Eventide Audio has introduced its new Riptide pedal, the result of extensive research into the iconic Shin-ei Uni-Vibe and legendary overdrives. The Uni-Vibe delivered swirling vibey waves of lush modulation recognizable on tracks by Jimi Hendrix, David Gilmour and Robin Trower. Overdrive is the classic distortion technique originally discovered by guitarists cranking their amps to the max and driving the vacuum tubes into heavy saturation. These two classic effects are offered with the Riptide pedal as “Vibe” and “Drive.”

Riptide features two distinct voicings each for both Vibe and Drive, delivered in glorious stereo. The two colors of balanced, touch-sensitive overdrive distortion are Green for a dynamic mid-range crunch and Red for a smooth and boosted overdrive sound. The Green for Vibe captures the richness and modulation of the original Uni-Vibe – enhanced by stereo output – while Red offers a deeper, phase-y effect. Players can effortlessly reorder the process from Drive into Vibe or Vibe into Drive, and any combination of parameters can be mapped to an expression pedal.

Three knobs for Drive, three for Vibe, and a pair of dual-action latching or momentary footswitches provide players effect control, with five onboard presets and more available using Eventide Device Manager (EDM) software. A triple Aux switch can be used for easy preset selection or a single Aux switch for Tap Tempo. Riptide’s Catch-up mode lets you dial in your sound when toggling between presets/parameters. The pedal offers multiple bypass options – Buffered, Relay, DSP+FX or Kill dry. It also provides MIDI support over USB.

The new Eventide Riptide pedal will start hitting stores around late November, 2023.

In 1973, Eventide Clockworks introduced the Omnipressor^®, the first studio product to encourage the use of dynamics for special effects. It joined the Instant Phaser^® in studios worldwide, with the Instant Flanger^® following shortly after. All were used on countless recordings and are now considered truly classic products. Unlike the Phaser and Flanger, the Omnipressor, with its still-unique dynamic reversal, infinite compression, variable gating and separate “side chain,” was discontinued a few years later. It had become difficult to obtain some exclusive parts and even more difficult to explain it to an industry that was much less sophisticated than it is today.

Mistake! As the few hundred original Omnipressor units found homes with rabid fans or suffered unspeakable fates at the hands of entropy, they became so scarce that the few that were available on resale markets multiplied in value many times, if they could be found at all.

The original Omnipressor was born from an idea that Eventide’s founder, Richard Factor, got while talking to Mark Weiss, one of the scientists investigating the “18-minute gap” of the Nixon Watergate scandal. The side-chain idea that resulted enabled feats of compression that was impossible (and unstable) with the compression architecture of the previous era, but doable with the emerging, more modern hardware of the 1970s. The earlier “white face” (Model 2826) Omnipressor was not just hard to explain, but it was hard to use, and it yielded shortly to the “black face” (Model 2830) unit designed by Jon Paul, another ex-colleague of Mark Weiss. This version, after selling another few hundred units, in its turn yielded to the darkness of commercial necessity – what we now call “supply chain” – and so became a legend to collectors and a desideratum to recordists worldwide.

In those few years of production, the model 2830 was a success. Engineers and producers discovered what was possible by using dynamics as an effect. Many of the original units are still in operation today. They rarely come up for sale; when they do sellers are asking north of $6000! A clamor from those coveting the unique Omnipressor dynamic effects resulted first in Factor developing a hardware emulation using VSIG for the Eventide Orville, and later Eventide’s development team creating an Omnipressor plug-in for ProTools. Fatefully, in an episode of the Gear Club podcast, Factor impulsively suggested that Eventide would reintroduce the rack mount classic.

Today, Eventide announces the golden-anniversary Omnipressor Model 2830*Au. The original hand-drawn schematics were in the Eventide archives, and the new model is a faithful replica designed with the same circuitry and the same sound as the original 2830. With supply chain issues resolved after 50 years, you can now find the 2830*Au for sale and priced about the same as the original, even though in 2023 dollars.

The new *Au model features the ability to link multiple units and is fitted with input and output audio transformers, which were a costly option on the original. Other improvements include a universal power supply and a back-lit meter. More convenient TRS/XLR connectors replace the original terminal strip.

The MSRP for the Omnipressor Model 2830*Au is $1999, and it will ship in January 2024. Pre-orders are available now.

Eventide Audio is charting new spatial territory with the introduction of immersive audio versions of two distinctly Eventide plug-ins: Blackhole^® Immersive and Micropitch Immersive. Debuted during the AES NY 2023 Convention (booth 622), the two plug-ins are designed from the ground up for surround and immersive workflows, including Dolby Atmos^®. Blackhole Immersive expands the signature sound of the stereo version of Eventide’s otherworldly reverb across an entire immersive mix. Eventide’s iconic MicroPitch panned pitch and delay effect is relied upon by legions of engineers for the creation of beautiful and wide stereo soundfields. Now, with MicroPitch Immersive, the proven power of strategically decorrelated sound is pushed into three dimensions.

The clean and intuitive interface of the Eventide Immersive plug-ins seamlessly fits into production, whether the project is mixing music, post-production for film, or sound design for games. With Blackhole Immersive, the enhanced workflow gives full control over the reverb across channels, for an evolving immersive experience – from subtle to radical. MicroPitch Immersive users can spread, tilt and dynamically morph the effect across the width, depth and height of an immersive mix. With both plug-ins, the Front, Top and Rear speakers can be EQ’d separately, and users can smoothly morph between two distinct settings – ideal for sound design.

