Well, I wasn't in the market for a new EQ plugin, but hearing this kinda makes me have second thoughts. They're not lying when they say it sounds smooth. Plus the discount for existing customers is pretty nice too.
I bought it 2 days ago and got addicted! It adds excitement to tracks. First, surgical (notching) corrections with the Fab Filter Q3 … then the Pulsar for sound & vibe
I have had a Silver Face Massive Passive for 15+ yrs and a Purple Face Mastering version for about 10 and I still haven't heard a single plugin quite manage to capture the very particular magic of the Massivo. This is one of the better ones I've heard, but the real MP has a very distinct and slightly hard-to-describe mid range, it's very much its own thing (it's also very transparent and clinical for filtering, but its always extremely musical and punchy). The low end and highs are certainly in the Pultec realm, but the lows are maybe a bit tighter, but larger sounding and the highs are a bit softer, and it's got very extended frequency range compared to a Pultec, which I think is one of the hardest things for plug-in makers to capture. The UAD version was always pretty harsh in the highs and the mid range sounded nothing like a Massivo, this is probably the first one I've heard that does a decent job, though it's a bit digitally overly-smoothe, but again, the MP just has a very unique mid-range that is hard to replicate. Its filters are also very unique sounding, transparent but in a colorful way, if that makes any sense. Its certainly very passive sounding in all regards, as you'd expect, and passive gear seems to be a bit of a weak point with alot of software. There are some good ones out there for sure, but it's really hard for software to capture the almost "acoustic" vibe of passive tube gear. There have been plenty of analog attempts to copy the MP that sound nothing like it, as well. So I'm not sure if it's that it is just really hard to capture it's tone digitally, or if the Massivo's tone is hard to replicate in both the analog and digital domains. There's a reason it's such a staple for engineers everywhere, that's for sure. It's a piece of desert-island gear for me without a doubt, especially the Silver Face version (it's probably just semantics, but my ear tends to favor the Silver Face for some reason. The newer purple one has what seems like a slightly tighter bottom in comparison). I use my MP's on just about everything during tracking, mixing and of course mastering. It may be a bold statement, but I think the Massive Passive may be up there as one of the best EQ designs of all time, there's really nothing that does exactly what it does. Sure, there's things like the Curvebender from Chandler, which is an amazing unit, but beyond having 4 bands per channel, they're hard to compare sonically. They can often be one of the very first tools I go to if I'm mixing something that wasn't tracked by me, especially if there are sources that sound less than great, the MP is great for reshaping a track to give it some life, in the most natural sounding way. When used for filtering, it gets rid of problem frequencies in a way that sounds like they were never there to begin with, and for additive eq, it can go from very subtle and gentle to very extreme, without ever losing it's musicality.
Agreed. I have a MP and it's so clean and huge. Big fat tubes can not be emulated properly. There's just something there. The convenience of the plug is amazing but the sound of analog is really moving air pressure.
I’ve actually heard a hardware Massive Passive and Pultec side by side. I liked the midrange on the MP way better but liked the low end boost on the Pultec better. Similar designs but quite different sonically to my ears. This plugin sounds great to my ears 😁
@@NUWAVEDRIP it was an actual EQP 1A. The strangest thing to me was that the MP seemed more noticeably colored, particularly in that midrange area. I liked it a lot. I was surprised the hardware Pultec sounded pretty damn clean in comparison. But the lowend sounded beefier, at least on the source material running through it. The MP seemed gentle in comparison. Admittedly this was a one time deal for me working with both side by side
The secret sauce is that the bands are parallel. This really contributes to my purchase of it. They gave a pretty hefty discount to existing Pulsar customers... I was all in.
Can you explain this? Do you mean that instead of eqing the entire signal it duplicates the signal and eqs only one of them so it's in parallel? If that's right, then is there no way to have it eq the whole signal? Also doesn't parallel eq tend to cause more phase problems? I'm relatively new to all this, so correct me if I'm wrong
@@evanmcgregor145 The bands run their processing in parallel. This is why the EQ has such gentile slopes. If the slopes become too high, the phase cancellation issues become too apparent. With the more gentile slopes, the phase cancellation merely leads to a different sound that can be easily tuned.
A real massive passive being a passive design has only so much boost or cut total for all 4 bands. So if you are maxed boosting the high frequencies and then boost the low frequencies the high frequencies don't end up with the same amount of boost. They are lowered to compensate for the overall boost or cut. Mainly because there is only so much headroom in a passive design. Hope that makes sense.
Ok, I think, Pulsar has proven, that they really, really can analog legends! Waiting for La2A (even though I have tons of them) and something from Sontec or Massenburg. I guess, they could to wonderful emulations of this gear
Butter smooth!! Wow. What a delicious drive too. Would have loved to hear it with oversampling on, I’m assuming it would be under the top right burger settings like other pulsar plugins.
Autogain on eq would be useful if you were feeding the eq into a compressor or saturator that was already set up. I often change the output gain on eq's just for this reason.
Good call. I often do the same, it is a subtle but noticeable difference. Sometimes it's really hard to tell how much gain an EQ is adding, because by nature its adding or taking away only part of the signal.
@@Ferrichrome For sure. Boosting in the lows can raise the output gain a LOT. Compressor characteristics and nonlinear distortion are so dependent on input gain that it's kind of a must if you boost in the lows before a compressor or analog emulation. Really cool stuff can be done by boosting certain frequencies before a compressor.
