Cytomic "The Scream" stomp box distortion plugin

[andy-cytomic]

This is a supremely fun preset to tinker with! Very nice Andy!

Indeed endless subtle random presets can be created and it's fun to simply explore the various things you can do with it. Thanks for posting this!

Great! I'll do four variations on this that allow for the drive boost to be a high boost, a mid boost, low mid boost and a low boost, and set their drive knob to 50% so you can instantly hear the boost. This preset is subtle drive to start with, and wide boost if you use the drive knob.

[plexuss]

I'm starting to work on final presets for The Scream and wanted to share a mastering one to get feedback:

Yes, this is very effective on first listen. I am using it for mastering on a track with a lot of complex sounds and wide soundstage. I cranked it to +12 in and gain matches out to -12 - imparts a nice heaft and clarity that was missing. I would say its a wee be heavy handed at +12 in, so it has a good range of operation with a range well within the realm of subtle harmonic impact a la preamp vibe. But with more energy and the ability to really push it without sounding bad. I tried random as well which was very interesting and every roll was usable musically. I just settled on one that sounded good. Pretty cool use of The Scream - the preset demonstrate how powerful it is. I didn't expect it!

[miloszz]

I totally forgot I owned this until the filter thread got bumped up recently - downloaded and it still sounds incredible. Love it on some of the basic string and brass libraries bundled with Live.

[andy-cytomic]

Yes, this is very effective on first listen. I am using it for mastering on a track with a lot of complex sounds and wide soundstage. I cranked it to +12 in and gain matches out to -12 - imparts a nice heaft and clarity that was missing. I would say its a wee be heavy handed at +12 in, so it has a good range of operation with a range well within the realm of subtle harmonic impact a la preamp vibe. But with more energy and the ability to really push it without sounding bad. I tried random as well which was very interesting and every roll was usable musically. I just settled on one that sounded good. Pretty cool use of The Scream - the preset demonstrate how powerful it is. I didn't expect it!

Great, thanks for the feedback!

More presets to come.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

"Mastering grade Tube Screamer" was not on my 2023 audio gear bingo sheet, but here we are.

[plexuss]

"Mastering grade Tube Screamer" was not on my 2023 audio gear bingo sheet, but here we are.

Yes. It's very weird to see The Scream in my mastering chain.

[jamcat]

Gave this a try now that it's finally VST3 and Apple Silicon native. Pretty nice. It sounds really really close to The Screamer from Fazertone, which is modeled with machine learning. Cytomic is just a bit smoother sounding. I might pick this one up. I just wonder if it will ever be out of beta.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

The code part is done. It's only in beta waiting for presets and a manual. Maybe a web page upgrade. Hop on in.

[jamcat]

Presets and a manual?
There's only 3 knobs! Give me an hour.

[plexuss]

Presets and a manual?
There's only 3 knobs! Give me an hour.

It's way deeper than that...

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[jamcat]

I've never seen a manual document and describe every internal component before. Why would anyone need to do that? They just tell you what the knobs do, not all the resistors and capacitors.

It was a valiant effort on your part, though.


In fact, here's the relevant section from the 4-page real TubeScreamer manual:

OVER DRIVE
Adjusts the amount of distortion.

TONE
Controls the amount of high frequency contour.
Adds bite to the sound or makes it mellower.

LEVEL
Controls the level of the distorted signal, but
does not effect the normal signal. Useful for
matching the distortion level to the normal level
when switching the effect in and out.

Soft touch FET electronic switch changes EFFECT/NOR-
MAL.

LED indicator comes on when effect is on. If it is dim or
does not light, replace the battery

Done.

The rest of the manual just shows you how to plug it into an amp and change the battery in a few different languages. Nothing in there about resistors.

[dayjob]

I've never seen a manual document and describe every internal component before. Why would anyone need to do that? They just tell you what the knobs do, not all the resistors and capacitors.

every component is modeled so when you change them and the circuit behavior is altered... and the components interact... so, a user, if inclined, can greatly alter the sound of the plug in. it's like having all the options in one pedal... making it more than one pedal.

all that information is relevant to someone who wants to experiment and make presets.

[andy-cytomic]

The presets will take most of the time, but that's really the fun part! As for the manual, I need to cover quite a few things:
* the installation and authorisation process
* the regular controls drive, tone, and level
* the pre post and mix knobs and where they are in the signal chain, and how to adjust gain staging
* the voltage and bias knobs and what they do
* how to enter text to change values
* how to fine drag values
* how to reset the knob positions
* how to emulate a dying battery for broken sounds
* the plugin options including user interface scaling, detecting bad i/o, saving cpu with detecting silence
* saving default presets for slot A and/or B
* the regular undo system
* the mod 1 / mod 2 switch and how they work and how they interact with the undo system
* the mods page (easy edits)
* the rand page
* the full schematic page and how to edit values in mono and stereo, broken down by area
* pedal bypass button is different to the top left "power" button
* the oversampling modes: linear vs intermediate vs minimum phase for both up and down sampling
* realtime vs offline render oversampling amounts and how they interact with plugin latency
* the difference between HD mode and MD (ie HD off) mode
* how to import your own spice based diode models / libraries, and which parts of those models will be used in which modes

Those are a few of the topics I think are worth covering off the top of my head, or at least have online reference pages to cover those things (eg for oversampling), there will no doubt be more once I've completed more of the manual.

One of the videos I'd like to do is the history of the Tube Screamer being a rip off of the Boss OD-1, and how Boss did a rip off of the rip off in the Boss SD-1, and then compare how the TS808 sounds vs The Scream / TS9 / TS9DX / Behringer TO800.

[andy-cytomic]

In fact, here's the relevant section from the 4-page real TubeScreamer manual:

Soft touch FET electronic switch changes EFFECT/NOR-
MAL.

Thanks for the reminder on this, the soft touch fet switch is emulated. When you have a high gain setting, and you toggle the switch, you will get a momentary "chirp" since there is a brief period while the jfets switch that has a global feedback loop of the entire main drive stage back to the input of the drive stage (much like a resonance filter), so I'll have to explain that is is actually the circuit being modelled correctly, and not a bug, otherwise I'll get support queries that there is a bug!

Also I have been mentioning to people that have complained it is "still in beta" that if they don't need a manual (the hardware doesn't really have much of one), and don't need presets (the hardware doesn't really have any), then it is out of beta since the software itself is feature complete.

[cptgone]

Don't forget the cat.
Unless sales mean nothing to you, you better put a cat on the GUI.

Apart from that, great plugin. I've had more fun using it than the original hardware.