New Music Gear Monday: Goodhertz Megaverb Reverb Plugin

Way back in the dark ages of the 80s adding a reverb unit to your studio was normally very painful to your pocketbook. You either bought a real plate (hopefully you had room for it) or ponied up the really big bucks for a digital Lexicon, AMS, or EMT unit. Then along came Alesis, the little company started by MXR co-founder Keith Barr in his bedroom that broke the reverb game wide open with digital reverb at a seemingly unbeatable price of around $500. The Alesis XT, MIDIVerb and Microverbs didn’t sound as good as the big expensive boys on the block, but they did have a “sound” that everyone remembers thanks to their limitations. That’s what Goodhertz now provides with its Megaverb plugin.

The company calls Megaverb the “Incredibly good bad reverb,” which means that the audio limitations of the original hardware is replicated, only with a few new twists and a whole lot more control. It has a totally unique user interface that’s a little jarring at first but is remarkably clear when you get into it.

While it has all the normal parameters that you’d expect a reverb plugin to have, there are a few extra ones that make Megaverb unique. The first is Lofi. A big part of the sound of early digital reverbs came from their lack of digital resolution and their low fidelity digital converters. These characteristics have been modeled in Megaverb and split into digital and analog controls that can be dialed in separately. Analog controls the amount of analog clipping applied to the reverb signal, while Digital controls the amount of digital degradation applied to the reverb signal. That means you can make the sound as pretty or as crappy as you want.

Gated reverb is a quintessentially 80’s sound, and Megaverb makes achieving that sound easy with its built-in gate. The plugin doesn’t stop there though, as there are 12 different parameter settings to get that gate sound just right if you feeling like digging in a bit.

There are also a number of other parameters that are unusual for any kind of plugin, like Crosstalk, Stereo Bias, Stereo Bass Width and Stereo Treble Width so that you can dial in any reverb effect that you hear in your head. It also has a great manual that provides clear explanations and examples of what all the parameters do.

The Goodhertz Megaverb plugin is available for $95. It’s available for windows or Mac platforms in all the normal plugin flavors. You can find out more and purchase it here. Also, check out this great video about the story of Megaverb below. It’s an award winner!

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