Product Reviews by KVR Members

I've had this baby for a long time. I've used it as a wrapper in Protools, Logic and Bitwig and lately as a Standalone VST host on my second PC and in live situations. It's the kind of tool that you at first wish you didn't need, that works in the background and that you just set and forget. All these different plugin standards are really annoying and even if this is a solution It's hard to get very excited about it, until now.

The latest version 2.1 is fantastic. Built in effects, metering, undo/redo, M/S, PatchWork within PatchWork!!, scaleable GUI to 200%, lockable GUI and settings between presets. Add to that full MIDI control and that everything, even window states and positions are saved within presets and you've got a winner. The new preset handling especially is what makes this update so exciting.

This has grown into a full fledged creative tool and the core of my setup. Working with several DAWs I can now set it up as a channel strip and move freely between DAWs like never before. It loads every plugin format on Mac and PC, can be loaded as every format and works as Standalone.

From being a bridge between plugin formats Blue Cat has improved on this concept and taken it beyond what I thought it could be. It's stable, easy on the CPU, easy to use and even though it's not perfect I have to give it a 10 just to let you know how incredibly useful it is. There is nothing quite like it at the moment, highly recommended.

This one is magic! I can't figure out how they've done it, it's impossible. I have tried a lot of stereo wideners before and the drawback has always been that the process would make the signal incompatible with mono. Not this one. Put it on a ping pong delay or anything panned really and experience how stereo should sound like. To get wide stereo, use mono signals panned hard or use the bx_stereomaker.

This is it. What an amazing DAW! If You are willing to put in the time and effort to work thru the action list, this thing can do whatever You want, how You want it and in ways you haven't even thought of yet. The basic setup looks limiting at first if You are used to other DAWs like Live, Bitwig, Logic or ProTools, but once You get under the hood, it is fantastic. I bought this just a few months ago and I have just finished setting up my computer keyboard with easy to find shortcuts, every controller I have is mapped exactly like I want them, like they've never been mapped with any other software before. Even my Push have come to life with nativeKontrol PXT-General better than it works in both Live and Bitwig. It just works, is super stable, fast, low on CPU and the workflow is like nothing else. Sure there are some fancy things missing and it's not as pretty as other DAWs but hey I know that I am not looking back. I have found my DAW. The mapping and routing in both audio and MIDI is beyond anything I've tried before. And considering the price this just has to be an 11 out of 10.

I never owned a CZ but I remember using it in the studio back in the days and this totally captures the feel of it. But in contrast to the hardware this plug-in is dead easy to operate. This is one hell of a soundsource. I've been using it for about a year now and I keep coming back to it because it's so well laid out and so easy to get good, interesting results out of.

It has tons of character just like the original and also it will not make every sound You can think of. But what it does it does great. You might need some additional plug-ins to make it sit well in a mix, but so does almost every other synth out there. Apart from a great chorus, a unison and a vibrato there aren't any effects but this might even be a good thing. A lot of synths have effects that just aren't good enough especially reverbs that don't work with the rest of the sounds in a mix. So You just might as well add them Yourself to begin with. I guess most of us have some good dedicated effects anyway, and I rather pay a more reasonable price for a really good sound generator instead.

There is room for improvement though, the preset handling desperately needs some kind of sorting or tagging system. The master section could do with more gain control and some metering (like it's sibling Carbon Electra). The stand alone version (which I really appreciate) would be even more useful with note triggering from the computer keyboard. And scaling of the GUI is almost a must these days with 4K and Retina monitors.

Apart from this I am a fan and I would really recommend it.

This plug-in is by a stretch worth maybe a 4, so I'll give it a three just to even things out. A drummachine without a groove control??! Yes You read it right. No groove control. This means that You can not get anything remotely funky out of this one. You might as well put samples on a grid in Your DAW. I mean buying a drum machine at this price You are looking for some assistance to make Your drumtracks swing. Keep looking, this is not it. This is a disaster of a drummachine. Have a look at xfer Nerve, SonicCharge Microtonic or even AudioDamage Tattoo for something that at least adds something. This is just a basic sampletrigger. Alright, the samples are good but so is every samplepack out there.

It's easy to like Klevgränd and their approach to sound and graphic design, especially on the iPad where they are intuitive and quick. When ported to VST however they appear more like toys. Most plug-ins need some gain-staging to perform at their full capacity, and to do that You need some metering. This one has nothing of that, or at most a minimal amount. It's hard to fault the sound however, loud sounds better, and this one goes really loud without any obvious artifacts. It works great on a digital source without background noise to even out the sound and make it louder, but I wouldn't trust it on an acoustic recording or the master bus. It's true that if it sounds good, it is good. But I personally would really like some more control. It just doesn't feel right if I can't verify my settings visually after some hours of mixing. The GUI looks great and is intuitive, maybe if they add some more controls and meters in an expert mode I would use it more.