in this…
Reason Free puts 15 Rack devices in any DAW with no expiry
Reason Studios has put 15 of its Rack devices into a free version of the Reason Rack Plugin. There is no trial period,…
Bitwig Studio 6.1 turns Sampler into a slicer with five ways to cut
Bitwig Studio 6.1 gives Sampler a sliced mode, alongside the single-sample and multisample configurations it already…
Move 2.1 bounces a MIDI clip to audio without stopping the transport
Move 2.1 adds a bounce command, and the reason it matters on a device this size is arithmetic. Move has four tracks.…
Pittsburgh Modular shrinks the SV-1 semi-modular synth for 2027
Semi-modular synths sell on a promise: patch points without a full Eurorack case, so you get hands-on routing without…
Behringer D Mini brings paraphonic Minimoog voicing
Behringer's D Mini is now available in the EU, priced at 99€, after Thomann's first batch sold out and Musicstore.de…
Minimal Audio's Lucid is a granular multi-effect with two playback engines
Minimal Audio has released Lucid, a granular effect built around two engines called Stretch and Scrub. Stretch…
Audio Damage AD-202 turns the MC-202 into an 8-voice polyphonic synth
Audio Damage has released the AD-202, a software emulation of Roland's 1983 MC-202, the synth/sequencer hybrid that…
SinTH2 is a €5,800+ built-to-order synth with 60-voice polyphony
This is a big, dense hardware synth for people who want everything on the panel and nothing in a menu. Five sample…
Karno's SEPIA keeps the analogue and adds the recall, which is the other way round
Almost every plugin worth writing about this month has been software chasing hardware. Acustica sampling a Pultec,…
Manley's Dual EQ series is passive, which is exactly why it is full of tubes
Manley have released two two-channel passive tube equalizers, the Dual Main EQ and the Dual Mid Band EQ. Both are…
AudioScape's Rev Blue 76A rebuilds the noisy 1176, on purpose
AudioScape have announced the Rev Blue 76A, a limited run of twenty units built on the Revision A circuit of the 1176.…
Diamond Color EQ 4 arrives with an AUTO control users are reading as a bug
Acustica Audio have released Diamond Color EQ 4, the latest version of the equalizer they build with Luca Pretolesi of…
Softube's Reference 1998 and 1956 are a Massive Passive and a Pultec, and cannot say so
Softube have released two passive tube equalizers, Reference 1998 Equalizer and Reference 1956 Equalizer. Neither one…
HoRNet SpectraDuck does spectral ducking at 5 ms, which is the interesting number
HoRNet have released SpectraDuck, a sidechain ducker that works in the frequency domain. Instead of pulling the whole…
AIR's Fabric Vintage Andromeda samples the Alesis A6, which is a different thing from modelling it
AIR Music Tech have released Fabric Vintage Andromeda, built around the Alesis Andromeda A6. It is a multisample…
The Dangerous Music BAX EQ plugin puts a 1952 hi-fi tone control on a mastering bus
"Officially licensed" usually means a logo agreement and a photograph of the front panel. The Dangerous Music BAX EQ…
MadeOnEarth's LedRover is a stereo diode distortion built around the TB-303
Most distortion pedals are designed for guitar and then sold to everyone else. The compromises that follow are…
Two ways to put MIDI in a TR-808: a commercial mod and open-source firmware
The TR-808 has no velocity sensitivity and no MIDI. Every hit on the original hardware fires at a fixed level, and…
Rave Generation's Master Bus Processor puts six master stages in one window
Master chains usually end up as a stack: an EQ, a bus compressor, something for loudness, something for width, a…
MONOCHORD plays a chord per key and sends the whole performance out as MIDI
Chord plugins usually stop at the chord. You pick a key and a scale, the plugin hands you voicings under one finger,…
Audiocube Space moves 3D sources between separate plugin instances
Most spatial plugins give you one window per track. You place a source, close it, open the next one, and hold the…
UAD's EMT 140 and 250 plate reverbs now run without Apollo hardware
Reissues usually arrive with a new panel and a claim larger than the change deserves. This one is the opposite.…
Glitch² 2.1.5 goes free on all three platforms
Glitch² 2.1.5 lists two changes: "Glitch2 is now free in memory of Kieran", and VST3 versions added for all platforms.…
ZL Spectrum Equalizer ducks every FFT bin against its matching sidechain bin
