This Reverb Makes Drums Iconic

Reverb on drums. Yikes. Its a contentious topic. I want to share my go-to plugins and settings for my typical vintage inspired sound.
Lets also stack up these plugins against my one hardware reverb unit. The Intersound PRV-1
And last but not least introduce a new plugin in my tool box. The Pulsar Primavera. It is the latest spring reverb plugin and contains many unique features, expanding on what is typically a quite simple reverb.
If you like the Pulsar Primavera it is currently on sale for $69, and below you can find a vvundertone affiliate link. Greatly appreciate everyone watching my videos, and this month I am continuing the dedication.
pulsar.audio/p...
4:28 Dry drums vs Arturia and Pulsar
6:38 Plugin vs Hardware
13:35 Adding reverb to dry beats
22:22 Conclusions

[@aiwanoe]

Finally a youtube producer who works on good music

[@vvundertone]

Now THATS a compliment. Appreciate you! 🫡

[@aiwanoe]

@@vvundertone well deserved

[@sonicjoydivisonswans]

Agreed! Also I wanna hear this track when it comes out!!

[@danluscombe5006]

Agreed, @vvundertone you’re kinda messing with the formula here. Great stuff.

[@_S._S._]

Ok ok oni loh

[@eafortson]

The format of these videos give so much information, entertainment for that knowledge retention, but most importantly, inspiration. I always leave these videos ready to go tinker and usually with plugins I already own. Well done dude. Appreciate you in this space.

[@vvundertone]

Grateful that you shared this experience! This makes me inspired to continue doing what I do! Thank you!

[@Manmademadman]

Spring Reverb Snob here! the Pulsar indeed sounds great! I'm surrounded by real hardware spring reverbs (Peavey Valverb and Korg GR-1) You should also try TENS (by Klanghelm) and Springbox by PSP Audioware which are great plugin Spring reverbs, each unique. Keep up the Lords work!

[@joanpeiron6080]

Audiopunks echomixer is amazing too :)

[@machinate]

Spring reverb IMPULSE snob here - I have a stoopid collection of them (prolly like 100 samples) that basically moves with me into every new project.

[@dismalfist]

TENS is super indeed. For non-spring, that Ro Gold plate from Black Rooster is divine.

[@vvundertone]

😮

[@vvundertone]

Will check them out!! Thank you!

[@rayanb.2578]

Babe wake up, vvundertone just dropped

[@Barnet310]

This is one of best YT vids I seen in years!

[@vvundertone]

Appreciate that 🙏🏼

[@Sauce1Da]

All your videos are great buddy to say the least. Genuinely got love for the details and sounds of music in all.

[@vvundertone]

Thank you so much. Music is everything. It will never get old. 🤍

[@000michaelb000]

So refreshing to hear the desired effects coming through some great music

[@vvundertone]

Sincerely appreciate that!

[@kinghobmusic6603]

not remotely related to the topic of this video but this is some of the best sounding voiceover on YT

[@vvundertone]

Ayyye appreciate that!

[@danielguevara8815]

this video dramatically improved my drum sound holy shit! ty for putting this love out into the world bro. much appreciated fr

[@napalmfugitive]

Please keep making these videos, absolutely digging your content and visual aesthetics - fully immersed every time I watch. ❤️

[@nicok5630]

Great job distinguishing the verb plugins - it can really change the groove of a song.

[@vvundertone]

TY! 😂 Right? Reverb is powerful!

[@SethPlaysBass]

I love reverb on drums. The spring on the snare is really cool, it reminds me of a Radiohead tune (Decks Dark maybe?) I'm also a massive fan of the LinnDrum snare and clap through a Lexicon 224. Probably my favorite snare reverb sound is on Kuhmilch 74 Bpm by Vulfpeck. The mix is so crushed that the (plate?) reverb spreads really nicely. Love the video!

[@SmokeM2D6]

That Pulsar Verb is nasty work

[@vvundertone]

😂👌🏼

[@santmcmc1849]

I love your videos, please keep doing them. Hello from gdl mexico

[@vvundertone]

🙏🏼 ty! More to come 🤝🏼

[@lyobty]

this video should be called amercian tame impala blessing me for 23 minutes

[@vvundertone]

ty 🤣 i'll stick that in the *title idea* notes

[@STMRecords1]

You're my new favourite channel

[@vvundertone]

🙏🏼 💙

[@waveguider]

Gibbs was the OG manufacture of the reverb tanks for the Hammond Organ Corporation

[@vvundertone]

Ahhh no wonder. Those sound amazing!

[@chrisquigley9345]

GBD is a great British spring. 2 9DC1D1E tanks and a preamp. Super simple and super nice

[@vvundertone]

Thank you! Are they hard to find?? I couldn’t locate one.

