Waves Abbey Road RS124 Compressor - First Impressions

[louschmidt]

Hey guys,

I made this tutorial giving my first impressions on the brand new Waves Plugin, the Abbey Road RS 124 Compressor. I did some tests on Drums, Synths, Guitars, and on the master bus. The plug-in is intuitive and sounds really musical.

Hope you like it

Thanks,

Lou

[v1o]

Many prefer the original abbey roads plugin version better.

[Cancel Culture Club]

Many prefer the original abbey roads plugin version better.

But, what do many of the working professionals really think?

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

I wouldn’t put a ton of stock in what a paid endorser says. Individually, I’d say most plugins we talk about these days can be made to sound very good to excellent. Give me a plugin and I’ll make it sound good and could enthusiastically describe what I hear. Wouldn’t mean the plugin was the best in class, or didn’t have issues (like aliasing), or unrelated nonsense like crappy update practices.

Ask those presenters five years later what their go-to’s are and are those same products they so enthusiastically endorsed going to be in regular use in their sessions?

I personally won’t buy a Waves plugin for more than $29 and even then I’ve regretted some of those purchases. Reasons that sometimes have nothing to do with the sound of the plugin.

[Cancel Culture Club]

I wouldn’t put a ton of stock in what a paid endorser says.

Here's one from a working professional that isn't endorsed by Waves, but he has been making hit records with Waves plugins for decades, so it may be a little bias.

[eytanmich123]

I wouldn’t put a ton of stock in what a paid endorser says.

It is good as a reference info. nothing more and nothing less.

Individually, I’d say most plugins we talk about these days can be made to sound very good to excellent. Give me a plugin and I’ll make it sound good and could enthusiastically describe what I hear.

That is the eternal tragedy we live in, for quite some years (that 99% of plugins sound the same, and if not - they can be made to sound the same by loading another plug right after)

Ask those presenters five years later what their go-to’s are and are those same products they so enthusiastically endorsed going to be in regular use in their sessions?

Hehe... five ?? how about 1 year (or even months). and how about - eg. - guys like Pensado who uses, like, 200 DIFFERENT plugins "on every mix" (that is : if I were to count all the times he presented "5 plugins I use on every mix")

OTOH, there are profs who use plugins that are "very old, not cutting edge, have TONS of aliasing" and STILL make great music. but how can that be ?! (//end sarcasm)

I personally won’t buy a Waves plugin for more than $29 and even then I’ve regretted some of those purchases. Reasons that sometimes have nothing to do with the sound of the plugin.

With today's SOL (speed of light) rate of releases, and the current state of "tools" (read: plain commodity. just like socks, tv and ikea furniture. I call this process "use, enthuse, lose [read: dispense]") - 29$ seems to be the current tipping point.

when I see EA's R4 - I know for certain we are at that stage (originally 300$ - now 29$. what happened that it had to shed to 1/10 of its original price ?)

[Cancel Culture Club]

when I see EA's R4 - I know for certain we are at that stage (originally 300$ - now 29$. what happened that it had to shed to 1/10 of its original price ?)

Market saturation, supply and demand, too much competition to stay financially competitive without drastic sales, subscription schemes or lowering the price entirely.

The question is, do you need the top of the line, most expensive brand named vacuum cleaner to do the job? Probably not.

Does it make it more fun, exciting and maybe a little easier and convenient as your preferred method? Then maybe it's worth spending the extra cash for the initial hype and instant availability.

But, from a practical sense, you could do the job with stock plugins these days, they are all good quality. It all comes down to the source material, song or the result of all the twiddling and tweaking.

The average person doesn't listen to music the way people who make it do, that's the biggest hurdle for most artists or aspiring professionals to overcome.

[v1o]

What do you think of this now that it has been out for a month. Is the honeymoon phase over?

[Cancel Culture Club]

What do you think of this now that it has been out for a month. Is the honeymoon phase over?

This could be said for just about anything. Once that new car smell wears off, it's just like any other.
Plugins are so good these days that you can simply find a suitable replacement in 10 different varieties.

I believe it's more important to support a company that provides it's users with what they're looking for and listens to their requests and tries to support each other. Rather then dictate the future needs of their user base.

Waves has made a lot of changes to their Waves Central due to all the feedback from all the new users, and they made the process easier. Some companies would have just ignored them for the next couple of years until it hit a paid upgrade cycle and maybe took a look at it.

The biggest problem with Wave's reputation is all the misinformed and lazy computer illiterate users not reading documentation and not researching all the options.

[Michey]

from a practical sense, you could do the job with stock plugins these days, they are all good quality. It all comes down to the source material, song or the result of all the twiddling and tweaking.

From practical point of view, it is like that for many years (that 99% of people will enjoy your music with whatever processors you throw at them).

Source material ? in electronic music the "source" is being your interface quality (which is getting better and better each year, to the extent that you can find "bedroom" type cheap card with 120dB DR).