Ducking one instrument out of the way of another is the oldest job in mixing, and dynamic EQ is how most people do it…
Vermona's drumDING samples its own analog voice into six tracks
Most drum machines hand you a fixed set of voices: a kick circuit, a snare circuit, a hat circuit, and whatever else…
SSL's Odyssey puts instant recall behind an all-analogue signal path
Solid State Logic has launched Odyssey, a large-format recording console whose audio path is entirely analogue but…
Hermetic Modular's Alchemy Lab is an open SDK Eurorack platform
Building your own Eurorack module from scratch means designing a PCB, sourcing a processor, writing firmware from zero,…
NUSofting Dig Vox models a vocal tract instead of sampling a singer
NUSofting's Dig Vox does not begin with a recorded vowel. It builds one. A model of the glottis supplies the vocal-fold…
UDO DMNO lets two four-voice synths pass notes and audio between them
UDO's DMNO is built as two four-voice synths sharing one 44-note keyboard, but its most useful idea is not the doubled…
ASM gives the Leviasynth sequencer a more musical way to evolve patterns
ASM has expanded the Leviasynth’s sequencer with a new tool for creating variations without completely losing the…
Cytomic details The Glue 2's DBX 202 modelling and new harmonics control
The Glue has been a fixture on mix buses for over a decade, Cytomic's take on the classic SSL-style bus compressor, and…
OceanSwift's DevOcean Modular fits 140 modules into a standalone app
Ocean Swift has released DevOcean Modular, a standalone modular synthesis environment that runs on its own C++ engine…
Strymon's TimeLine MX adds a granular delay and runs two engines at once
Strymon has replaced its long-running TimeLine with the TimeLine MX, a $679 pedal carrying eleven delay engines and a…
PEEL STEMS 2 cuts real-time stem-separation latency nearly in half
Zplane has released PEEL STEMS 2, a major update to its plug-in for separating a finished mix into drums, bass, vocals…
Baby Audio's SubCulture makes bass enhancement follow every note
Baby Audio's SubCulture approaches bass enhancement as a pitch-aware process. Rather than boosting one fixed frequency,…
SinTH2 puts 120 knobs on a 60-voice synth you can only order direct
SinTH2 premiered on 18 July, and it is not an instrument you add to a basket. The four-person team behind it builds…
Soothe3: oeksound rebuilds the plugin half the industry mixes through
Ten years after the original Soothe quietly changed how records deal with harshness, Finnish developer oeksound has…
Three years late, Behringer's AKS Mini opens pre-orders at €119
Announced in January 2023 with a promised summer release, Behringer's AKS Mini has finally reached the pre-order stage,…
Audio Damage's Tessera turns any audio into chords that stay in key
Resonator plugins are quietly having a year, with new entries from AAS, Lunacy Audio and BLEASS already on the board,…
reFX confirms Rippler: Tilr's closed-source freeware synth goes commercial
Here's a story the plugin world doesn't produce often: an independent developer gives away an ambitious instrument, and…
UAD 11.9 brings Black Box HG-2 and elysia karacter to Apollo DSP
Universal Audio's UAD 11.9 software adds DSP versions of the Black Box Analog Design HG-2 and elysia karacter for…
Logic Pro 12.3 expands Beat Breaker and Alchemy
Logic Pro 12.3 for Mac and Logic Pro 3.3 for iPad share two main additions: more control inside Beat Breaker and an…
FL Studio 2026 rebuilds FLEX and lets Gopher edit your session
Image-Line released FL Studio 2026 on July 7 and followed it with version 2026.1.2 on July 20. The main changes are a…
Behringer's JT-2 reaches Europe: one Jupiter-8 voice for €179
Behringer's habit of carving famous polysynths down to a single voice continues, and this one has just started shipping…
PSP BBDelay: Vintage BBD character
PSP BBDelay is a delay plugin built around the character of classic Bucket Brigade Device (BBD) chips, those analog…
DubBox by Vochlea: Turn vocal recordings into production-ready loops
DubBox is a standalone application that converts vocal percussion into usable drum loops. You beatbox or mouth-drum…
Boz Digital Labs Automator
Automator is a multi-parameter effect plugin that lets you control EQ, gain, pan, and stereo width using a single…
Native Instruments Super*Saw: Dense Sawtooth Sounds Without the Clutter
Native Instruments’ SuperSaw is a $99 synth plugin built around two eight-voice sawtooth oscillator layers. Its…