[@soysos.tuffsound]

Yup, big spring reverb fan here too. I recently sold an Orban 111B that I had for many, many years because I didn't really love the sound. Springs are an ESSENTIAL seasoning with Dub and that's my jam. That Primavera is very good BTW.

[@justicejamesmusic]

I just got an orban 111b and love it! I make reggae music and find it very nice. I do still use plenty of spring plugins but there’s a unique sound from the orban that’s unlike any plugin I’ve found so far. What didn’t you like about it?

[@soysos.tuffsound]

@@justicejamesmusic TBH, it was noisy and I just wasn't using it that much. It's got a lot of great features like the switchable limiter and EQ, but the sound wasn't doing it for me. I'm a big dub fanatic, but I'll be looking out for something else later in life after our big studio move.

[@vvundertone]

Too bad I couldn’t have bought it off you! 😂

[@justicejamesmusic]

@@vvundertonewell if for some reason I ever decide to sell mine I’ll reach out to you first!

[@CatFish107]

Shoutout to Plateau reverb from Valley in VCV rack. Very nice plate verb with oodles of parameters.

[@vvundertone]

Oooo I’ll check it out!

[@ikehayes9252]

That's an algorithmic "plate" reverb based on the Dattorro algorithm, not really a realistic plate emulation. The Dattorro algorithm can be found in many free reverb plugins. It sounds okayish for a digital plate emulation, but nothing mindblowing by todays standards.

[@scootb7400]

Back in like 2010 I got the Softube spring reverb plugin. My friends all turned their noses up at it because it wasn’t analog (I also have a 90’s Fender tube reverb unit). But I would sneak some of the Softube on the snare and/or drum OH’s and they were in love!

[@vvundertone]

Haha, it’s how you use it!!

[@ramencoke]

Very important video that not many people are making !

[@vvundertone]

Cheers mate, 🙏🏼🤝🏼

[@KostasMkostasm]

Another cool video! Keep up the good work 💪

[@desktorp]

It's basically the reggae dub drum sound.

[@Barney-ii1no]

Yeah it was reggae/dub that first started the trend of it being used, then soul and funk n fusion etc, I like the way Khruangbin subtly use spring reverb

[@vvundertone]

Indeed. Also used for a lot more

[@LuxNaturaAudio]

Love this whole mix breakdown format and affinity for spring reverbs!! I recently just made a video here using an old Carvin PA mixer to sum drums through because those old boards have some of the best spring verbs... my MX822 is snappy and sounds closer to this Primavera, but the SP600 is like a lengthy plate-like sound... SPRING SUPREMACY ✨

[@vvundertone]

So true. Those old boards for live, or cool 60s garage bands have gorgeous spring tones. And luckily still fairly affordable!

[@LuxNaturaAudio]

@@vvundertone Shhhh let's keep it that way... Everyone deserves a nice spring ✨

[@brentsmith9411]

GBS = Great British Spring

[@MoreDeadRecords]

What a fantastic video. I feel like I’m in the room with you, I’ll be booking another session asap Mr vvundertone 🙌🏻

[@vvundertone]

Wow that’s a great way to put it. I really appreciate that! More to come!

[@BILLYPATRON]

BX20 Spring by UA is their cheapest reverb but one I use most. Especially vocals and acoustic guitar. Nice dark tone.

[@vvundertone]

got that one too. good stuff. but gotta say trying a real unit of theirs would be incredible. Thing is massive!

[@waynesoper197]

Becoming my favourite vids man. Up and up dude 🎉

[@vvundertone]

🫂🤝🏼✨

[@TheMossyTube]

You’re stuff sounds amazing. Keep it up! 🙌🏻

[@vvundertone]

Appreciate ✨🙏🏼

[@milesbennett8926]

"the springs have a bit of nastiness that just...... matches my freak" TOP TIER JOKE

[@Thoracius]

You can adjust the decay of hardware spring reverbs by using varispeed. E.g. Send a sped up signal in and then slow it form

[@vvundertone]

That’s a great work around! Thank you will try. Especially on tape 💥

[@CatFish107]

If I understood correctly, some plate verbs had felt dampers that you could tighten down or loosen with a screw. Maybe something similar is available for springs? It wouldn't get you longer tails, but could allow for some adjustment.

[@kniferideaudio]

The Sound Toys Plate was always to "knocky" sounding for snare to me. I pretty much only ever use it on synths. I use PSP Spring Box and Soft Tube spring a lot on Snare. I have a 1963 Epiphone Pathfinder guitar amp that if you turn the volume down all the way, and the reverb up, you get all wet reverb from the guitar amp. I mic and reamp that for vocals, synth, snare... everything. it's fantastic.

