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Blue Cat’s Dynamics

€149

A no-nonsense device that can

handle both gating and compression

in the same transfer curve, BC’s

Dynamics provides two circuits for

these different duties. Both the ‘Up’

and ‘Down’ circuits contain

Threshold and Ratio controls, a

Knee, and Depth (range, by any

other name). These two stages can

be pushed into positive or negative

ratios, with the two stages plotted on

the same graph, and the attack,

release and hold of both determined

together in a separate pane. Attack

and release ‘Shape’ parameters are a

nice touch, although not obviously

descriptive of what those shapes are.

Elsewhere, there are some niceties

like VCA/Opto processing style

blending and Peak/RMS detection

blending, Lookahead, and L/R M/S

stereo linkage.

The Ashley Madison of

compressors, BC Dynamics has just

the right amount of new dynamics

experiences to pique the interest of

someone who’s bored of the same

four controls and wants to go further

down the rabbit hole.

bluecataudio.com

VERDICT 8.7

FabFilter Pro-C 2 £134

A compressor souped-up with that

legendary FabFilter sauce, Pro-C 2

gets you compressor with eight

ﬂavours, including Vocal, Opto,

Punch and Mastering, and Auto

makeup Gain on output if desired.

There’s Lookahead, Hold and fairly

comprehensive sidechain editing,

with Pro-Q-style EQ. The Stereo

Linking slider spans Unlinked (0%),

Linked (100%), and pushing it past

100 lets you determine linking in

mid/side combination.

Super-compressors

For when just attack, release, threshold and ratio

won’t do, these are the most compress-hensive

dynamics devices out there right now

u-he Presswerk €129

u-he’s compression brainchild can be taken many ways. To start, it’s simple:

Threshold, Ratio, and Attack that goes down to 0.1ms, Release and Adaptive

Release, Dry/Wet, Auto Makeup, and a lovely saturation section to boot.

But let’s head back into esoterica again. You can select between Feedback

and Feedforward circuit models or an ‘Interactive’ mode that combines the

best of both worlds, the detector’s RMS Window can be tweaked, and the

knee response changed using the Soft Knee and Non-linearity controls. The

sidechain can be high- and low-pass ﬁltered, and both internal and external

sidechains can be blended between. There’s a ‘dual phase rotator’ to make

Presswerk behave more like an analogue compressor. Very nice touches.

Bearing this complexity in mind, perhaps the best thing about Presswerk is

the ability to load it in different views with more bitesize controls. These

focused interfaces – Easy Compressor, Drum Compressor, Limiter, etc – let you

concentrate on just what you need to carry out speciﬁc tasks. It’s the perfect

balance of simple tasks and advanced treatments within a single plugin.

u-he.com

VERDICT 9.2

MUST HAVE!

Reviews | Xxxxxxxxx

ROUND-UP

FMU342.rev_roundup.indd 96 2/20/19 3:56 PM

Summary of content (2 pages)

PAGE 1
Reviews | Xxxxxxxxx FM | ROUND-UP Super-compressors For when just attack, release, threshold and ratio won’t do, these are the most compress-hensive dynamics devices out there right now FM | MUST HAVE! u-he Presswerk €129 u-he’s compression brainchild can be taken many ways. To start, it’s simple: Threshold, Ratio, and Attack that goes down to 0.1ms, Release and Adaptive Release, Dry/Wet, Auto Makeup, and a lovely saturation section to boot. But let’s head back into esoterica again.
PAGE 2
Super-compressors | Roundup Pro-C 2 doesn’t quite take it as overboard as the other compressors in this round-up, remaining focused and restrained in its implementation of compression. The options it does give you, though, are all stunningly easy to use, immediately available and intuitive. Other than that, the best thing about this one is probably its waveform visualiser, running by alongside the knee so you can immediately see how your changes are affecting the compression. fabfilter.