This TDM plug-in delivers compelling shades of analog tape to PT|HD DAWs
by Alex Oana, 3.15.2007
Alex Oana is an 11-time Minnesota Music Award winner, including three for Producer of the Year. So he got too big for his britches and moved to LA, where they slapped some sense into him. Contact him at www.alexoana.com.
I used to record on tape. I used to mix through desks. I now mix on a desk with tape on my sore mouse finger. I love mixing in the box, but digital mixing is in its infancy compared to the evolved and perfected analog technology it has heretofore been prematurely judged against. I need plug-ins that supply what I miss about the analog world.
Enter the Phoenix, a meticulously modeled $450 TDM tape machine emulation plug-in suite released by Crane Song and designed by Dave Hill (who also builds fancy tape electronics). It is from this standard of fidelity that Phoenix takes its inspiration.
Real tape adds harmonics, varying equalization, and dynamics ranging from compression to overdrive depending on the machine, the alignment, the tape formulation and how hard you hit it. Phoenix's sound has been accurately described as subtle, but one must understand it's not trying to be a glorified distortion effect. Think of Phoenix as a well-behaved two-track deck; you can insert on one track, the two-mix, or all your tracks.
Features
FAST FACTS
Applications
Studio, mastering, live (with Digidesign VENUE)
Key Features
Five types of high-quality tape machine emulation; up to 192 kHz; TDM/Pro Tools only
Price
$450
Contact
Crane Song 715-398-3627 plug-ins@cranesong.net
Phoenix has five types, each a separate plug-in. Even Crane Song found it difficult to describe their sounds, as evinced by these given names: “Iridescent,” “Luminescent,” “Dark Essence,” “Luster” and “Radiant.”
Phoenix has three buttons, one big knob and one hidden control for input gain. The three buttons have names more cryptic than the actul plug-ins and work like three fixed bias and EQ settings on a tape machine. They are:
Gold - Normal, properly aligned and biased, flat frequency response. Harmonics increase equally across the spectrum.
Sapphire - Underbiased, bright EQ curve. Shiny and light on its feet with extra high-frequency harmonics.
Opal - Overbiased, dark and meaty EQ curve. Emphasizes low frequency harmonics. Can get quite thick.
The big knob - Determines how much “Phoenix process” blends in your signal.
Adjusting the input trim is akin to “how hard you hit the tape.” This makes a world of difference, and I wish its control weren't so obscured. There is no obvious GUI control, such as a knob or fader, for this parameter. It took me a long while to realize I could change the input gain by clicking on the words “Input Gain” and moving my mouse up and down.
Analog behaves the opposite of digital, distorting less when the signal level is lower. It's also usually noisier. The Phoenix does not add noise at any level, like it or not, nor does it introduce wow and flutter or phase distortion. You can put Phoenix on a duplicated track, for example, and blend the two together with no smearing — an important consideration for advanced ITB mixers.
I get the feeling from the looks of the Phoenix's crackled silver faceplate and its MacDraw font that Dave hasn't left Crane Song HQ in Superior, Wisconsin since the 1990s, when fashion trends of the 1980s finally trickled north. We end users benefit sonically, if not aesthetically, from his hermetic dedication.
In Use
I just finished mixing a record by Romantica, a Minneapolis band that was recorded (except for the drums) with one microphone and one preamp by the band themselves. Every acoustic and electric guitar, accordion, violin and vocal were committed to hard disk with one Millennia TD-1 — the clearest, fastest preamp I've ever heard — and a Neumann TLM-103, the most popular entry-level Neumann with a clear and bright signature of its own. These, combined with the band's Digi 002 front-end, made for a mix window full of highly dynamic (no compressor was used in tracking), shiny tracks. I needed a way to give these tracks some girth and some harmonic individuality.
A violin — with its sustained, distinct timbre — is the perfect source to highlight the harmonic contribution of each of the five Phoenix variations. It wasn't until I tried injecting some warmth into Romantica's violin tracks that my ear came to fully understand the Phoenix, though I had previously used it for a year.
