New Music Gear Monday: Wilkerson Audio DeBleeder Leakage Suppressor Plugin

Depending on the era that you grew up in the audio business, you have a different point of view on leakage, especially on the drums. If you’re old-school with experience in limited analog tracks and lots of musicians playing in the same room, leakage probably isn’t too much of a bother. There’s so much music that’s not recorded that way anymore and opting for a cleaner sound though, and in those cases leakage can be a major concern. If drum spill is something you struggle with, then you’re going to love DeBleeder from Wilkerson Audio.

DeBleeder can’t really be classified as a gate or expander, but it performs the function of both, only better. While it can be used on other track elements, it seems to be designed primarily for drums and it certainly does shine in that application.

The plugin is built around 4 familiar parameter controls. The Fundamental control allows you to monitor the sidechain in order to find the primary harmonic of the source element (1 octave above the fundamental actually works best for drums). This makes sure that you’ll be able to get the most out of using the other controls when it comes to clean-up. This can be set either from the audio in the signal path, or from an external source like a drum trigger, and there’s a separate Bandwidth control for fine tuning.

Speaking of bandwidth, the Range control limits the bandwidth, and along with the Reduction control, actually performs the leakage suppression magic of the plugin. Use both to decrease the spill to either an acceptable level, or in some cases, eliminate it completely. There’s also a Threshold control and 2 low-frequency rolloff selections, with the steepest one being used just for fine tuning the parameter.

Finally there’s a Release parameter allows control over how quickly the bleed control algorithm begins after it detects a hit or transient.

There’s also an Info button that brings up a window providing actual number settings on all the parameters, and exposing a small Knee control that you can use to make sure that all the ghost notes played on a snare or high-hat are getting through.

Wilkinson Audio’s DeBleeder V1.2 plugin works on Mac or PC platforms and on all plugin formats. The price is normally $80, which is more than fair for what it does, but it’s currently available for just $30, which is a steal.

You can find out more here, or check out the video manual video below.

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