Plugins are like all other commodity as of now. we just tend to treat them as "Tools".
But if it looks like commodity, being marketed as commodity, and costs like commodity... it must be commodity.

The average person doesn't listen to music the way people who make it do, that's the biggest hurdle for most artists or aspiring professionals to overcome.

Quite right.

But the hurdle is in our head... the (sad) truth is that there is almost no "bad sounding music or processors". there is just "wrong usage". we just blame the plug for us being inapt.
good music - is good music (if its a dance track : good groove and compelling beat. if its a song : good lyrics, beat and melody). believe me, I know someone (from my family) who's internationally known in his genre of choice. he always laughs at me, seeing my struggles, grabbing "tool" after tool after tool (he likes mocking me "Wow dude, your loops really smells like teen spirit, I can hear the bass through the wall", then he starts singing : "Hey Dude, don't make it bad, Take a rad song and make it better... Remember to let it into your farts, Then you can start to make it better...") whereas he just makes music continuously with his Ableton and stock plugins, spitting track after track... after track.

[Cancel Culture Club]

from a practical sense, you could do the job with stock plugins these days, they are all good quality. It all comes down to the source material, song or the result of all the twiddling and tweaking.

From practical point of view, it is like that for many years (that 99% of people will enjoy your music with whatever processors you throw at them).

Source material ? in electronic music the "source" is being your interface quality (which is getting better and better each year, to the extent that you can find "bedroom" type cheap card with 120dB DR).

Plugins are like all other commodity as of now. we just tend to treat them as "Tools".
But if it looks like commodity, being marketed as commodity, and costs like commodity... it must be commodity.

The average person doesn't listen to music the way people who make it do, that's the biggest hurdle for most artists or aspiring professionals to overcome.

Quite right.

But the hurdle is in our head... the (sad) truth is that there is almost no "bad sounding music or processors". there is just "wrong usage". we just blame the plug for us being inapt.
good music - is good music (if its a dance track : good groove and compelling beat. if its a song : good lyrics, beat and melody). believe me, I know someone (from my family) who's internationally known in his genre of choice. he always laughs at me, seeing my struggles, grabbing "tool" after tool after tool (he likes mocking me "Wow dude, your loops really smells like teen spirit, I can hear the bass through the wall", then he starts singing : "Hey Dude, don't make it bad, Take a rad song and make it better... Remember to let it into your farts, Then you can start to make it better...") whereas he just makes music continuously with his Ableton and stock plugins, spitting track after track... after track.

The source material includes many things, such as you mentioned the quality of the recording.

But to expand on that, it also includes things like recording audio directly or via midi. Which comes with a lot of inherent issues that must be dealt with technically for analog. On the other hand you have latency, buffers, PDC and other things to deal with on the digital side.

And even beyond that, the creative ideas of what to play and record in the first place...

[Michey]

The source material includes many things, such as you mentioned the quality of the recording.

When making electronic music, within your computer, and only with samples/synths - your interface is a sole monarch.

But to expand on that, it also includes things like recording audio directly or via midi. Which comes with a lot of inherent issues that must be dealt with technically for analog. On the other hand you have latency, buffers, PDC and other things to deal with on the digital side.

These are just performance relating things... nothing to do with raw quality. zero bearing.

And even beyond that, the creative ideas of what to play and record in the first place...

again, performance. not quality.

Don't mix them (no pun untended).

[Cancel Culture Club]

The source material includes many things, such as you mentioned the quality of the recording.

When making electronic music, within your computer, and only with samples/synths - your interface is a sole monarch.

But to expand on that, it also includes things like recording audio directly or via midi. Which comes with a lot of inherent issues that must be dealt with technically for analog. On the other hand you have latency, buffers, PDC and other things to deal with on the digital side.

These are just performance relating things... nothing to do with raw quality. zero bearing.

And even beyond that, the creative ideas of what to play and record in the first place...

again, performance. not quality.

Don't mix them (no pun untended).

I think you've missed the plot.

The importance of what you're recording, playing and eventually releasing starts with an idea and is executed to completion by the steps each individual decides to take according to their taste and experience.

I think you're trying to generalize the term source material to the basic definition of quality of capture, and not including the quality of content.

These are the things that make music worth listening to, not which audio interface you use.

Example, people prefer to listen to a great artist on cheap speakers, then a terrible artist on the most expensive audio system in the world...

The source material includes the quality of content along with the quality of format and delivery...

[Cancel Culture Club]

Just to add to the quality of content being important in the total quality of the source material.

It's the same reason Hiphop producers with little or no musical background use high quality samples from songs on vinyl that are already filled with high quality content, then rearranged.

Which had the same affect with EDM remix producers that use high quality source material, stems, sample packs, loops, etc. They are already working with high quality content, then rearranged.

You can even go as far as to say virtual instrument presets, that some well known artist has made with their countless hours of experience can also be considered.

All these choices and decisions that ultimately result in a finished project are just pieces of the source material...