Steven Wilson swears by this $20 guitar plugin – here’s why
Can a cheap plugin really transform your tone? And in a world of pristine digital recordings, is imperfection actually the secret ingredient? For Steven Wilson, the answer to both is a resounding yes – and it only cost him 20 bucks.
Speaking in a recent interview with Guitarist, the Porcupine Tree frontman reveals the humble guitar plugin he leaned on heavily while shaping the sound of his new solo album The Overview.
READ MORE: Steven Wilson: “I love the guitar, but it’s an instrument that belongs to the 20th century in many ways”
“It’s a $20 plugin made by Aberrant DSP called SketchCassette [SketchCassette II is currently $36],” Wilson says, noting that the tool’s charm lies in how it breaks the clinical precision of digital audio by introducing analogue-like quirks – from hiss and warble to subtle degradation – much like what you’d get from a well-loved four-track.
“You can choose the brand of tape, you can choose Ferric, Chrome, or Metal, how much wow and flutter, how much saturation, how much hiss, how old the tape is…”
“[The plugin makes] things sound like they’re coming off a cassette tape,” he adds. “It’s a very lo-fi thing.”
For Wilson, that lo-fi aesthetic isn’t just about nostalgia – it’s about bringing back character that’s often lost in the polish of modern production.
“Sometimes the problem with digital sounds is they just lack a little bit of character, and a little bit of what you would think of as an imperfection can make things have character,” he explains.
“So very often, I just load up this cassette plugin and add a little bit of flutter or warble or saturation, or just make it sound like it’s coming off a tape that’s been recorded over three or four times, and suddenly it gives the sound character.”
The guitarist also says that tools like SketchCassette offer “the best of both worlds, using the best of digital technology, but then also bringing in some of the characteristics of analogue that we love so much.”
“It’s a gift for someone like me, who thinks of himself primarily as a producer, that there’s never been more ways to process, twist, and mutate sound,” Wilson continues. “It’s just extraordinary, particularly when you bring together, as I have on this record, the two worlds of the vintage and the modern.”
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Source: www.guitar-bass.net
