PsuedoStereo releases Classic OLD 2M, a freeware vintage compressor plugin for Windows and macOS.
Vintage compressors have a certain gravitas. The pioneers of early dynamics processors at Abbey Road and Chandler Limited get special props for their work in the field.
Chandler, in particular, is one manufacturer that is often imitated but never fully surpassed. PsuedoStereo, or developer Yuri Semenov, has taken a crack at a classic Chandler compressor and debuted the free Compressor Classic OLD 2M.
OLD 2M is based on the Chandler Limited TG1, itself a recreation of the EMI TG12413, which was inspired by the Fairchild 660 and 670. A lot of things to get inspired by, right?
OLD 2M has a fairly familiar interface and bears the legacy of Chandler’s design ethos quite well. Users familiar with the Abbey Road channel strip from Waves or the Chandler Limiter from Softube should feel right at home. Thankfully, this one is a good bit less expensive than the Chandler set from Softube.
Compression is done via stereo or dual mono, which can be further manipulated to mid and side bands. There are only two options present for the compression itself, one being Comp and the other Limiter.
Comp is more gradual, more akin to a varimu at lower input gain. Limiter is closer to a classic limiter, around 6:1 to 10:1 by my ear. It is a grabbier setting and quite readily snags the transients in your material.
Also of note is the patchbay readily accessed by the PB button on the interface. This allows you to route the left and right channels freely between the compressor and output stages as you wish.
The controls aside from the patchbay are fairly lean, with a sidechain high pass filter being present in addition to a release stage for the compression envelope. The attack is fixed in value but is good for most uses.
I find this works quite well on the mix bus as well as instrument groups and is well worth a look for those wanting to add a little retro flavor to their productions. For the low price of free, who can argue against that?
Compressor Classic OLD 2M is available for Windows and Mac computers. Supported plugin formats are VST, VST3, and AU.
If you like vintage compressors, check out our free BPB Dirty LA plugin, too!
Download: Compressor Classic OLD 2M (read YouTube description to get the link)
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