WAVESFACTORY CASSETTE

Turn your studio clock back to the era of the tape-based Portastudio with this evocative new saturation and modulation plugin

These days, we’re spoilt for choice when it comes to tape emulation plugins, but there are only a handful that aim to capture the sonic texture of domestic cassette tape, as opposed to ‘professional’ reel-to-reel machines. The latest entrant onto this particular scene couldn’t be clearer in its naming or more straightforward in its front panel controls – but looks can be deceptive, as Cassette (VST/AU/AAX) also offers a wealth of under-the-hood parameters with which to finesse its magnetised-particulate stylings, or take them to extremes.

’Sette and match

At the heart of Cassette is a selection of four tape types and three ‘decks’ – see Taping advantage – which are simply stepped through using the arrow buttons to either side of the beautifully animated tape graphic, and the Pro, Home and Micro buttons. The (gaincompensated) Input control overdrives the signal into the tape by up to +24dB, for gentle saturation or overt distortion, or attenuates it by up to -24dB to increase the relative level of hiss and noise that are a key feature of the plugin.

The six knobs below enable tweaking of various fundamental characteristics. Erasures specifies the number of times your virtual cassette has been recorded onto, from 0 (brand new) to 20 (pretty knackered), while Spread narrows the stereo field down from ‘as presented’ to mono. Stability ramps up the wow and flutter, from totally stable at 100% to wholly unstable at 0%; Static and Dynamic Noise set the levels of hiss and asperity from -96 to 0dB, respectively; and Artifacts determines the amount of high-frequency degradation and random-frequency dropouts emulated.

Clicking the cogwheel icon opens the

Settings panel, in which the underlying parameters dialled in with the Stability and Artifacts knobs are made available for detailed editing. These comprise Rate and Depth modulation sliders for Wow, Flutter, Degradation and Dropouts, and randomising of wow and flutter (Stability Randomness). Here, you can also activate periodic ‘snagging’ of the tape (Random Snap); get into the nitty gritty of channel leakage (Crosstalk), record head angles (Azimuth) and Intermodulation; and simulate recording through a series of up to four cassettes (Re-Cassette) for even more filth. Incidentally, the Mix knob not only blends the dry and wet signals as expected, but can also be used for flanging in conjunction with the modulation settings. Mix is so useful, in fact, that it should really be on the front panel.

All hands on deck

Cassette is an easy recommendation: its modelling of tapes and decks sounds incredibly realistic, you get plenty of control, and the price is right. On the downside, the Settings screen would be better as a slide-out ‘tray’, rather than a modal that has to be dismissed to return to the main controls. We can’t think of any good reason not to allow access to all parameters at once.

Don’t let that stop you from jumping at Wavesfactory’s superb plugin, though. No matter what ‘high-street’ tape distortion task you have in mind – retro-fying synthwave pads, adding warmth and crunch to techno drum loops, imbuing full mixes with vintage vibes, you name it – Cassette’s productive (and fun!) electromagnetic toybox ably gets it done.