Reverb is one of the most used tools in the music world. Regardless of if you work in live sound, production, mixing, mastering, playing live, or any other sub-sector of the music industry - you’re bound to work with reverb... and often! But what is it?

I tend to think of reverb as sound coming from a reflective space, or a long distance. Have you ever noticed that when you’re in a large space like a lobby, or a space without a lot of sound absorbing furniture, like a bathroom, that your voice and footsteps echo? That’s essentially what reverb is. Reverb, short for reverberation, is basically the effect a room or a space has on a sound. It’s a great tool for adding depth and character to a sound, blurring a sound, or adding distance.

In the past, engineers would have house sized reverberation rooms built into their studios so they could re-record a signal and simulate the feeling of a large room in their recordings. This became known as “room reverb”. Later on, engineers created two other reverbs - plate reverb, and spring reverb. Both came from vibrating either a plate or a spring suspended in a box.

How to Use Reverb

Not everyone has access to a house sized reflective space in their studio (in fact, I don’t know of anyone who has access to something like that), so reverb is often added as a plugin. It’s a pretty simple tool to use, but it can be a bit unintuitive if you don’t know what all the settings affect. Here’s the most basic elements of reverb explained:

Dry/Wet

The Dry/Wet setting on a reverb determines the ratio between the original signal, and the processed signal. Dry means the original sound, and wet means the processed sound. For example, if the Dry/Wet knob is set at 30%, that means that 30% of the sound you hear will be the reverb and 70% of the sound will be the original signal. If the knob is at 100%, that means you’re only hearing the reverb.

Decay Time

Decay Time is how long it takes for the reverb to fade out. A four second decay time means that a signal will reverberate and fade out for four seconds.

Predelay

Predelay is a bit tricky. It’s how long it takes for the reverb to kick in. So, if you have this function set at .3ms, you’ll have a space of .3 milliseconds of dry signal before your reverb fades in. Some reverb plugins also have a fade in time that you can adjust.

Early Reflections

Early Reflections is another one of those tricky features. This is basically the initial sound reflections on the wall of a space before everything blurs together into reverb. I would compare early reflections to dropping a coin on a table. The coin bounces once (this is the dry signal), then it bounces a few more times (early reflections) before settling into a spin or more continuous sound (reverb)

Size

The size function in a reverb determines how large the simulated space is. The larger a space, the larger the reverberation sounds. This has a very distinct feel to it. I suggest you try messing around with this setting to get a feel for the difference between a small reverb and a large one!

Now that we know the different elements that control reverb, how do we use it in a musical sense?

Your usage of reverb changes depending on what style of music you’re creating. If you play in a rock band, you’ll most likely use short, dry reverb to provide a slight character to your guitar tone. On the other hand, if you’re a more ambient artist, you’ll probably us a longer, wetter reverb to blur out your sound and create a lush soundscape. Reverb is applicable to just about every instrument and voice.

Reverb can also be used to create distance. Most mixes have two dimensions. Pan - which is the direction a sound exists (left, center, or right), and distance - which is usually determined with reverb. The wetter and longer the decay time a sound has, the farther away it feels.

Reverb has a lot of uses. I suggest you experiment with it to see what resonates with you best!

... get it? *resonates* anyways... moving on

Reverb Plugins: My Suggestions

There’s three reverbs I find myself continually going back to in my productions. They each accomplish very different things, and they do those things very well. Let’s go through the three verbs I use on every project!

The Utilitarian Verb: Neoverb

Neoverb is a smart reverb created by Izotope. The plugin will analyze the signal it’s receiving and suggest a recommended reverb algorithm, which is usually a blend between a room, plate, and spring reverb. This is a great reverb for adding character, vibe, or distance to a sound. It sounds and feels very natural, and the whole fact that the plugin does the work for me by creating a suggestion, is great! Izotope has this reverb available for purchase for $249, or you can subscribe to their Music Production Suite membership for only $20/mo.

The Moody One: Valhalla Vintage Verb

Vintage Verb is the plugin I use when I want to drown a sound in reverb or create really big feeling spaces. There’s a ton of presets on this reverb, but honestly, I tend to use the default preset that loads with the plugin. It’s quite dark in character and works in almost every use case. Priced at $50, it’s an incredibly affordable tool.

The Legendary One: LiquidSonics Seventh Heaven Professional

Seventh Heaven Professional reverb is modeled after the Bricasti M7 Reverb. It’s incredible. The M7 Reverb was created to model the way sound interacts in nature. It’s a simple reverb that has an extremely wide range of uses. It’s very dense and detailed, but adds a sense of air to a sound, which gives it a sense of place without sounding splashy or gritty. The Liquid Sonics Seventh Heaven Professional reverb models this sound exquisitely and captures all the delicate nuances of it’s Bricasti parent. This is definitely one reverb you want to have in your arsenal as a music creator! This reverb is available for $179 on the LiquidSonics website

The One Stop Shop: Fabfilter Pro-R

This is the reverb that does everything! It’s my go to reverb when I really need to shape a sound and get detailed with my reverbs. It’s also by far one of the easiest interfaces to use. If you’re going to purchase just one reverb, this is the one I suggest! It does it all! This reverb is $199 at fabfilter’s website.

And there you have it, folks! I hope this helps - and as you know, I’m always here to support in any way!

Spike

What Is Reverb & What Are The Best Reverb Plugins?