I like neve from catfish

 

It's on the "all bundle" from 2022

 

Thanks mk_96. I see I already have that *and* I see that it has individual installers. And if I'd bothered to do an Everything search for Focusrite, I'd have found it.

Anyway, grateful for the help. Not sure why I never bothered to install anything from that download. I think I was trying to get away from frittering away my time installing and testing every release that came down the highway. That was a fantastic release though.

 

One of the band I like, the guitar player swears that his guitar tone in the record was DI straight to Focusrite console cranked. He said it's the "secret" of United Recording Studios (formerly known as The Village) Studio A guitar tone and most bands did it and the reason why they decide to record there. I tried to do it with the plugins... failed miserably. Apart from that, it's top 3 CS plugin (until yesterday) from PA for me, my favourite guitar EQ just got a new console emulation from PA.

EDIT : I just remembered, there's a guitar pedal for that Di straight to console cranked by JHS.



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NEWS! Plugin Alliance just released a new channel strip plugin by Lindell Audio. It's the Lindell 69 Series. A channel strip plugin based on the famous Helios Type 69 console.



The Waves Kramer HLS Channel EQ plugin is my most used, favourite and one plugin that I don't think any other plugin can replace for guitar. I don't know what the dumb shit it does but if it's not 2.8kHz, it's 3.5kHz, one of them will make the guitar won't sound like made of cheap firewood anymore. Works for 10 years or more for me every single time. I bought it long time ago and still been using it until today for every guitar track I've ever processed whether it needs or not, when they not, it will be there doing nothing turned on with a touch of its preamp so the aliasing start kicking in. It has something to do with Waves Aliasing™ Technology or something, but it works for me. Let's see if the Lindell 69 Series can change that, if they can beat that sweet inharmonic distortion from Kramer HLS Channel EQ.

Spoiler: Lol

To avoid misunderstanding there's no such thing as Waves Aliasing™ Technology it's just another way of saying Waves plugins create aliasing because there's no oversampling implementation until recently. Analog hardware doesn't produce aliasing, it's a flaw only in digital domain that can be minimize with higher internal sample rate processing. Aliasing, according to many, is theoretically a bad thing in DSP technology, but also bear in mind a famous plugin like Soundtoys Decapitator also produces aliasing and was being used in 95% songs that gets Grammy nomination for the past 15 years and clocked, I estimate more than 100 Billions streams.

 

Last edited: Jun 16, 2023

The American Class A and the British Class A channel strips have a standalone version with own interface that don't need the Console 1 hardware to work.

 

And it already said hello to our sister.

 

I can't... everytime I read something like that, the "hello" will sound like :

 

The very best one is Lindell 69 series because it is the newest and has '69' in the name

 

Or in short

 

Give us a feedback after youre done testing. I'm not a channel strip guy but this was super hyped in my social circle so I'm curious.

 

It's gonna take a while because it's a channel strip plugin and you'll only get the whole idea after 2-3 mixes, the sound, ease of use, range, how it works together when 150 instance running at once, too much stuff to consider to be fair. Kinda risky to experiment with client mixes, it could backfire and it has to be the right genre too.

I however installed it on my laptop and played with the EQ, my main machine kinda have to wait for the witches release as I don't want to mix releases. I compared it to the Waves Kramer HLS Channel EQ and as for now I can say, the Lindell 69 Series EQ is not the bad boy I expected, it sounds like Hi-Fi EQ where my sweet love crazy Kramer HLS is more nasty sounding and brutal. Mainly because the Lindell only modeled the Line Amp circuit of it, which has a slight roll-off at the high-end, to minimize harshness. This behavior is the same on Line Amp mode in Kramer HLS EQ too but they both sound different. The EQ curves are similar but I can feel the Lindell's is much more smoother, has to do with additional frequency points at the high shelf, where Kramer HLS only have a fixed 10kHz. All the nasty part that I like on Helios EQ is on the Mic mode, only the Waves version have it. The preamp section of 69 Series however offers huge range of harmonic variety between the Gain/Drive knob and the combination of two gain compensation toggles, but they are all still in the handsome sounding area, characteristically.

A quick test on an Acoustic Guitar track, the Lindell's version seems to give a more pleasant Justin Bieber/Ed Sheeran type of vibe. Sweet tone, smooth and silky sounding but the Kramer HLS doesn't sound that good for that particular track at all. It was a sitting-on-the-beach-in-the-summer-singing-with-bunch-of-chicks kinda acoustic guitar track anyway. I'm pretty convinced if the acoustic guitar track is more to Syd Barret Madcap Laughs kinda vibe, the Kramer HLS would've shine brighter.

