Reverb plug-ins suggestions?

H-evolve

H-evolve

Member
Apr 21, 2014
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Montreal, Canada
Hi,

Looking for a good yet not overly expensive reverb plug-in. I'm not a reverb specialist at all, therefore I was wondering if you guys often use more than one software? Say one specific for the drum, another different one for the guitar, etc?

So ya, if you could send suggestions on what you use for guitars, drums, bass, vocals, etc.

Thanks a lot!
 
I you want a reverb that is not overly expensive, easy to deal with and very diverse I could recommend PSPs EasyVerb. It gives you various very good presets to start with. For example: For drums I like the Basic and Short Plate presets, for guitars (if reverb is needed at all) the Small Hall or Basic Room Presets. For Vocals the Large Plate is very cool. For every reverb algorythm (Ambience, Room, Hall, Cathedral, Plate etc.) there are basic, small and large presets. That makes it really easy to find a direction.

PSPs 2445 is very good, too. And very easy to understand because it doesn't have millions of buttons, knobs and faders. It sounds a bit smoother than the EasyVerb but isn't that diverse because it mainly emulates plate reverb sounds.

Soundwise I currently love Waves' Abbey Road Reverb Plates. As the name indicates it only has plate reverbs, but do they sound amazing! The downside is that it is VERY demanding CPU-wise.

Valhalla reverb plugins (Room, Vintage or Plate) get much praise. For 50 bucks you get a very good reverb plugin qualitywise. But I personally as an amateur musician find the above mentioned PSP EasyVerb much easier to handle.

Download the demos and try them!

Another tip: place high- and lowpass filters (200-600 Hz and 5-10 Khz depending on the instrument) before the reverb.
 
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GrabtharsHammer77 said:
I you want a reverb that is not overly expensive, easy to deal with and very diverse I could recommend PSPs EasyVerb. It gives you various very good presets to start with. For example: For drums I like the Basic and Short Plate presets, for guitars (if reverb is needed at all) the Small Hall or Basic Room Presets. For Vocals the Large Plate is very cool. For every reverb algorythm (Ambience, Room, Hall, Cathedral, Plate etc.) there are basic, small and large presets. That makes it really easy to find a direction.

PSPs 2445 is very good, too. And very easy to understand because it doesn't have millions of buttons, knobs and faders. It sounds a bit smoother than the EasyVerb but isn't that diverse because it mainly emulates plate reverb sounds.
.....
Click to expand...

Thanks a lot man. I have not heard about the PSP stuff, but I'll sure try them. I have heard however about the Valhalla and yes it's nice, but I wanted to check more options. So thanks a lot for your feedback
 
realistically you're going to want a few different reverbs as they'll often have their strengths in different areas.

of the more old school "physical" type reverb units, you'll have:

Springs
Chambers (actual room rather than algorithm modelling one)
Plate (again a physical sheet of metal than an algorithm)

For springs: there isn't too many options. PSP make a spring reverb plugin, there's overloud springage, UAD BX20, impulses and whatever stock plugins can muster.

Chambers: impulses are probably the best bet here. Various libraries out there have the Cello (Eastwest/United Western) Bill Putnum chambers which sound pretty great. Capitol Studios are the holy grain but they don't allow people to sample them.

Plate: Until recently there wasn't many ITB options. UAD have the EMT140, waves abbey road, Valhalla Plate and Sknote Verbtone. I use the UAD most but the waves plugin sounded very much like I remember real plates to sound. Valhalla sounds great but less like a real plate to me.

On the "digital" side of things you'll want to cover a variety of spaces/uses. Often you'll want something with great early reflections that does short/realistic spaces well to add a sense of depth. Also a natural, longer sound, as well as overly hyped modulated/spacey sounds. AND on top of that you can have the lexicon/eventide/etc take on chambers/halls/plates that don't sound like the real thing but definitely have their own vibe.

There's no single plugin that will cover all this ground so you'll want to think about what sounds you like/use the most and also what you have available to you already through stock plugins/free impulses etc.

I find plate reverbs work on most things (can do subtle and hyped and sound very musical). Also the impulses of plate's sound terrible to me so I'd possibly start here. If you can afford Waves Abbey Road plates, impulses for springs and valhalla vintage for everything else for the time being.
 