[@Drfresh1402]

Super plate is the best plate I’ve ever heard.

[@kniferideaudio]

@@Drfresh1402 I like it on a lot of stuff, I just prefer Vahalla and the UA Pure Plate.

[@vvundertone]

Now that’s the real sauce! Using a guitar amp 🔥

[@andrewstadium]

Up vote on the PSP. I got it on some kind of Sweetwater sale for 40 bucks and I love it!. Video is making me want to get the Arturia though

[@Rgdonaire_07]

Great content! New subscriber!

[@vvundertone]

happy you enjoy spring like me :)

[@ProducedByFinn]

No one else caught the Training Day reference? IYKYK

[@vvundertone]

THANK YOU haha.

[@itsYarni]

I'd love to see just the drum processing broken down. IE the dry raw kick then the processing you've done on it and for all the 4 drum tracks!

[@vvundertone]

Ooo that would be fun. Kicks are where I really go wild. Everything else can survive with mild processing but kicks I always end up with massive chains! Will continue to release more videos based on this subject for sure.

[@itsYarni]

@@vvundertone I await the finer details 😎

[@chriscalinescu]

Behringer popped up because you can buy a hardware spring reverb for the price of the arturia plugin

[@vvundertone]

imo that behringer reverb sounds like absolute garbage.

[@nicks.8003]

I like the sounds you're getting. Do you do sample packs of drums that have different velocity samples or round robins? Something that could be loaded into a sampler.

[@marcopepe4046]

Hi, nice video but... at 21:00 the low end sounds great! Really deep bass sound, perfectly matched with the kick. Any video on how to work on that? Thanks.

[@bexiexz]

ooo i love this sm! contentious indeed

[@stum5807]

Super inspiring 🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿5 bagger tutorial

[@vvundertone]

☺️🙏🏼

[@oinkooink]

Klanghelm's got a Spring verb you might enjoy, Sir.

[@vvundertone]

I’ll scope it out!! TY!

[@elizaosmo]

I like the song, but I’m really curious did band walk in to you with some kind of idea and it was a collab, or you’ve had the creative freedom? Your channel is lit 🔥🌞 Def staying here for longer ❤

[@vvundertone]

TY! It was just some friends. Pretty much no communication outside come over and lets record a song haha.

[@elizaosmo]

@@vvundertone Haha I see, I was wondering if you are open to collabs? I’m a Poster designer/singer musician, would love to do something together :)

[@RayanTelleria]

Love your stuff !!

[@bringyourownheart]

Excellent video.

[@vvundertone]

Thank you so much!

[@CatFish107]

Ok, I'll go get some headphones to finish watching this. Little bit of interesting fyi: the fake stereo plugin put enough time difference on the signal that I could notice a difference while listening on a phone speaker.

[@vvundertone]

Hey that’s great to hear! Even translates to the phone 🔥

[@TearyHistory]

I loved the video. Which vst piano is it? I saw it's from Labs, but which one? Maybe the soft piano?

[@vvundertone]

Correct. It’s the soft piano. Such a fantastic VST!

[@sebastiancybulski9494]

🔥🔥

[@IvanUruev]

Thank you man!

[@vvundertone]

🫡🙏🏼

[@elijahjohnson6923]

what headphones are you using here?

[@digital.nic0]

nasty work my brother

[@vvundertone]

🙏🏼🤝🏼

[@ARIOS44]

When you say added overheads can I do the same thing for just hat and open hat one shot samples? Or is that the same thing as overheads

[@vvundertone]

Yes that would be a close approximation. Only difference is on the example I’m doing the whole kit is getting reverb since the overheads pick up everything. It’s just much much more subtle than putting reverb on a snare directly. Another way to replicate this style is just using different sends and amounts of reverb so you have control over each element. A unique set of parameters for each one shot would help.

[@AdamFraserTv]

Just persoanl preference but I would've pulled some mids/lows from the spring.

[@vvundertone]

Shaping the reverb is def super important

[@AdamFraserTv]

@@vvundertone But also maybe not . I was just working on some drum breaks and maybe it was just that specific reverb but I left a little more mid / low then I usually would I guess ( I try to not box myself in ) and it just fit better for the context . That’s the beauty of music though. Anyways love what ya do man . This channel is a gem . Appreciate ya !

[@tyler_]

Love it, man! I'm excited to do some of my own drum processing using spring reverb. Luckily I already own these plugins. What are your thoughts on using electronic drum samples? I've got a LinnDrum - going to at least see how it sounds. Sometimes I'll forego recording real drums if I've got a whole lot of other acoustic elements and maybe some spring would give a little more life. Thanks!

