Recording - August 2019 - 43

Adding ambience reverb across multiple tracks can result in
a coherent, glued-together mix. The effect appears to be felt
as much as heard. Many stock DAW reverb plugins feature
ambience presets. There is a freeware plugin called Ambience
that has some good presets.

Ambience
Reverb

Bright Shiny Rooms

It is believed that famed recording pioneer Bill Putnam invented the reverb chamber or echo chamber-a room designed
specifically for the creation and capture of reverb effects. The
first one wasn't actually 'designed' per se-it was the bathroom in Bill's Chicago recording studio! He ran audio from the
studio to a speaker in the bathroom, positioned a microphone
in there, and brought its signal back to the console where he
mixed it into his productions. Everyone loved it and the idea
took off. Studios became known for the quality of their chambers. United Western, Sunset Sound, Gold Star, Abbey Road,
and probably most famously, the studios at Capitol Records in
Hollywood, all have legendary chambers.
Chamber signals routed to console effect returns offered a
precise, controllable method for creating and adding reverb
to a mix. The reverb time could be adjusted by moving the
speaker and the mic around inside the chamber. Baffles and
other structures could be added to dampen the sound or add
complexity to the reflections. These physical chambers turned
out to be pretty flexible, and the best ones sounded fantastic.

Abbey Road
Chambers Reverb

It's hard to characterize the classic chamber sound-no two
chambers are the same! Differences aside, they do share some
characteristics: quick and diffuse onset, diminished resonances,
and lots of density. I would say that density is one of the
hallmarks of chamber reverb. Most plugins offer a variety of
different sounding chambers. Try them all and find the ones
that work for your purposes.
Chamber reverb is a good choice if you're going for a
vintage vibe. There isn't anything I wouldn't at least try to put
through a chamber reverb. I find them quite useful when used
judiciously on drums, vocals, and both acoustic and electric
guitars. There are many good chamber reverb plugins to
choose from. My personal favorite is Abbey Road Chambers
from Waves, reviewed elsewhere in this issue.

Things that Bang and Clang

The thing about reverb chambers is that they take up a lot of
space and cost quite a bit to design and build. Smaller studio
owners need more economical options. A German company
called EMT saw the opportunity and created the first ever plate
reverb in 1957, the EMT 140 Reverberation Unit.

Abbey Road
Plates Reverb
A plate reverb utilizes a large, thin piece of sheet metal,
suspended on springs in a metal frame. A transducer is mounted
at the center of the plate. As signal is passed through the transducer, the plate moves. The movement of the plate creates the
reverb effect. Pickups mounted on the plate's edges capture the
sound, which is then sent to an effect return on the console.
Reverb time is controlled by damping the plate.
Plate reverbs have an almost instant attack, and the effect very
quickly gains a lot of complexity and density. The high end tends
to ring on a little, and they can be a bit dark or thick sounding in
the low end. It's a very common practice to EQ a plate reverb so
that it sits comfortably in a mix (highpass and lowpass filters are
a good idea on just about every kind of reverb). Overall, plate
reverb is very open and smooth sounding.
A well-tweaked plate reverb can sound fantastic on just about
anything. Many recordings that you know and love have been
mixed with plate reverb exclusively. I love them on vocals. They
RECORDING August 2019

Recording - August 2019

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - August 2019