@@FerrichromeI just run a meter before and after and take the difference. Could maybe setup a macro in live? That’s beyond my live skill set right now so not sure
@@russcontact ya lol, you could do that, 2 year later I actually use SlickEQ sometimes which has a very good gain compensation built in. Helps stop yourself from tricking your ears and making the wrong EQ moves
i have smasher, mu and now massive from pulsar audio. I use them a lot, smasher is, in most cases, the compressor that i use in parallel compression. All these plugins sounds really so nice! And an soud enginer that i know likes pulsar, because he could compare the plug and the hardware and the plugs sounds in the way that the real hardware, and this is a case of massive, and the reason why i bought it!
This sounds and functions a lot like SPL Passeq from Plugin Alliance. Massive Passive truly adds a little pixie dust that you can't get on other EQ's without tweaking the curve a lot. Totally worth getting...especially now while it's on sale Oct 2022.
What I've heard of the Pulsar Massive EQ sounds great. I'm getting it as the Massive & Mu Bundle within the next month. That bundle also comes with the Relab LX480 Essentials reverb at this time. PS 12/20/2022 Last week, I bought this bundle that included the Relab reverb. All 3 are great IMO. I got the Pulsar bundle during their Black Friday sale, I paid $129 plus about $3.50 foreign payment fee. I'm in the US FWIW.
I definitely like the what this can do. I do more or less feel happy with my EQ options right now, but this seem to be very musical sounding. Also, extra points for the seated dancing!
I’m a big fan of Pulsar plugin. Massive Passive is a Pultec-like EQ (based on its passive design and thus EQ curves are very smooth and musical even you’re doing something crazy. The drive is subtle but audible. Great tonality for mixing and mastering purpose. Definitely will go for it
Me like - had to sell my MP years ago, but the workflow on this one seems right familiar. Having the graphic interface is a big plus just to see what I'm doing with the knobs. The drive is a cool new feature, though that's more for da rude that what I'ld use it for. I like level matching too so you can A/B your mixes. With the wild disclaimer that I'm comparing a $5k box on my phone & buds over RU-vid, what's not to love!
Nice video Pulsar Massive is awesome EQ indeed, but i prefer Mammoth Eq from Analog in the Box a third Party Library developer emulating Manley Passive for Acustica Audio Nebula i think its the best emulation in the box but pulsar is very close.
...of course the ONE plugin that has AutoGain (literally) front and center is the one where you don't need it xD (no front, just Murphy's Law. Keep up the great work)
Definitely needed imo, when you A/B the plugin you don't want any additional gain to trick your ears. Of course you can do this manually with output gain.
When it comes to EQs Fabfilter Pro Q3 is good enough for me. It appears they tried to emulate the display of Pro Q3, but add the Manley knobs at the bottom.
i am not so sure anymore if there are any differences at all in the virtual EQ world -plug in doctor hepled me to come up to that conclusion. I did a test myself with 5 virtual eqs and the SPL EQ aswell... matched their curves with plug in doc, and they all sound the same... you can find the testvideo on my YT-page.
Used it on some acoustic indie rock tracks last month. Really brought out a lot. I don't know if it has the same ah ha effect though as it does with my trappy electronic productions
haha, I just bought this thing on a whim (I like the Pulsar Mu plugin) and just now I see the snake oil video. Had to skip to the conclusion part of the video to justify my impulsive buy. I can test this thing myself with a clear conscience now ;) 😆
I always thought using the scroll wheel on the mouse would adjust the bandwitdth in any decent EQ plugin… at least in FabFilter ProQ3 and Harrison LegacyQ. Would love to hear your opinon on LegacyQ. To my ears, FabFilter doesn't ”sound”, or aims not to, while LegacyQ is supposed to. I find myself using both in MixBus, currently preferring ProQ3 for most use cases.
@@TransistorLSD Passive EQ means it has no active electronics in the circuit (at least in the filter it self), paralell eq its just an approach to blend the dry/wet signals.
@@timoheinrich8763 What? 😄 Do you mean "is Slick EQ M inspired by the Massive Passive"? I'm not sure if it's directly inspired by the Massive Passive, but it's definitely inspired by a passive/parallel EQ design. It works much in the same way as a Massive Passive, although with more bands and more features. Slick EQ M is in my eyes the ultimate digital mastering EQ!
@@nj1255 Thanks for the answer. I just asked because that's how I understood your comment. In any case I agree that the Slick EQ even in the free version is a great tool for mastering!
I watch all your videos but I would love if you would include whether or not a plugin is low latency and what latency it incurs. Would just save all of us going to read the manual!
Original is nice but way to expensive for music producer. UAD is sounding little better in some cases and Pulsar is just awesome because it does behave like the real deal and has modern GUI which the better sounding (small differences) UAD version doesn't have. I need to make a comparison but the Pulsar one will be easier to use and does not require my M1 to connect to my thunderbolt Sonnet 3 x UAD2 OCTO ridge. Pulsar is well protected in the OSX world which I'm in and I don't mind PC guys having this for free I would never dump OSX for the reason of cracked plugins.
I like your presentations, but why do you use this type of music to try a Manley/Pultec type plugin. Acoustic music and/or jazz would be better in my opinion.
I got the Massive, the VoxBox, and the Vari Mu for $250 USD. I know a guy who linked me to a website and I got them there. 🤣 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. Yes, they are digital and I got them from UAD, but the REAL things... Man... That's like a few mortgage payments. 😅
Is it really 10 dBs you are tweaking ( @09:24 ) ??? remember that dB is a very non linear unit. . . . . Could it just be the resolution you are getting withthe plugin's knobs??? .... I get similar results using 10cm motorized faders to tweak ProQ3..... or using the NOB controller. . . . . which are controllers that can bring more resolution and thus, controll to the tweaks I do to my filters. Hey!! what happened to the nails? I would've leave them on just to keep the haters anoyed! 👊