[@MUFFINWRATH]

Definitely depends on the track but a real drummer is always going to be a very different vibe to electronic drums. I think spring can work but if you're trying to bring "life" to drums machines heavy modulated digital reverbs, phasers, choruses and even re-amping can help push it further. I think on acoustic kits these can often make the drums sound un-natural but on drum machines that's often part of the appeal already. They're all just tools though and it will always depend on what vibe you're going for - sometimes a super dry linndrum might be the way to go.

[@vvundertone]

I love electronic drum samples. Most of mine come from Casio presets. My dream is a Roland 606. But a LinnDrum! That’s next level for sure.

[@tyler_]

@@vvundertone The LinnDrum is great, but I would venture to say that what you do with drums comes out sounding much better in the end (to my ears, at least) - You have proven that analog/digital can work together in harmony and that we can still find vintage recording equipment out there that is unique, sounds phenomenal, but doesn't completely annihilate the bank account.

[@vvundertone]

@@tyler_ you literally just wrote the vvundertone mission statement right there 🤝🏼🙏🏼

[@tyler_]

@@MUFFINWRATH Good insight. Makes complete sense that it might just be good to keep the LinnDrum dry instead of immediately reaching for effects.

[@defiantDreemurr]

i should really use springs more on drums, i use em a lot on electronic drums (808s and CR78s mostly) cause it has this cool unnatural sound but i never really use em on “regular” drums

[@vvundertone]

I also love spring on 808s!

[@sevchyk]

Can you detail out that combination of the Echoplex through the pedal (Jekyll & Hyde? What model exactly is that?). Did I understand you right, the exact order goes like this: raw sound - Jekyll pedal - Echoplex delay, doesn't it? The sound that I am talking about is exactly at the timecode 08:18.

[@vvundertone]

I believe it went raw sound - echoplex - then Jekyll and Hyde (OG version). So the echos also achieved some nice saturation. Also I released the video of my making processing those. It’s the mixing drums to cassette video!

[@davidbadstubner4582]

If you didn’t like the cross stick why not change it?

[@vvundertone]

You know there are some things you discover only days after a session sometimes. When you have a room full of musicians, juggling all the mics, trouble shooting, making sure everyone’s comfortable, things inevitably get lost in the sauce. And as for drum replacement software, I guess I just like to make things more difficult 😞

[@davidbadstubner4582]

@@vvundertoneheard on all of that! Sorry I was maybe just feeling crusty.

[@davidbadstubner4582]

So this is all predicated on minimal productions right? There’s not much credence to this if there’s tons of tracks happening in a dense mix right?

[@vvundertone]

Not necessarily. I chose minimal productions here to highlight the verbs. I think by playing with decay times, plus ducking features you can add reverb to any sort of mix and it can enhance it.

[@davidbadstubner4582]

@@vvundertonelove it

[@atiochryst]

Where can I find the full song? Song name?

[@vvundertone]

Sadly I don’t think it’s available on streaming anywhere. But it’s by “The Monroe” song is “Awake at Dawn”

[@andy2190]

does "The Monroe" have any socials?

[@vvundertone]

they have pretty much gone dormant sadly.

[@andy2190]

@ that’s unfortunate, such incredibly good music. These videos are phenomenal btw thank you for them

[@nostalgiaregret]

Where’s the piano from?

[@vvundertone]

Spitfire, “Soft Piano”

[@hellomishel3047]

What is the song? Name of the band?

[@vvundertone]

The Monroe. Sadly they never put it out

[@jakegillespie_]

What is that mic model?

[@vvundertone]

Electro-Voice RE-18

[@murtlefilms]

Is that first song released?

[@loveinfall199]

whats the name of the song

[@vvundertone]

Sadly no. It’s by The Monroe. It’s called Awake At Dawn.

[@andyr3276]

Onwards and upwards 👆👆👆

[@NecropsY1]

all i hear is vocals taking up 80% of the mix

[@hoggboyy]

Yeah, it's a vocal heavy composition. It's exactly what the song calls for.

[@NecropsY1]

maybe do some metal where drum sound actually matters

[@vvundertone]

this is funny.

[@paulmorgan3758]

sort out your vocal mic settings first before you waste my time with your no doubt crap advice.

[@vvundertone]

In the wise words of Weezy F. Baby “Even Gwen Stafani said she couldn’t doubt me”

[@markus6409]

Sprung reverb is so ugly.

[@danluscombe5006]

You are dead on the inside.

[@pH-LIVE]

You're awesome. The algorithm has blessed me today. You will also be receiving some of my money, between the Sound and Vision pages of WUNDERTONE. And whatever affiliate kickbacks you deserve! This is all excellent content.

[@vvundertone]

Much much appreciated! Especially in this time where I’m struggling to find inspo. Will be back soon 😅🏃🏻‍♀️