Best Saturation For Specific Instruments

[Mustang Martigan]

I'm looking to buy a couple saturation plugins. From what I've read, certain ones work best when used on specific insturments. I'm interested in grabbing ones that sound best on vocals and the 2bus.

I've heard good things about the Waves Kramer Tape plug for vocals, due to the delay it adds when set a certain way.

As for the 2bus, Softube Tape seems to be a pretty popular choice.

You guys have any suggestions?

[Recycled_Brains]

I like Soundtoys Decapitator a lot. Even more since I downloaded Tchad Blake's presets. Those are a lot of fun. I've found it's most valuable in a less-is-more sense. Love it on vocals and damn near everything else, just in small doses. I haven't successfully used it on 2-buss yet. I have tried though. Usually I dig it at first, but then end up taking it off. That's by no means a rule though.

I really love the Massey Tapehead too. So simple, but sounds great. The THC plugin is really fun too, but it's much more heavy handed. The new version has a blend control though, so that's sick.

[MoreSpaceEcho]

The saturation on the venerable old Blockfish still rules on drums.

[permanent hearing damage]

I like Soundtoys Decapitator a lot. Even more since I downloaded Tchad Blake's presets. Those are a lot of fun. I've found it's most valuable in a less-is-more sense. Love it on vocals and damn near everything else, just in small doses. I haven't successfully used it on 2-buss yet. I have tried though. Usually I dig it at first, but then end up taking it off. That's by no means a rule though.

+1, though I never got the Tchad Blake presets, i'll have to do some digging! I love it on vocals - usually start with the "punk vox" preset and tweak/blend from there. Even for quiet, singer-songwriter type stuff. just a tiny bit blended in helps fill it out.

I do often use it on my 2-bus, also, after compression/EQ but before my limiter. I just use the "E" mode and usually just a little bit, but I always like what it does.

I also really like the UAD Studer in 30ips mode - does nice things to the low end!

[permanent hearing damage]

also UAD 1073 MKII is great for adding dirt to guitars, tho not expressly a saturation plug

I like PSP's vintage warmer, UAD 1176 RevA (no compression), bx VSM-3,or UAD API vision for dirt on bass, though don't use any of them often

Decapitator on Drum bus in the "T" mode

[Nick Sevilla]

If you are using Avid Pro Tools and are current, they now offer HEAT for non TDM / HDX systems.

https://www.avid.com/plugins/heat

It works a charm on most things.

Other ones I like:

Nomad Factory Magnetic II. Very good.

http://go.nomadfactory.com/products/p897-Magnetic-II/

I used to be able to use this one too, but it is discontinued for current DAWs:

http://www.ursplugins.com/ursSat64.php

[Recycled_Brains]

I like Soundtoys Decapitator a lot. Even more since I downloaded Tchad Blake's presets. Those are a lot of fun. I've found it's most valuable in a less-is-more sense. Love it on vocals and damn near everything else, just in small doses. I haven't successfully used it on 2-buss yet. I have tried though. Usually I dig it at first, but then end up taking it off. That's by no means a rule though.

+1, though I never got the Tchad Blake presets, i'll have to do some digging! I love it on vocals - usually start with the "punk vox" preset and tweak/blend from there. Even for quiet, singer-songwriter type stuff. just a tiny bit blended in helps fill it out.

I do often use it on my 2-bus, also, after compression/EQ but before my limiter. I just use the "E" mode and usually just a little bit, but I always like what it does.

I also really like the UAD Studer in 30ips mode - does nice things to the low end!

The E mode is the one I never use. Something about it just doesn't do it for me, but I could see how it could be cool on the mix buss since it does that smiley face thing a bit. I'll have to try it some more. Definitely get the Tchad presets. They're great. Currently using 2 of them on the vocals for my band's thing. We like our vocals blown to bits.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2djfi7m9gj7g6 ... s.zip?dl=0

[kslight]

Besides what has already been said, Elysia Phil’s Cascade is cool sometimes.

[Snarl 12/8]

My favorite for low end instruments (bass and kick drum) back when I was digital / ITB was Quadrafuzz. It's like multiband saturation and was a great sortof distortion EQ for adding something to rumbly parts. It was a free plugin with some DAW I used to use. Does anyone know of any DAW that comes with it still?

[Nick Sevilla]

My favorite for low end instruments (bass and kick drum) back when I was digital / ITB was Quadrafuzz. It's like multiband saturation and was a great sortof distortion EQ for adding something to rumbly parts. It was a free plugin with some DAW I used to use. Does anyone know of any DAW that comes with it still?

Forgot about that one. It is part of the Cubase DAW, but only the better versions.

[digitaldrummer]

I use SoundToys Devil-Loc Deluxe for a lot of stuff, although I think it would be a bit much for a whole mix. but drums, vocals, guitars... all really nice if you want to destroy it (but you don't have to because it has a mix control...).

[Recycled_Brains]

The UAD ATR-102 can be cool too. I have zero patience for experimenting with it, so it's fairly hit or miss for me, but it's rad when it works. Usually if the default setting sounds cool, I'll do a quick run through of the different tape formulations and calibration levels (always on 1/2, 15IPS). If that's not enough to get me there, I bail. It's like 50/50. I've only tried it on the mix buss though. I should probably experiment more with it on individual busses.

[drumsound]

I like Soundtoys Decapitator a lot. Even more since I downloaded Tchad Blake's presets. Those are a lot of fun. I've found it's most valuable in a less-is-more sense. Love it on vocals and damn near everything else, just in small doses. I haven't successfully used it on 2-buss yet. I have tried though. Usually I dig it at first, but then end up taking it off. That's by no means a rule though.

+1, though I never got the Tchad Blake presets, i'll have to do some digging! I love it on vocals - usually start with the "punk vox" preset and tweak/blend from there. Even for quiet, singer-songwriter type stuff. just a tiny bit blended in helps fill it out.

I do often use it on my 2-bus, also, after compression/EQ but before my limiter. I just use the "E" mode and usually just a little bit, but I always like what it does.

I also really like the UAD Studer in 30ips mode - does nice things to the low end!

The E mode is the one I never use. Something about it just doesn't do it for me, but I could see how it could be cool on the mix buss since it does that smiley face thing a bit. I'll have to try it some more. Definitely get the Tchad presets. They're great. Currently using 2 of them on the vocals for my band's thing. We like our vocals blown to bits.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2djfi7m9gj7g6 ... s.zip?dl=0

Thanks for this. I remember reading about the Tchad Black presets a long time ago. How do you install them?

[losthighway]

This is kind of like bringing up spaghetti in a pizza conversation, but I've always preferred saturation from amps, outboard boxes and/or pedals. Not even necessarily expensive stuff. The combination of a tone knob, a gain knob and the infinite degrees of how hard you can hit the gain stage by twisting an aux send is very satisfying to me.

I suppose if you're wanting to saturate everything a little bit this could be a huge time suck compared to a plugin that's doing it for you.

[I'm Painting Again]

This is kind of like bringing up spaghetti in a pizza conversation, but I've always preferred saturation from amps, outboard boxes and/or pedals. Not even necessarily expensive stuff. The combination of a tone knob, a gain knob and the infinite degrees of how hard you can hit the gain stage by twisting an aux send is very satisfying to me.

I suppose if you're wanting to saturate everything a little bit this could be a huge time suck compared to a plugin that's doing it for you.

same

feels and sounds the best to me as well

loop out to an overdriven original memory man - add a very slight delay and it really gets thick - push it though an eq and
blend it up under the original - lovely

stuff like that