As a songwriter, burgeoning engineer or prospective producer, you’ll already have spent a great deal of time getting to grips with your DAW - and you may have recognised the gap between your skill and your taste. Many make an easy mistake in attempting to fill this gap with gear, whether that’s a plethora of new guitar pedals or, especially at this time of year when Cyber Monday plugin deals are at fever pitch, a library full of plugin licenses…
But what use is a never-ending dropdown list of plugins in your DAW, if you don’t really know how to use any of them? Add in a handful of old adages - chiefly ‘less is more’ and ‘too many cooks spoil the broth’ - and a clear directive emerges: you should be spending more time learning how to use a small handful of essential plugins than guessing your way through dozens of them.
Why limit your library?
Limiting your library can actually be a hugely freeing creative step, particularly if you’re a newer producer agonising over the volume of tools you’ve yet to learn. Just as professional engineers and producers have their favourite go-to effects and utilities, so too can you create excellent work with a curated set of essential plugins. And here, I’m going to make a case for some of those essentials, via my own curated list of 12 plugins that cover the bases for most producers’ needs - and pretty much all of them are on sale for Cyber Monday! Although you’ll need to act fast as Cyber Monday ends in a matter of hours.
Now, some caveats. This isn’t a prescriptive list, nor is it a sign for you to stop your own hunt for new sounds. This is simply a demonstration that most creative needs can be met with a relatively austere level of investment - and an opportunity to think critically about the types of tools you really need at your disposal. Depending on the music you make, some plugins will appeal more than others - but no matter what you’re producing, most of these plugins will have something essential to offer you.
Dynamics & EQ
1. Waves Scheps 73
The Scheps 73 is a tweaked model of the famed Neve 1073 mic preamp, a ubiquitous studio Swiss-Army knife capable of imparting considerable character on anything it touches. Any time you’re recording something straight into your audio interface, you should be reaching for something like this; pleasant pre-amp drive, expressive 3-band EQ and Neve-transformer saturation work together to create something electric.
Cyber Monday deal: was $129, now $27.99 at Waves.com
2. Universal Audio 1176
Compression isn’t the easiest tool to get your head around at the start of your production journey, but as soon as you do, your mixes will leap into vibrant life - and the Universal Audio 1176 is a fantastic place to start. This compressor is likely the presence you feel like your drums are currently missing, particularly if you smash the whole lot through it New York style. Universal Audio have a three-pack bundle of different 1176 ‘flavours’, and could be all you need to liven up your drum or vocal chains.
Cyber Monday deal: was $299, now $29 at Sweetwater
3. FabFilter Pro-Q 3
The FabFilter Pro-Q 3 is, in short, the bee’s knees. It’s an industry-standard piece of software, and one which remains our favourite EQ plugin in a crowded field. It’s an incredibly practical EQ to use, with huge versatility - and in its latest form, adds both mid-side and dynamic EQ functionality.
Cyber Monday deal: was $179, now $134 at Sweetwater
4. Waves Aphex Vintage Aural Exciter
This suggestion might raise a few eyebrows, particularly when measured against other must-haves in this article, but I’m an absolute evangelist for it. Initially designed to return high-end content to aged or degraded tape, the Aural Exciter is a saturator that creates new high-frequency harmonic information, rather than boosting what already exists. As such, Waves’ plugin emulation can solve a great many difficult-to-define audio problems in one fell swoop, from raising the prominence of smothered lead parts to adding valuable ‘air’ to a vocal.
Cyber Monday deal: was $149, now $29.99 at Waves.com
Instruments
5. Native Instruments Kontakt 8
Every producer needs a decent software plugin for playing samples, whether you’re retriggering your live snare for added body, creating ambient beds or building out your maximalist breakcore masterpiece. There are many to choose from, but Kontakt 8 is a comprehensive one with a huge number of sound libraries and virtual instruments to pick from besides.
Honourable mentions here go to Dave Hilowitz’s Decent Sampler plugin, which gives you access to a shedload of brilliant, esoteric (and often free) sample packs through its proprietary shopfront - and to CWITEC’s free TX16Wx sampler plugin, which is a great option for building your own sample-based instruments from the ground up.
Cyber Monday deal: There isn’t one as it’s so new, but you can check out it here at native-instruments.com
6. Arturia Pigments 5
Arturia’s Pigments 5 is as broad as it is deep, offering four distinct types of synthesis across two synth engines (with a third ‘utility’ engine for samples or sub-oscillation) and a powerful rack of effects to explore. You can also use this to play and morph samples of your own, meaning you could get away with this alone for the vast majority of your synth-and-sample needs.
Cyber Monday deal: was $199, now $99 at Sweetwater
Delay, reverb & convolution
7. Soundtoys EchoBoy
There are plenty of great digital delays out there, including the ones that likely came free with your DAW of choice. Soundtoys EchoBoy is a cut above, though, and one of the most popular delay plugins amongst the pros for a reason. It can do great things with anything it hears, but it shines on vocals.
Cyber Monday deal: was $199, now $49 at Sweetwater
8. Valhalla VintageVerb
Valhalla’s VintageVerb is one of an excellent suite of algorithmic reverbs, that lets you put 22 different algorithms through the filter of 70s or 80s studio-hardware quirkiness. It’s a hugely versatile thing, and hugely reliable for pretty much everything ‘verb. Honestly, most of the Valhalla reverbs are all-timers - but if you have to pick only one, pick this one.
Cyber Monday deal: currently available for $50 at valhalladsp.com
9. Melda Production MConvolutionMB
Convolution is the closest you’ll get to actually recording in a reverberant space - and is hence a supremely powerful tool to have as a producer, whether you want to add a little roomy life to some dead drums or put your singer in a remote Appalachian cave. Melda’s MConvolutionMB has a huge selection of impulse responses pre-included for you to mess around with - as well as the option to use source and use your own impulse response files.
Cyber Monday deal: was $55, now $25 at Sweetwater
10. SoundHack +Bubbler
This is Jon Hopkins’ secret weapon, and now it’s yours. The SoundHack +bubbler is a highly creative delay plugin, which granulates, reverses, pitch-shifts and otherwise manipulates parts of your incoming signal to create ethereal, weird, and musical beds of runaway sound. You can run it tame for a lively slapback, or let It loose to add texture. It’s a ‘need’ because it’s a unique solution, and something you can easily break out if your collaborator or client feels like the music’s ‘missing something’. Best part? It’s free!
Cyber Monday deal: It’s free!
…and the rest
11. Celemony Melodyne 5
Celemony’s Melodyne 5 is to Autotune as a scalpel is to a hatchet. This is professional grade correction software most commonly used on vocals, to retune and otherwise shape vocal performances towards their platonic ideal. If used correctly, it can be near-invisible – and, as a producer working frequently on pop or with guest vocalists, essential to the finished product.
Cyber Monday deal: Get Melodyne 5 Studio at full price, or try Melodyne 5 Essentials for only $49 ($50 off) at Sweetwater
12. IK Multimedia Amplitube 5
This is a godsend plugin for producers who don’t have the luxury of several 100W tube amps and a sound-isolated space to crank them in. IK Multimedia’s Amplitube 5 was our favourite guitar VST of 2024, and your very own storage locker of amps, cabs, mics and pedals.
Cyber Monday deal: was $199.99, now $49.99 at IK Multimedia
