LIRA-8, Deess-ertic Lite, Echodude BBD-150: Free Plugins of the Week
LIRA-8, Deess-ertic Lite, Echodude BBD-150: Free Plugins of the Week · Source: Mike Moreno DSP, Garuc Audio, Overload Audio
LIRA-8 brings the mighty SOMA Lyra-8 drone synth to your DAW as a free plugin! This week’s round-up also features a free de-esser plugin and a classic BBD delay.
Free Plugins of the Week
Mike Moreno DSP LIRA-8: Free Emulation of the SOMA Lyra-8
SOMA Laboratories’ Lyra-8 is one of the most exciting and inspiring analog drone synthesizers available today – and now you can add it to your DAW for free! While the developer doesn’t claim that LIRA-8 is a 100% accurate emulation of the original, it does mirror the capabilities and signal flow of the hardware – and if you ask me, the sound is pretty much spot-on, as well.
Like the original, LIRA-8 offers eight oscillators/voices, each of which can be tuned individually. The voices are arranged in pairs, with the waveform (continuously variable from triangle to square) and FM being adjustable per voice pair. The sound-defining dual delay and distortion effects of the original are of course also there, as is the so-called Hyper LFO for modulating the voices and the delay.
The Lyra-8 has two metal sensors per voice. In the plugin, you can either click the voice checkboxes to hold the notes, or trigger the voices using MIDI notes.
If you’ve always wanted to play around with the Lyra-8 but couldn’t justify the price of the hardware, LIRA-8 is a great free alternative to get your feet wet!
The plugin runs on macOS, Windows, and Linux in VST, VST3, AU, and LV2 formats. Apple Silicon processors are not currently supported.
And just in case you like the sound so much that you decide to invest in the hardware version, the SOMA Laboratories Lyra-8 is available from Thomann*.
Garuc Audio Deess-ertic Lite: Free De-Esser Plugin for your DAW
Deess-ertic Lite by Garuc Audio is a free de-esser plugin that detects and reduces excessive sibilance like “s”, “sh”, or “t” sounds in your recordings. The developer says that it offers excellent transparency and quality thanks to 64-bit floating-point processing, controlling sibilance while preserving the character and energy of your tracks. Use it on vocal recordings, podcasts, or voiceovers!
The controls are fairly standard: Deess-ertic Lite offers input and output level controls and meters, as well as a Frequency knob for dialing in the desired frequency. The big Process knob controls the intensity of the effect, i.e. the amount of reduction. There’s also a Dry/Wet knob. Using the buttons at the bottom, you can listen in on the detector, monitor what’s being removed (Delta), and activate the Auto RMS and Auto Peak gain compensation functions.
Deess-ertic Lite is available for macOS and Windows in VST3, AU, and AAX formats.
Overload Audio Echodude BBD-150: Vintage BBD Delay as a Free Plugin
Analog BBD (bucket brigade) delays may not be as universally cherished as tape delays, but their characteristic sound and artefacts are just as interesting and unique, in my opinion. Echodude BBD-150 by Overload Audio seeks to capture this sound in a free plugin. The developer says that it’s modeled on the Echoman EM-150 and Melos DE-1 – two classic BBD delays of the ‘80s.
According to Overload Audio, the plugin faithfully recreates the behavior, frequency shaping, and saturation response of the original units, including their characteristic input drive and feedback response. This lets you create anything from clean repeats to the saturated, self-oscillating sounds BBD delays are most loved for.
Echodude BBD-150 is available for macOS and Windows in VST3 and AU formats.
Check out our huge archive to discover many more free plugins like LIRA-8, Deess-ertic Lite, and Echodude BBD-150!
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