Hello there and welcome back to another cool plugin review article for you! This time, we will have a look at an outstanding reverb plugin, Eventide Blackhole reverb. In this Eventide Blackhole review, I will introduce one of the greatest audio technology companies, Eventide and provide you with details for this sweet and progressive reverb plugin that is packed with features as well as a demo video, showing you the best presets.
Table of Contents
Eventide Company
For those who have never heard of the Eventide Audio company, here’s a quick introduction. Eventide was founded by Stephen Katz, Richard Factor and Orville Greene back in 1971. They first started as a partner to Sound Exchange studio in New York. Since then, they have become an industry standard brand in audio technology and already revolutionised the audio & music industry with their groundbreaking products. Eventide is one of the pioneers of audio effects and unique algorithms that not many audio technology companies can even come close to! Thomann's 70th Anniversary Offers
As you may already know, back in the day the effects or FX boxes did not exist as plugins. Luckily, this great company has been releasing their world-renowned effect algorithms to the masses in various plugin formats! Even though Eventide still ships their legendary, professional effects in rack format and in more compact pedal size, they have also made sure that people who prefer using plugins can benefit from their effects arsenal.
Eventide Blackhole Reverb
Eventide released their H9 Harmonizer effects processor which was one of the most compact formats ever back in 2013. Later on, they also released their world-renowned algorithms in this pedal as plugins. Eventide Blackhole Reverb belongs to this family and is one of the most popular reverb algorithms ever on the market.
With traditional reverbs, you expect an emulation of halls, cathedrals and some room reverbs, however, with Eventide Blackhole you have all the ethereal and extraterrestrial spaces. There’s a reason why it’s called Blackhole! Day-tripping is guaranteed! 🙂
With larger-sized reverb settings, soft attack and slow decay, reverb tails with enriched harmonics really fit excellent on guitars, strings and pads. With smaller-sized reverb settings, those reverb characteristics can add this angelic voicing to your vocals or completely revolutionise your drum tracks.
Extreme to Subtle
Even though once you start playing with presets, your first impression will be probably a sensation coming out of this world, Blackhole is also capable of way more subtle effects for enhancing instruments and adding that missing touch to your mixes.
With every H9 series plugin, you will have extreme control over the effects parameter and will be able to adjust anything on the go without getting lost in the manual.
Eventide Blackhole Reverb was first released as an algorithm in their groundbreaking DPS4000 processor. In time, Eventide improved and refined this algorithm and eventually we have this outstanding ambient effect for guitarists and keyboard players.
Eventide Blackhole Features
Eventide Blackhole is also packed with features like any H9 series plugins out there. It’s very easy to use and comes with 50 presets created by Eventide artists. Creating spatial effects and drones is also very easy with the help of supernatural settings. You can also easily create track-highlighting effects for key instruments and tracks with subtle settings as well.
With Gravity control, you can reverse the time by inverting the reverb’s decay parameter. Blackhole also features a Killswitch function that allows you to mute the input so you can only hear the reverb. By using this feature with automation, you can have outstanding effects at a single click or a footswitch when assigned to a MIDI controller. Check out the best guitar pickup company, Seymour Duncan here!
As with all Eventide H9 plugins, it comes with a Mix Lock feature which is one of my favourite features that allows you to lock the wet/dry ratio so that when you switch preset, you will always have the same wet/dry ratio.
Not to mention, innovative Ribbon and Hot Switch controls for changing any single or combined parameter by simply assigning them to these controllers and controlling them with ease!
How to use Eventide Blackhole Reverb?
As with any plugins that you can use in your DAW, using Eventide Blackhole Reverb is extremely easy! You can use it as an insert or send effect and adjust the wet/dry ratio to your taste. But my preferred way to use most of the time-based plugins is using them as send effects.
Basically, you need a separate send effect channel or just simply a channel in Reaper or your preferred DAW. Then you add your effect to this channel as shown below. Next, you want to disable the record for this channel. Lastly, you need to send your guitar or instrument channel to this track.
With this method, when I play the guitar through my KRK Rokit 4 G5 monitors, I don’t need to get my guitar signal to be processed and sent back to me. In fact, I hear my guitar with zero latency dry plus I add the effects on top of it by dialling the volume on the mixer. As you can see Eventide Blackhole mix parameter is set to 100%, meaning that this channel will only generate a 100% wet signal.
To summarize, here’s the signal chain:
Fender Stratocaster – ENGL E570 – ENGL Cabloader – RME Babyface PRO – KRK Rokit 5 G4 (100% Dry) + KRK Rokit 5 G4 (100% Wet)
So with this setup, if you record-enable your guitar track and start recording, you will hear the effects while recording but the wet signal won’t be recorded. Once you are done and playing the track, you will hear both and you can adjust the balance between wet and dry signals. Martinic Plugins - Precisely Modeled Vintage Instruments and FX Plugins
If you have difficulties understanding this concept, please contact me and I will be more than happy to help! 🙂
Eventide Blackhole Review & Sound Demo (no talking)
Here’s an Eventide Blackhole preset walkthrough demo featuring my Fender American Standard Stratocaster, ENGL E570, ENGL Cabloader and RME Babyface PRO. I have tried to include most of the presets that go pretty well out of the box with guitars, rather than trying to squeeze every presets in the video.
As you can see and hear, Eventide Blackhole Reverb is packed with day trip algorithms! Out of the box, it provides so much inspiration and you will highly likely find yourself playing and focusing on simple things that matter. I went through all the presets and tried to pick up the ones quickly and played random stuff that came to my mind. It was like a meditation session! Some of the presets are so deep-sounding that you just want to ring a note and listen to the magic!
If you just need to have Blackhole Reverb in your effects arsenal and you mostly play in your home studio, it’s better to get it as a plugin. However, you can always go for the H9 Harmonizer effects processor that includes all H9 series plugins with the same extreme flexibility and control! You also have the option to buy the stompbox version of Eventide Blackhole. Music Plugin Deals at Pluginboutique.com
So basically you have a single plugin, a single stompbox or multi-effects unit options which is really cool as you are not forced to go for one option.
I hope you enjoyed this brief article and demo video of Eventide Blackhole Reverb. Thanks for visiting my blog and supporting me so far! I will hopefully see you in the next review here!
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