Computer Music

WAVES CLA MIXHUB

When Chris Lord-Alge puts his name to a plugin version of his own mixing console with a novel twist, great things are expected…

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The latest collaborat­ion between Waves and Grammy-winning engineer Chris Lord-Alge is an emulation of a full channel strip from the latter’s actual SSL 4000 series mixer, with a particular feature that can only be described as ‘killer’. Claiming to be “the first multitrack” plugin (Softube’s Console 1 system is similar in concept but very different in execution), CLA MixHub lets you access up to 64 instances of the plugin via any one of them. Thus, a full SSL console is effectivel­y recreated in a single window within the host DAW, convenient­ly grouped into banks of eight channels at a time, called ‘buckets’.

Bucket list

Once inserted into as many channels of the host DAW’s mixer as you need (see Kicking the Buckets), any running instance of MixHub can be switched between its Channel View (ie, all of its own channel strip components together) and the grouped Bucket View, where the selected bucket of up to eight channels is flipped between grouped operation of one of said components at a time. While that’s certainly the headline, however, it wouldn’t count for much if the channel strip itself wasn’t up to snuff – which, fortunatel­y, it very much is. The four main component modules largely mirror their SSL inspiratio­n, comprising Input, Output, EQ and Dynamics. There’s also an Insert slot into which you can plumb any one of your installed Waves plugins. Input, EQ and Dynamics can each be set to stereo, dual mono or mid-side configurat­ion, and clicking the Expanded View button on a module blows it up to two separate channels (left/right or mid-side) for independen­t tweaking, and reveals the Dynamics module’s Sidechain EQ, or opens the interface of the Insert plugin. The EQ, Dynamics and Insert modules can be freely rearranged by dragging them left and right.

“A full SSL console is effectivel­y recreated in a single window within the host DAW”

All module cons

The Input section has Line and Mic input level controls, each dialling in its own style of harmonic distortion when pushed hard, and Mic adding up to 50dB of gain. This distortion (and more at the output) can be disabled by deactivati­ng the Analog button, while the Noise

?? ?? EQ Four bands of glorious SSL-style equalisati­on ANALOG & NOISE Activate these two for authentic analogue vibes MIC GAIN With up to 50dB of Gain, there’s plenty of distortion on tap PLUGIN INSERT Insert a Waves plugin anywhere in the chain EXPANDED VIEW View the Insert plugin, stereo channels and more GATE/EXPANDER Including the Ducker mode and sidechaini­ng COMPRESSOR Call up the SSL original or the 1176-style “Bluey” ASSIGN MENU Assign the channel to one of eight ‘bucket’ groups COMP MIX Blend the dry and wet signals for parallel compressio­n BUCKET VIEW Click to view eight groups of eight channels at once OUTPUT SELECTOR Choose your output channel format
EQ Four bands of glorious SSL-style equalisati­on ANALOG & NOISE Activate these two for authentic analogue vibes MIC GAIN With up to 50dB of Gain, there’s plenty of distortion on tap PLUGIN INSERT Insert a Waves plugin anywhere in the chain EXPANDED VIEW View the Insert plugin, stereo channels and more GATE/EXPANDER Including the Ducker mode and sidechaini­ng COMPRESSOR Call up the SSL original or the 1176-style “Bluey” ASSIGN MENU Assign the channel to one of eight ‘bucket’ groups COMP MIX Blend the dry and wet signals for parallel compressio­n BUCKET VIEW Click to view eight groups of eight channels at once OUTPUT SELECTOR Choose your output channel format

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