Overloud has unveiled a signature plugin pack for blues-rock star Eric Gales, comprising a virtual suite of his go-to guitar amplifiers, cabinets and effects pedals.
The TH-U Eric Gales Pack can be purchased to expand your existing TH-U setup or used as a standalone plugin containing editing features such as Rig Player and Amp Tweaks, plus a tuner and looper.
Inside, it's got everything you need to sound like Gales... Well, besides being preternaturally gifted on guitar. That you have got to learn for yourself (though Gales has been good enough to share some of his tips for guitar players).
Developed with Gales, there are 25 patches onboard so you can have quick access to his favourite tones, or dial in your own using his virtual rig. The pack has his DV Mark Raw Dawg Signature head and matching 2x12 vertical cabinet, the EG RAW Drive amp head, EG Fuzz and EG Shape Booster plus a pair of 4x12" Celestion-based cab sims and 13 effects.
The DV Mark Raw Dawg Signature head is a dynamic single-channel amplifier with a built-in shaping filter that Overloud says makes a great pedal platform. If that represents the core of Gales' sound, the EG RAW Drive amp head is for when it's time to dial up the heat with a little more overdrive.
The EG Fuzz is designed to complement Gales' signature head and bring out that juicy sparkling grit, while the EG Shape Booster is an overdrive pedal with an integrated shaping circuit, allowing you to accentuate certain frequencies by the amp's saturation.
For instance, set it low and it'll gently hit the virtual front end of the amp for a warm tone with a little less saturation and natural compression. Set it high and, like a hardware booster, it'll work that amp a bit harder – perfect for solos.
As for the pack's effects suite, Overloud has stacked this with a trio of modulation pedals, two compressors, two overdrives (one modelled after the Pro Co RAT, the other a TS-style drive), three delay/reverbs, an MXR-style phaser, wah-wah and, of course, a 'Wham-Me' pedal for executing Gales' signature Whammy pedal pitchshifts. There is tremolo onboard too.
The TH-U setup allows you to position up to four mics in front of and behind the cabinet, with Overloud's Fluid Convolution DSP tech making for more seamless IR transitions with fewer digital artefacts and less pressure placed on your CPU.
You can also load and mix IRs with the cab microphones, and choose the cabinet's real response or a processed version to suit your sound, and select up to six different room types and 18 microphone models.
Further adjustments can be made to the preamp and power tubes in the amps using TH-U's Amp Tweak feature, and there is even a variac sim, too, so you can effectively mod the amp models on the fly.
All this is MIDI-controllable, available now, and offered at an introductory price of $59 ($39 for TH-U Premium users), rising to $99. You can also trial it for free.
See Overloud for more details.