Machinated said:
For springs: there isn't too many options. PSP make a spring reverb plugin, there's overloud springage, UAD BX20, impulses and whatever stock plugins can muster.
Click to expand...
What about this one ? http://www.softube.com/index.php?id=sr

On the digital side of things, 2cAudio Breeze is affordable and sounds great to me (EDIT : actually it's not THAT cheap for now, but sometimes on sale).
Otherwise, I use Valhalla Vintage, and Waves IR1 for real spaces/rooms (you can grab this one or the IR-L version for pretty cheap on Audiodeluxe, you just have to wait for it to be on sale).
 
MrBongo said:
my search ended with the Lexicon PCM bundle. I couldn´t get any really great results out of most other reverbs, including Valhalla (don´t understand the hype at all)
Click to expand...

funny, i could not get any satisfying sound out of the PCM bundle since i have bought it a good year ago.
do you know a good "preset database" for this plugin?
the stock presets seem quite confusing and very random to me.
i know, one should not rely on presets but often it's a nice starting point to work with! :)
 
More threads should be like this. Very informative.

Nowadays Valhalla seems to be THE standard for reverb plugins, just like the 6505/Tubescreamer combination for heavy rhythm guitars. I'm sure their plugins are great in the right hands - for me they just didn't work. However PSP EasyVerb "clicked" with me immediately. The stock presets are really great and offer good starting points for all the different algorythms (in fact I mostly use the stock presets for all my tracks without feeling the need for further tweaking) and on KVRs market place I could grab a license for only $30. I guess everyone just has to try all options and find out what works best for him.

Gotta check out the Lexicon... ;-)

(Edit: just saw the price for the lexicon... $599 is just too much for me TBH)
 
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FIXXXER said:
funny, i could not get any satisfying sound out of the PCM bundle since i have bought it a good year ago.
do you know a good "preset database" for this plugin?
the stock presets seem quite confusing and very random to me.
i know, one should not rely on presets but often it's a nice starting point to work with! :)
Click to expand...

some of the stock presets are very usable, as soon as you tweak the EQ sections (especially for late) and the Bass Reverb Tail to your needs. There is another slider, Bass XOV, in the advanced menu. I usually find myself using lower cutoff points than the presets suggest
 
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GrabtharsHammer77 said:
Just watched some videos demonstrating Verberate. The sounds I heard so far are all very promising, very "real" for an algorythmic reverb. Will check out the demo in the next few days.
Click to expand...
That's exactly the reason I bought it. It just sounded "real", like you said.
 
GrabtharsHammer77 said:
More threads should be like this. Very informative.

[...]

(Edit: just saw the price for the lexicon... $599 is just too much for me TBH)
Click to expand...
missed that post. Yes, great thread!

The price apparently has increased, I bought it for 299€. Atm it´s 429 over here (for the reverb bundle, not total bundle).
When Lexicon released it, it was way over 1k. Hilarious
 
MrBongo said:
some of the stock presets are very usable, as soon as you tweak the EQ sections (especially for late) and the Bass Reverb Tail to your needs. There is another slider, Bass XOV, in the advanced menu. I usually find myself using lower cutoff points than the presets suggest
Click to expand...

yeah but it's hard to find a good starting point especially because of the bland naming of the presets.
guess i need to RTFM on this one.

as for a great reverb this one seems also quite interesting,
it's basically the reverb section from the AXE FX II, which has absolutely amazing sounding reverbs.

 
For $150 you can get Valhalla Plate/Room/Vintage and be pretty well set as far as algorithmic verbs go. I can't say my experience is anything like previous posters - they've been rock-solid for me and easy to fit into any production. Plate completely killed any GAS I had for the UAD EMT140 and the others replaced the Lexicon bundle for me (and I really only liked the Vintage Plate from it).
 
Valhalla plate and vintage verb here.
I don't want or need any other verbs. They are amazing.
 
Would be nice to hear from the topic starter which reverb he finally went with.

After all the Valhalla praise I tried them all again. And I must admit that - although I still really like PSPs EasyVerb and 2445 - Valhalla VintageVerb's "Drum Plate" preset is perhaps the best snare verb I ever had. With just a little high- and lowcut before the verb it sounds just perfect!
 
EpicVerb from Variety of Sound has been getting a lot of use on my drums lately, specifically the snare when I want that. However, I've always had a soft spot for that VST. Variety of Sound made some awesome free plugins.

Glenn Fricker recently suggested it on his Top 5 free plugins video. But I'm sure some members here will curse me for mentioning him.
 
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