London's Abbey Road Studios has announced the release of its new Brilliance Pack of three EQ plug-ins providing authentic emulations of vintage EMI 'presence' EQs for Mac OS X and Windows.
Based on the original modules built in the 1960s, the plug-ins bring these classic EQs to the digital domain. The original RS127 and RS135 EQ boxes were custom-built by EMI technicians in the early 1960s to supplement the limited EQ on the REDD mixing consoles. They were the predominant outboard EQs at Abbey Road throughout the '60s and were used on many famous recordings during this period, including almost every album made by The Beatles.
The plug-ins were developed from original EMI circuit schematics, circuit simulation and digital modelling of vintage Abbey Road units. The plug-ins retain the operation and characteristics of the original hardware and essentially provide the complete range of presence EQs that were used at Abbey Road in the '60s.
Three plug-in modules are included:
- The RS127 Rack is modelled on the original rack-mount Brilliance Control.
- The RS135 recreates the 8kHz boost unit.
- The RS127 Box plug-in was created by modelling the standalone Brilliance Control with an EMI transformer used to connect it to modern consoles. The plug-in features an exaggerated response or 'transformer effect' at some settings, which is due to an interaction between the RS127 and the transformer.
Peter Cobbin, Director of Engineering at Abbey Road Studios, says: "Put simply - they're brilliant! I can highly recommend using these EQs on guitars, keyboards and vocals. If you find that +/-10 dB is not enough, do what they did back then - use two of them!"
The plug-ins are compatible with Mac OS X and Windows and provided in TDM, RTAS, AU and VST plug-in formats.
The Brilliance Pack is priced at $199 and is available to demo and purchase now.