Sorry, it's a long one 
Well, it's been a couple of months or so since the initial positively rabid reaction to the release of the Neve 88RS channel strip :lol: I was admittedly as rabid as anyone, and I don't mind admitting it At first, I was impressed by the ease of use, the workflow, the fact there was a pretty nice eq and a useful decent compressor for only a couple of % of 3 cards, etc etc. I did notice that it had a slight effect on the sound, and did null tests and so on to verify this, blah blah. Mainly it was the overall usefulness of it that sold me.
However, now I have been using it a while it's suddenly become really obvious to me what an extremely positive effect it has had on my overall sound. I'm working on an album (breakbeat/dnb/old crusty samples, not aggressive synths!) and got the 88 a few tunes into making it. I've managed to finish a few more tunes since then (finally :roll: ) and mix a couple of much older tunes again to update them. What's come to light is a certain magic 'something' where I can actually explicitly hear whether or not I have used the 88, and if I have, that I have used the right amount of them in a tune. It has a tiny little effect that adds up to a big effect. It just gives a feeling of pure class, there's no getting away from it. The mixes I did before still sound great, but are just missing 'that' sound. I'm going to go back and simply drop a few 88's doing nothing in the right places, to bring them into line without changing the mix, and I just know it will work.
There's a few adjectives that spring to mind - fat, creamy, smooth, blah blah... but it's just BIG, it really is. I've worked on some pretty good desks, but the majority of my outboard experience is with a d8b, and I'd take the 88RS over the d8b's channels+inserts every time, no question. It's blown me away all over again without me even realising it. It's the kind of subtly cumulative effect you don't notice until you listen to the mixes you did right before you got it and think 'what's missing?'.
I probably could have put this in an old thread, but I wanted more to focus on what people who have been battering it for a while thought.
Anyone else have feelings like this about the 88RS?
Well, it's been a couple of months or so since the initial positively rabid reaction to the release of the Neve 88RS channel strip :lol: I was admittedly as rabid as anyone, and I don't mind admitting it
At first, I was impressed by the ease of use, the workflow, the fact there was a pretty nice eq and a useful decent compressor for only a couple of % of 3 cards, etc etc. I did notice that it had a slight effect on the sound, and did null tests and so on to verify this, blah blah. Mainly it was the overall usefulness of it that sold me.However, now I have been using it a while it's suddenly become really obvious to me what an extremely positive effect it has had on my overall sound. I'm working on an album (breakbeat/dnb/old crusty samples, not aggressive synths!) and got the 88 a few tunes into making it. I've managed to finish a few more tunes since then (finally :roll: ) and mix a couple of much older tunes again to update them. What's come to light is a certain magic 'something' where I can actually explicitly hear whether or not I have used the 88, and if I have, that I have used the right amount of them in a tune. It has a tiny little effect that adds up to a big effect. It just gives a feeling of pure class, there's no getting away from it. The mixes I did before still sound great, but are just missing 'that' sound. I'm going to go back and simply drop a few 88's doing nothing in the right places, to bring them into line without changing the mix, and I just know it will work.
There's a few adjectives that spring to mind - fat, creamy, smooth, blah blah... but it's just BIG, it really is. I've worked on some pretty good desks, but the majority of my outboard experience is with a d8b, and I'd take the 88RS over the d8b's channels+inserts every time, no question. It's blown me away all over again without me even realising it. It's the kind of subtly cumulative effect you don't notice until you listen to the mixes you did right before you got it and think 'what's missing?'.
I probably could have put this in an old thread, but I wanted more to focus on what people who have been battering it for a while thought.
Anyone else have feelings like this about the 88RS?
