ReFill Review: A Massive Reason
Mike McKew is an audio engineer and producer from the Washington DC area. As a musician for over 10 years, he has gained valuable insight into many aspects into audio, with a particular affinity for Reason. Here’s his review of SoftPhonics’ first VST ReFill, “A Massive Reason”.
When VSTs were introduced into Reason in version 9.5, there was quite a lot of excitement, but also some underlying apprehension. What would happen to Rack Extensions? Would ReFills still be a viable format? Well, as evidenced by this article, it seems that Rack Extensions are doing just fine – in fact, they are more popular than ever!
But what about ReFills? Wouldn’t there be enough sounds available with all of the VST synths out there? Enter Softphonics, who have proven time and time again that no, there are not enough sounds out there with their amazing ReFills.
A Massive Reason is a marriage of two titans. As the first ever ReFill based off a VST, it proves that not only are ReFills alive and well, but that there is now more space than ever to expand into. Massive is an amazing synth by itself, but combined with the flexibility of Reason’s rack and routing possibilities, it gets taken to a new level. And this is just the beginning.
Massive by Native Instruments is a mainstay in the world of synthesis that was first released in 2007. It is a wavetable synthesizer with very flexible modulation routing that utilizes three oscillators, two filters, and four envelopes, along with many other parameters. It has long been considered one of the highest quality soft synthesizers on the market.
And I’m not going to beat around the bush… this ReFill sounds amazing, and it can’t be beat for the price.
A Massive Reason requires Reason 9.5 or above and Massive 1.3 or above. It features 115 Combinator patches in 6 categories: Bass, FX, Key, Pad, Sequenced, and Synth. All the patches load with a sleek red skin on the Combinator, and each offers a lot of flexibility with programmed rotary knobs and buttons. Of course, each patch uses one or more instance of Massive along with various stock Reason devices. Using over 200 custom Massive patches has given this ReFill an amazing amount of depth.
A marriage of two titans
The first thing that struck me about the patches was just how deep and complex they were. As mentioned, each patch takes full advantage of the routing possibilities within a Combinator, with each rotary and button programed to control various parameters. Everything is clearly labeled and organized.
The sounds themselves are extremely varied and each one sounds amazing and unique. You’ve got fat basses, lush pads, screaming leads, and everything in between. Many sounds evolve over time, so it’s always worth holding them out to see what comes out of them. Further, many sounds are altered dramatically by turning the knobs on the Combinator. Particularly if there are two instances of Massive blended together to create the patch, there is often a “Crossfade” knob that allows you to fade between the two sounds.
The most important thing this ReFill makes easy is music-making. And that’s the whole point, isn’t it? Seriously, it really is so easy to just grab a few patches, find a suitable loop, and you’re most of the way there. As someone who has only scraped the surface of sound design and synthesis, having patches like these at my disposal save me a lot of time and energy. It also saves effort later on, because I found that these patches fit perfectly into a mix without any additional processing. Certainly there may be cases where EQ or compression is still needed, but the extremely high quality of the sounds is evident when mixing.
Enough jabber, let’s hear some sounds! I picked my three favorite patches from each of the six categories, for 18 sounds total. There is no additional processing at all – the sounds were bounced in place from MIDI, then bounced to disk as WAV, and finally converted to 320kbps MP3 for embedding on this page. Enjoy!
Bass
FX
Key
Pad
Sequenced
Synth
I hope everyone who owns Massive will take a look at this ReFill, because it is truly extraordinary. You won’t be disappointed with the plethora of sounds available! If you like this ReFill, head over to www.softphonics.com to take a look at their other products. Also, keep an eye out for upcoming ReFills and Rack Extensions from Softphonics – they’re sure to be impressive!
SoftPhonics’ Website: http://www.softphonics.com
A Massive Reason in the Prop Shop: https://shop.propellerheads.se/product/a-massive-reason/
Check Mike’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/MikeMcKew
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