Oeksound Soothe 3

How much more soothing can Oeksound’s Soothe get? Quite a lot, as it turns out...

Since plug‑ins started to become popular, some 30 years ago, many new types of processor have been introduced. A few have become universally successful, the most obvious example being real‑time automated pitch correction. But many of these new ways of modifying recorded sound have remained niche products. Plug‑ins that have become universal ‘must haves’ don’t often do something fundamentally new or original: rather, they offer a faster or better‑sounding or more versatile way to implement existing concepts. Think, for example, of Soundtoys’ EchoBoy, or FabFilter’s Pro‑Q.

Then, back in the mid‑2010s, a group of Finnish developers identified a problem that hadn’t previously been solved and developed a tool to address it. Ten years later, that tool is well on the way to the ubiquity enjoyed by plug‑ins like Antares’ Auto‑Tune. Other companies have since released alternative implementations of the same idea, and it was arguably anticipated in some respects by products like Paul Frindle’s Dynamic Spectrum Mapper, but Oeksound’s Soothe is by far the most widely used processor of its kind.

Mellow Gold

The original raison d’être of the plug‑in is summed up well by its name. Soothe (reviewed in SOS June 2018) was initially launched as a tool for addressing harshness in recorded audio, and much of its success is down to the fact that the default preset worked remarkably well at doing exactly that, across a wide range of material.

Like many subjective qualities, harshness is hard to define clearly, or even to agree on, but Oeksound’s insight was to identify it with an excess of temporary resonances. For instance, when a vocalist belts out a high note, overtones of that note can become too strong, an issue which is only made worse by inappropriate mic choice or a compromised signal chain. But the key point is that these overtones are specific to the note in question. Other notes will produce different overtones, and quieter passages may well be completely problem‑free. Consequently, straightforward EQ is not usually a satisfactory solution. The overtones are too narrow to target effectively, they aren’t always present, and they aren’t always at the same frequencies.

So, although it presents an EQ‑like interface, Soothe is not an equaliser. The filter, bell and shelving curves set up by the user don’t affect the sound directly; rather, they weight the plug‑in’s algorithm to focus more or less on different frequency regions in its hunt for annoying resonances. The algorithm acts dynamically, so it’s continually identifying the resonances as they come and go, and automatically applies attenuation only when they occur. Soothe’s Depth control determines how aggressively this is done, while the Selectivity and Sharpness settings let you choose whether the attenuation should be broad and smooth, or surgically targeted.

Released in 2020, version 2 of Soothe greatly expanded the feature set. The original ‘hard’ algorithm was joined by a new ‘soft’ variant, which is typically more transparent in use. Compressor‑style attack and release controls were added, along with the option to use an external side‑chain input to trigger the processing. Soothe 2 (reviewed in SOS Feb 2020) added new powers to handle mud and congestion in low frequencies. And, in the background, the entire codebase had been rewritten, reducing latency by around 50 percent and making possible the development of a Live version targeted at front‑of‑house mixing.

Attention To Detail

Soothe 2 felt like a pretty complete tool, and you could be forgiven for wondering whether Oeksound had left much room for further improvement. Following its release, they went away and developed the superb Bloom, another dynamic tone‑altering plug‑in that complements Soothe without encroaching on the same applications. But now, in time for the 10th anniversary of Soothe’s launch, they’ve introduced another major update to their flagship product.

Like version 2, Soothe 3 is not backwards‑compatible, so any existing projects that you load will open with Soothe 2 active unless you manually replace it. The interface is now fully scalable, rather than just offering a choice of fixed sizes, and is rendered in a warmer and more friendly palette of blues. Everything is pretty much where it was before, but nothing is exactly the same! In use, perhaps the most immediately obvious change is that the Selectivity and Sharpness controls have disappeared. In their place is a single knob labelled Detail. The division of labour between the two was never very clear, and the new arrangement is both quicker and more intuitive to use. In fact, I’d actually forgotten that there used to be two controls until I opened up an old project with Soothe 2 active; and if there’s anything you could do with both that can’t be done with the new Detail control, I haven’t found it yet.

There are also major improvements to the EQ‑style interface. Soothe 2 presented six bands, all active by default, and although these were colour‑coded, they were otherwise not easily differentiated visually. Soothe 3’s default preset includes only high‑ and low‑pass filters, now immediately identifiable by their lozenge‑shaped icons, and a single bell band. Additional bands can be added by double‑clicking, up to a total of eight, and there are several new types available including band‑pass and tilt.

Soothe 2 introduced the option of working in Mid‑Sides mode as well as left‑right stereo, and channel balance is an area that has received a lot of attention in Soothe 3. Each band can be individually weighted anywhere between 100 percent left and 100 percent right, or Mid and Sides respectively if the plug‑in is operating in that mode. This is done using a new ‘focus’ setting which is operated in an intuitive click‑and‑drag fashion. Better still, this extends to surround too, with similar linking and weighting options available in multi‑channel configurations up to 9.1.6.

Across The Board

The other major addition is a new set of controls labelled Tilt. Again operated in a very immediate way by clicking and dragging, this in effect allows the Detail level and the attack and release times to be varied with frequency. For example, it’s relatively common practice with multiband dynamics processors to use shorter attack and release times at higher frequencies, where fast transients live, and slower time constants in the bass, where overly rapid adjustments can lead to distortion. The Tilt settings allow you to do the same with Soothe.

As well as the Depth control, Soothe has always offered a wet/dry mix option, which provides a slightly different way of varying the overall amount of processing. This is now joined by a Wet Trim setting, which does what you’d expect, but perhaps my favourite feature in Soothe 3 — in fact, definitely my favourite feature in Soothe 3 — is the new Max Cut parameter. Unlike most of Soothe’s parameters, this is scaled in real‑world units (decibels), and allows you to impose a hard limit on the amount of attenuation that is applied at any given frequency.

The new Max Cut parameter imposes a hard limit on how much attenuation Soothe can apply at any given frequency.

The Max Cut setting might not sound like a radical development, but it actually opens up all sorts of new possibilities.

The Max Cut setting might not sound like a radical development, but it actually opens up all sorts of new possibilities. When Soothe is being used as a corrective tool, it makes it a lot easier to find settings that work effectively on the quiet bits without going too far on the loud bits. In a situation where you’re triggering Soothe from an external key input to open up space for a vocal in a wall of guitars, things become much more controllable. And, for me, it was the key to a new range of applications that might be called creative rather than corrective. Especially on drums, I have now started to use Soothe almost as an alternative to EQ; by dialling in aggressive settings but limiting the amount of gain reduction, you can effectively change the timbre of stick hits on hi‑hats, for example. (It would be even better if Max Cut could also be tilted across the frequency spectrum, perhaps my one tiny wish for Soothe 4!)

Under The Hood

The power behind the throne here comes from changes Oeksound have made to the actual algorithms. Improvements have been made to both soft and hard modes, and Oeksound say that there has been particular focus on making the algorithms contextually ‘aware’ of the overall tonality of the source. This, in turn, means that when you push Soothe 3 hard, it behaves differently from previous versions. I’m not sure that ‘transparent’ is quite the right word to describe this, but it certainly allows you to go further in changing the timbre without telltale side‑effects becoming apparent. And at the same time, the new band‑pass band type makes it much easier to limit Soothe’s processing to a specific frequency region when you do want to do something surgical.

I’ve used Soothe 2 intensively ever since it was released, and if you’d asked me what features should be added in a version 3, I’d probably have scratched my head and struggled to answer. So full marks to Oeksound for coming up with a comprehensive update that not only makes it better at its core job, but also enables new applications. Previous versions of Soothe were invaluable tools for fixing badly recorded audio. Soothe 3 improves upon its predecessors in that role, but is also a genuine alternative to tools such as broad‑brush EQ and multiband compression for creative manipulation. And thanks to the merging of the Selectivity and Sharpness controls, it’s actually easier to use than Soothe 2, despite being more versatile. I think every existing owner will want to upgrade, especially given the very fair cost of doing so. And if you’re not already a Soothe user, now is definitely the time to take a second look at this uniquely capable plug‑in.