“Blackhole Immersive,” says engineer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Scott Michael Smith (The Walking Dead, The Handmaid’s Tale, The Revenant), “provides a way to design infinitely vast soundscapes while maintaining precise multichannel control. Instantly musical and absolutely gorgeous sounding. I love this plug-in!”

Used as a send or insert, Blackhole Immersive remains respectful yet reactive to track positioning. Blackhole Immersive’s Gravity, Size and Feedback parameters allow fast, easy tailoring of the reverb to an immersive space while the crossfeed control lets users blend the reverb between speakers – a mono source can become truly immersive with one simple gesture. “Blackhole Immersive takes my favorite reverb ever and makes it even more vast and otherworldly,” says composer/producer Matt Lange. “An absolute must-have for immersive mixing and production.”

“MicroPitch Immersive,” says producer/engineer Andrew Scheps (Red Hot Chili Peppers, Adele, Jay-Z), “is an invaluable tool for spreading sources around in ways from subtle to in your face. You might think it isn’t doing much until you turn it off; then you get sad.”

With up to 12 channels of spatialized, detuned delays, plus modulation, EQ and crossfeed controls, MicroPitch Immersive excels in creating both real and unreal immersive realities with boundaries that reflect, move, diffuse and dissolve. Tilting the Left/Right, Front/Back and Top/Main Detune parameters allow quick and easy asymmetrical detuning and space fine tuning. The plug-in’s enhanced delay and modulation capability can be used to create slapbacks, add movement with pitch modulation, or create exciting motion with patterned Loop Delay.

Ocicat Ruan of L+R SoundSystem Studio calls MicroPitch Immersive “Fast and powerful! Everything I wanted about delay is in there, and you can use it to recreate spatial depths and tones. The best part is that all of this can be done in seconds!”

Both plug-ins feature an easy-to-use UI optimized for immersive workflows with identical core controls for all channel layouts – no menu diving is required. The plug-ins’ transparent signal processing delivers the same sonic effect across all immersive formats and maintain incoming spatial image integrity. Individual speaker levels can be quickly set using the integrated Levels control section whether mixing in the supported LCR, Quadraphonic, 5.0 – 5.1.4, and 7.0 – 7.1.4 channel layouts. Kill Dry, Kill Wet and Freeze controls allow the creation of drastic effects, while the Mix Lock function allows for scrolling through presets or settings while keeping the wet/dry mix constant. The intuitive, resizable GUI offers Undo/Redo and A/B comparison. Both the plug-ins come with comprehensive presets libraries.

Both plug-ins are available for immediate download at an MSRP of $499. (USD) each. Owners of the stereo versions save 20% of their purchase.

Utilising a unique, interval-based approach to playing and creating melodies, Eventide’s novel Misha instrument/sequencer will be demonstrated by two friends-of-Eventide: MIDI guru Steve De Furia and sound designer Richard Devine. Since its release last summer, dozens of artists have discovered, for the first time, what it’s like to ‘play’ music easily and simply. A Misha software release is now available as a public beta. It includes a requested feature or two as well as fixes.

Misha is being shown at NAMM for the first time, and is designed to be played like a keyboard instrument while making music in a way unlike any other instrument.

Tone Row Sequencer
Inspired by twelve-tone composition, Misha’s sequencer expands upon the tone row technique, allowing for new paths of spontaneous creativity. Modify your sequence using some of the classic techniques such as Prime, Retrograde, or Inverted playback, or completely rearrange your sequence in unpredictable and exciting ways.

100 Scales
Misha comes preloaded with a variety of scales ranging from typical Western scales, microtonal scales, scales that use just intonation, and everything in between. Additionally, two banks of User scales allow you to upload your own scales using the Scala format for further experimentation.

Presets
Load a new sequence, key, scale, and more on the fly using presets. Presets can be accessed from the dedicated preset menu or can be loaded via MIDI Program Changes from external devices, allowing Misha to be an essential piece of gear for live performance.

Compatibility
Integrate Misha into your Eurorack system using the 3 pairs of T/G/CV inputs and outputs, or connect to your DAW or synths and sequencers via MIDI.

MIDI & CV Inputs
MIDI Note/CC maps and 3 pairs of CV inputs can be customised to a wide range of functions such as transposition, translation, randomisation, loading keys and scales, sequencer transport control, and much more.

USB & Keyboard Mapping
Play Misha’s intervals from your favourite MIDI keyboard or device and create a custom MIDI mapping to suite your needs. You can also play Misha using a USB computer keyboard using custom mappings.

Assignable Buttons
Easily assign Misha’s four user buttons to play intervals or other convenient functions such as octave up/down, chromatic steps, and more.

Newfangled Audio has released Invigorate, a bus compressor like no other. Invigorate can smoothly morph from compression, through limiting, to overdrive. This makes it fast and easy to mix in just the right amount of character and make mixes, busses, and tracks sound huge.

Invigorate’s user interface features a unique radar display and intelligent gain compensation engine that makes it easy to hear and see exactly what you’re doing. Three tone controls — Sensitivity, Input Exciter, and Output Tone — give you unprecedented control over the tone of your compressed signal. Invigorate also includes over 200 presets, including some developed by renowned artists, curated for a variety of audio sources, whole mixes, and mastering.

Invigorate is available from Eventide Audio with an introductory sale price of US$49 ($99 MSRP) through January 2, 2023.
Crossgrade discounts are available for owners of other Newfangled Audio products.

Learn more or request a free 30-day demo here.