Dimiguitar
Roadie
- Messages
- 446
I brought the spectre digital "cockblocker plugin. It was 50% off. Had been told it's an amazing gate for guitarists.
What I didn't know was the company had apparently been a Glen Fricker partnership/project with someone else. Now Fricker's out, it's said, but I really dislike his channel. The constant yelling and "I know better than you" attitude just feels overplayed, arrogant, mostly for the clicks, and for elevating oneself by scoring easy points against low hanging fruits.
But that aside. Maybe I shouldn't associate Fricker's channel with what the company is now, I thought. And he wasn't even the only person running it previously.
On to testing. If the plugin is good, it's good. So I sidechained the VST.
Unfortunately was very unimpressed. Played around with the deeper settings too, aside from the basic knob... and.. nah... choppy, glitchy, no matter what I did. For the life of me, could not find a proper balance with this gate. I don't know if the physical pedal (there is or was an equivalent) is any better. Maybe it is. I'm used to the sentry, isp decimator and fractal gates. These are what my expectations are built on.
That said, bear in mind that I'm new to gates in plugin form, so there's some elevated chance I did something wrong. I just doubt it. Checked that the sidechain worked properly, etc, and I'm not a total noob for setting up gates in general. Additionally, I compared against the internal tonex gate and don't feel the cockblocker was an upgrade.
My usage goal for such a gate is an improvement over the tonex gate. I find myself using the tonex plugin more and more lately, and a great gate makes a meaningful difference in my recordings. There's been times I've used no gate at all, but it just improves my tracks when I do.
Then I thought.. there must be better options than the cockblocker. Maybe they cost more, but this is important for me.
So after the "maturely" named cockblocker, I got the Sir standardGATE. They offer a package of 3 plugins for 50 euros for black Friday. I have used the Sir audio standardCLIP for few years with great results, so I was curious about their gate plugin. Don't think I had tried this before.
So I sidechained the standardGATE. Juggled a little bit with the settings, like I typically expect to do for metal tones. Result?
Oh man. Now that's legit. I even dialed in some absurdly high gain tones I'd never use, for shits and giggles, and got very usable results. No weird glitchiness, easy to tweak and find a good balance, just great all around. I can get pretty much exactly what I want from a gate. The UI isn't flashy, but it's simple to wrap my head around, and there's much else it can achieve too if you go digging.
So my plugin noise gate search is over. Don't see need for better (if it even exists).
I asked for a refund for the cockblocker. They offer no trial version, but refunds within 14 days are given "for any reason". Maybe I'm wrong about all this and did use the gate wrongly nonetheless -- but what I do know for sure is the Sir standardGATE, in comparison, works wonders for me. No contest ime.
What I didn't know was the company had apparently been a Glen Fricker partnership/project with someone else. Now Fricker's out, it's said, but I really dislike his channel. The constant yelling and "I know better than you" attitude just feels overplayed, arrogant, mostly for the clicks, and for elevating oneself by scoring easy points against low hanging fruits.
But that aside. Maybe I shouldn't associate Fricker's channel with what the company is now, I thought. And he wasn't even the only person running it previously.
On to testing. If the plugin is good, it's good. So I sidechained the VST.
Unfortunately was very unimpressed. Played around with the deeper settings too, aside from the basic knob... and.. nah... choppy, glitchy, no matter what I did. For the life of me, could not find a proper balance with this gate. I don't know if the physical pedal (there is or was an equivalent) is any better. Maybe it is. I'm used to the sentry, isp decimator and fractal gates. These are what my expectations are built on.
That said, bear in mind that I'm new to gates in plugin form, so there's some elevated chance I did something wrong. I just doubt it. Checked that the sidechain worked properly, etc, and I'm not a total noob for setting up gates in general. Additionally, I compared against the internal tonex gate and don't feel the cockblocker was an upgrade.
My usage goal for such a gate is an improvement over the tonex gate. I find myself using the tonex plugin more and more lately, and a great gate makes a meaningful difference in my recordings. There's been times I've used no gate at all, but it just improves my tracks when I do.
Then I thought.. there must be better options than the cockblocker. Maybe they cost more, but this is important for me.
So after the "maturely" named cockblocker, I got the Sir standardGATE. They offer a package of 3 plugins for 50 euros for black Friday. I have used the Sir audio standardCLIP for few years with great results, so I was curious about their gate plugin. Don't think I had tried this before.
So I sidechained the standardGATE. Juggled a little bit with the settings, like I typically expect to do for metal tones. Result?
Oh man. Now that's legit. I even dialed in some absurdly high gain tones I'd never use, for shits and giggles, and got very usable results. No weird glitchiness, easy to tweak and find a good balance, just great all around. I can get pretty much exactly what I want from a gate. The UI isn't flashy, but it's simple to wrap my head around, and there's much else it can achieve too if you go digging.
So my plugin noise gate search is over. Don't see need for better (if it even exists).
I asked for a refund for the cockblocker. They offer no trial version, but refunds within 14 days are given "for any reason". Maybe I'm wrong about all this and did use the gate wrongly nonetheless -- but what I do know for sure is the Sir standardGATE, in comparison, works wonders for me. No contest ime.
Last edited:
