Is Digital Catching Up To Analog? - Mixwave VLC vs Hazelrigg VLC

I got a rare opportunity to shoot out a plugin against the actual exact hardware unit it was modeled after. Let's see how close they really are!

The Hazelrigg Industries VLC is one of the best available preamp + EQ on the market. The MixWave VLC is a clone of this very unit.

[Producelikeapro]

Wonderful video Matt!! Always happy for you to come by and use our studio! We love what you do! Great plug in and of course great hardware!!

[threethievesmusic]

I used this on my recent tracks vocal chain and its magic. Sounds so good, brings the vocal forwards in a really nice way.

[IamtheI]

long live matty weiss.... he is a good egg

[danstuckie]

oh shit matt is the man! I learned about summing from one of his videos YEARS ago.

[zanza_Casal-Boss]

I buy the bundle now! Amazing plugins!

[MixedByDb]

Both sound great but I can definitely tell the real unit stands out .

[dougleydorite]

I think running multiple analog units into each other is where analog can be better than multiple digital devices. Would be cool to see a comparison of that

[mrmorpheus]

The vocal is to low & buried in the music to hear efficiently

[immtonmischer]

Interesting and great to hear a comparison where it's almost exclusively down to digital vs analog.

The plugin does what most plugins do and adds a kind of compression in a relatively narrow range that stands out - in this case and on this vocal around 1.2kHz.

Once I heard it it was pretty easy to pick it out, even scrolling the video down and doing it blind. It is even more pronounced when played in the track, as now that compressed midrange stands out in a penetrant way, overshadowing the details in the instruments in the side channel, as if a Masterbuss compressor had been added, which reacts to the vocal and pushes the instrumental back.

The hardware made the vocal sit better with the rest of the music and didn't take away anything from the background track. This behaviour has been my biggest pet peeve with all plugins in the last 10 years while mixing: they all create subtle new problems while solving the main issues and the more you use the more it stacks up.

I'm ITB (apart from a TAM Creme RC) as recall is a PITA and plan on staying there, but it would be nice if some developer could finally figure out why this happens and how to prevent it (and please spare me the "it measures the same" talk. I listen with my ears and not my eyes and if it sounds different it sounds different.)

[rollinweight]

I hear a clear difference. Analog has. Low mid bump almost muddy. The plugin has a digital overlay type sheen. in the upper mid and high end

[zfalcon]

I would also like to add the hardware version, to my ears, sounds a bit more "compressed". Maybe due to the natural saturation that occurs from the analog components. However, in this context, I would have to say that I actually prefer the more natural sounding with extended high-end from the plugin. But this is really just nitpicking and they sound so similar to where it really doesn't matter. I'd imagine there could be more difference in sound between different hardware of the same unit compared to this.

[saardean]

Its pretty close. Only it could be a level matched a bit more. I see a big difference on the metering and hear it also.

[Rhuggins]

Hey Matt - very cool. Where was this taken? Have you settled into Miami nicely? Cool to see Warren picked up a Vari Mu. Little tip: if you ever want to match up a plugin and its corresponding hardware in terms of EQ (or really any two EQ processors) - the free Bertrom Curve Analyzer plugin is incredibly useful. You just sandwich the plugin between the insert, and the plugin - and then you can superimpose the frequency response graphs on top of each other. As Im sure you know, nulling is difficult in the analog domain - and this makes it almost trivially easy to match up curves

[lilwombat]

im hearing wayy more highs on the plugin idk if it sounds crazy close but it doesnt sound bad

[SuperIZL]

That’s so weird… I can clearly hear the difference the hardware (at least here on my iPhone speaker) has more highfreq compression saturation going on and is more pronounced and smoother … in my perception….

Great video… I didn’t know about the hardware the plugin has that sound although not identical

I want both😅

[mixedbypricha]

Hardware top end is so much smoother and the sound is more realistic like positioned in a space hate to say 3D. The plugin is very close but sharp in the top end at those settings. I really wish you had pulled back some top end a bit on the plugin just to compare. The plugin didn't sound very good to me until the low end was brought up, Im hoping the same would apply to backing off the top end a bit.

[yoyoyo]

Coke and Diet Coke. Hopefully that pre switch in the harmonics section of the plugin is what I’m looking for.

[MonkeyBars]

excellent video subject thanks! love shootouts

that shirt though I'm not so sure of

[alyxonfire]

Hardware sounds nice but, for the price, you'd expect an output attenuation knob

[maxperson]

To me the hardware sounds more alive more 3d