I think they've made the EQ (69 Series) that way because the most of the mainstream EQ plugin lovers want an EQ plugins to be like that, smooth, sweet, glorious high-end all the nice stuff. Only a madman me would like an EQ plugin to be nasty sounding, right ? A nasty sounding digital EQ plugin that emulates an analog EQ sounds wrong on so many levels. Even Waves know that, but those geniuses paid Eddie Kramer to make it sounds relevant. Brilliant motherfuckers eh.

But..

from the Lindell Audio 69 Series Manual :

It looks like, they designed the plugin to be polite on the EQ section and move all the nastiness to the Dynamic section that features an FET compressor, a Limiter and Gate combined with Input/Output gain staging and mix knob included. The developer expects the user to abuse the dynamic section more which will be a different workflow. I don't know much about how to really use this channel strips to be honest (console trick) or if there's a special way to use it, I can't comment on how it is done on the real console back in the days since there are so little information about it and I'm guilty of not really looking for it. All I know the EQ is famous for its midrange bite. Still, it seems like a really interesting Channel Strip plugin to me, we'll see how it goes.

What the people in your circle been saying about it ? anything particularly interesting ?

 

Last edited: Jun 16, 2023

Why is there no option to set the configuration as default? Why everything has to be preactivated?
Stupid TMT and V-Gain and THD, Compressor, Gate, Eq. Everythings turned on and you are not able to turn everything off and set it as default on every single plugin of them. Crazy guys.

 

It is the same for all their other channel strips plugin too I believe ? (I haven't really checked tbh) but I've learned from a video I watched (probably Josh Gudwin) to always create a "Zero" preset (starting with a Z, so it will be on the bottom for quick access) on every PA channel strip plugin with everything turned off. I will always pick that preset as a starting point and have it on that preset in my template. Some DAW has the ability to set it as default preset. That's the only workaround I know.

Tips: for SSL type CS (4kE, 4kG, 9kJ), just turn the Dynamic module ON even when not compressing/gating. Some part of "SSL sound" is there. The THD knob only controls half part of it. The EQ is strangely clean. Lol.

 

Last edited: Jun 16, 2023

Interesting. I will try it on a mix with lousier vocal stems and see if it picks them up and straightens them out. Maybe that's the point since when you've got superb raw material in the first place, there's plenty of dirty-em-up plugins available. Currently I'm trying mixing different styles with only one plugin on each track (excluding the delay and reverb sends), that being a channel strip and I want to see if this thing can hold its own. I've had various degrees of progress working this way but nothing to call complete success yet.

 

This is the EQ with 6db boost on 14kHz and 2db boost on 2kHz. Low end bump is 100Hz selected for the Low Shelf without any boosting, which a known behavior for a Helios Type EQ.

Notice the slight roll off at the highest-end. You can see from the curves shape, it looks super smooth and should work well with vocals. It won't give you that modern pop 40kHz "air" stuff but you'll get the fundamental tone smooth and nice. Let us know what you think about it after you are done.

 

Last edited: Jun 16, 2023

Points for your preferences, that'd be my Top Two—in order—as well.
And to round out a Top Three, I'd add the Lindell 50 Series at #3. This new 69 Series has some glue in it though...

 

UPDATE : Added Pie chart (that nobody needs) on the original post because everything looks cooler in a pie chart . So far, 115 members have voted and the AMEK 9099 being the most voted channel strip plugin.

 

While the EQ section of the Lindell 69 Series is the famous Helios Type 69 EQ, I just found out that the Dynamic module is actually an ADR Compex design, that comes in standard in Helios Type 69 console. I really like the sound of the compressor and found out about it later after few digging (just one google search lol) and thought I share it here. Overall the Helios 69 sounds great if you want a dirty aggressive drums or maybe 70s sounding one too, simply put "colored".

If you would like to compare, other ADR Compex emulation :

1. Boz Digital Lab +10db Compressor (version 1 & 2) - technically an emulation of ADR Vocal Stressor that featured both EQ and Comp-Lim-Expander module.

2. Kush Audio Silika - loosely based on the unit according to its info page, but it is combined with a Neve.



3. SkNote Comp760

 

I have a tape simulation > Lindell 69 channel > Kramer PIE on my congas channel. It's the Sympathy for the Devil percussion signal flow that i was always searching in the box

 

So, I had a some time to play with it and a project to try it on and if you ask me, this plugin should be used sparingly on vocals, if ever. I wasn't able to find the sweet spot with it on as an insert and turning off sections of it.

The pre and the compressor got that sizzle and its main purpose seems to be drums and overall coloration. It's most forgiving on busses and whole mixes but it's too easy to overdo it and too hard to find the sweet spot. It's working most adequately on sounds that sound a bit sterile and flat as possible source material.

That doesn't mean it's useless, I'm sure someone else could benefit greatly from it, but that's not me right now. It's a shame because I was looking forward to its EQ + compressor combo, since all PA strips have something extra in their comps.

 

Last edited: Jul 3, 2023