What is “warmth” and why would I use the Phoenix to get it? To answer this question is to explain the popularity of digital recreations of classic analog gear. Those analog artifacts, those impurities, those distortions infected into amplified voltages — once just innocent sound waves in a room or oscillations in a synth — gave the sound more than clinical electronic conversion and storage; they added harmonics which translated into punch, grit, luster, attitude, radiance, dark essence…
Oh, I get it, Dave. This theme of reanimating the analog in a digital world is the new black when it comes to plug-in fashion.
I noticed as I tried each of the Phoenix types on the violin that the harmonic and EQ emphasis changed radically. I generally think of the Phoenix variations like choosing microphones or preamps: I'll use the same type if I want symmetry. I'll use different types of Phoenix if tracks need help gaining distinction from one another.
I ultimately chose “Luminescent” on the violin to bring out some fatness, mellow out some brashness, sustain its body, and to make it more distinct from the other tracks. Yes, one plug in did all that, yet its dynamics remained well intact. I chose “Dark Essence” for the pedal steel of Eric Heywood (Sun Volt, Ray LaMontange) to provide continuous presence in the low mids. and to set it apart from the electric six-string. Acoustic instruments benefit from Phoenix's tendency to add upward compression, the technique of blending in a compressed signal with an uncompressed signal of the same source.
The website mentions “Dark Essence” is great at reducing sibilance “by increasing the apparent loudness of the rest of the signal.” I put that advice to use on a mix, and it worked perfectly without making the vocal too heavy. Please be careful, though; I've found it easy to badly distort sibilance using the Phoenix as the final insert in a series, especially when preceded by compression and high frequency enhancement. The solution is to heavily de-ess or to reduce the input trim, which is a fair compromise. I just wish I could get more overall “tape saturation” without this obvious HF distortion, which is exactly what Dolby HX Pro does.
A broad palette of sounds can be achieved with a real live spinning tape deck as you change tape brand, the ips, how hard you hit it, etc., and you'll hear Phoenix operating within a safer range of these possibilities. A stunning example of “slamming the tape” is found in Roy Thomas Baker's vocal production on Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody. Legend has it he forced the engineer to cover the VU meters and just turn it up until it sounded good. You can hear Rich Costey quoting this technique on Muse's Starlight. One must also understand that, because of track width, a multitrack may saturate like this more readily than half-inch two-track.
My suggestion to improve the Phoenix would be the addition of a knob for the input gain control. I don't know why this feature is so hidden when the website espouses, “Phoenix's color is dependent on signal level.” Additionally, I could imagine a Phoenix “Fire Edition” (killer name, huh?), offering a drive control to really slam the tape followed by an output trim. Maybe they could name it “Evanescence.”
The Phoenix sound is interactive, and authentically non-linear. At first I couldn't help but want it to be more aggressive, more explosive, more rad. But, then again, when applied to a recording full of acoustic instruments its overall effect is radical.
Phoenix is great at re-injecting some thickness into attacky snare drums, and will smoothly saturate clean Wurli. I often flip through the Phoenix varieties on electric guitars when I'm in search of more presence in some part of their spectrum. Bass gets bigger. Kicks get fuller, but not necessarily punchier. One approach suggested by Crane Song is to put a Phoenix on every track — an approach made realistic by its high DSP efficiency. Many times when I thought a mix was almost “there” I'd still be having troubles. So I'd put a Phoenix on and things would fall into place.
Summary
I'd been mixing exclusively ITB for a year — always in search of magic ingredients that would make DAW mixing come to life — before I downloaded the Phoenix. I have come to realize the DAW platform — in its current state of the art, no matter what analog emulation plug-ins or summing box you add — is never going to sound the same as mixing through a desk or onto tape. Yet a quality plug-in like the Phoenix is a step toward making in-the-box mixing more musical and more fun.
Phoenix will change your world, in a very positive, sometimes subtle, sometimes dramatic way. Phoenix shines in a number of situations, and, unlike a physical tape machine, will allow you to place a tape-like effect at any point in your plug-in chain creating opportunities for limitless trickery.
The excitement and realism of Phoenix may not always break the fourth wall of digital, but of the many tape emulation plug-ins Phoenix is undoubtedly the most mature, pristine and well-mannered. Dave Hill, being a very clever man, probably named his first plug-in after the phoenix hoping that it would resurrect digital mixes and digitally immortalize the sound of the tape machine. He has accomplished both to the extent Pro Tools will allow.
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