The world of rock music has changed more since 2013 to now than I can ever remember before. In 2013, we saw a rise of the 80s synth-pop music and over the last couple of years, we’ve seen a huge push towards hip-hop and electronic production in rock.
With this push towards music production, we’re also seeing a rise of VSTs being used in indie rock music. I personally think this is an exciting time as there really is so much that you can do with VSTs. Today, you can find almost a VST effect or instrument for literally anything you need for music production.
In 2009, my band and I went into a well-established, local producer and our worlds changed. We learned about VSTs and we started instantly using them all over our music.
The 4 Best VSTs For Indie Rock Bands & Producers. The world of rock music has changed more since 2013 to now than I can ever remember before. In 2013, we saw a rise of the 80s synth-pop music.
In fact, the song that launched us was actually written on a piano and was then taken to production land. With our producer, we were able to surf through thousands of different sounds until we found the part we wanted with our MIDI pre-recorded.
We ended up finding some amazing Sylenth presets and tweaking them to our liking.
You can hear the song below.
Now, what is the reason for me to be telling you this? I wanted to start this article with a brief background of why VSTs are important for music production and I also wanted to show you exactly how we use them.
VSTs lead to creativity.
Although primarily used by producers to produce electronic music, VSTs are quickly finding their place in the indie rock scene. In fact, a lot of the biggest indie bands in the world today are experimenting with them.
The reason is simple: They’re easy to use, allow you to explore thousands of sounds & effects at the tip of your fingers. And all these activities lead to an increase in creativity and possibilities over your music.
It’s undeniable that writing music is easier when using VSTs as they allow you to experiment easily. Sure, recording analog sounds can be fun too, but they take up more time.
4 Best VSTs For Indie Rock Music
Don’t know where to start? Here are some of the best VSTs in terms of sound you can start with to add to your rock music arrangement.
CS-80 V By Arturia – Best for vintage arpeggios
The CS-80 V by Arturia is modeled after the iconic Yamaha CS-80 from the 1970s. With the CS-80, a polyphonic synthesizer, the first thing that jumps out to me is the incredible interface. The plugin’s interface mimics that of the original, giving you a really fun nostalgic vibe.
The original synthesizer was huge in size and expensive as well. It quickly became the go-to synthesizer of the 1970s, and because of its sound being incorporate in many hit songs, it has become truly an icon.
Probably one of the most expressive synthesizers made, even bands such as ABBA uses it. To be honest, there aren’t really any bad things I can say about this plugin. And it’s never a bad idea to incorporate some iconic sounds into modern rock music, giving it that twist that you might just need to take your music to the next level.
The Arpeggiator
My band wrote a few of our bigger songs using this arpeggiator and I can’t say enough good things about it. It really brings you back to the late 70s and early 80s.
A lot of modern Arps sound a little stale to my ear and there’s something very analog feeling and modern at the same time with this VST.
The presets are also very wide and full sounding, giving you a taste of what the synth is capable of. And from there, you could continue experimenting and tweaking.
The Low End
The low end on the CS-80 VST is incredible. It’s rich & fat when it needs to be and it’s one of my favorite things about this plugin as well.
Why do I recommend It?
It’s not overused. This is a big problem in modern productions today. For example, so many producers have taken to Splice for pretty much all of their productions and it’s has come to the point where sync companies are specifically saying, “no Splice.”
This is where a synth like the CS-80 can come in as a bit of an untapped goldmine. Sounds that are unique to many new fresh ears.
Jup-8 V By Arturia – Best for strings pads
The Jup-8 V is modeled after the iconic Roland Jupiter 8 and the pads on this plugin are absolutely stunning. In fact, it was this synth that placed the name, Arturia, as a serious Japanese manufacturer for synthesizers in the early 1980s.
If you’re a fan of bands such as Joywave, Passion Pit, Twenty One pilots, then you would definitely like this plugin. The synth is famously known for its lush pads, with its ability to layer sounds. With the VSTs version, the way you can tweak the sound has not only been expanded but you can even program really solid-sounding leads that will catch your listener’s attention.
The unique ‘colorful’ user interface and great sound, made the Jup 8 a hit among musicians and bands. And with the VST, this is an amazing tool to use for indie rock music. A great option to add to your arsenal of sounds.
There are over 500 different presets to pick from and each one of them sounds unique in its own way.
Why do I recommend It?
This is just a solid plugin that works incredibly well for rock bands that like to incorporate the use of pads and strings layers in their music. Download a demo of the Jup-8 V and try it for yourself. This one definitely beats the stock VST pads that come with your DAW.
Signal By Output
Signal is a popular and award-winning plugin that is used in a lot of music today. With this being said, I’ve really liked using it with rock music.
Packed with distinctive and modern sounding instruments, it brings this really fun vibe to rock music and my band has used this over and over.
Signal is an easy to use plugin that pretty much sounds incredible out of the gates. From fat-sounding Arps to ripping bass leads, Signal excels in most aspects of production, especially when it comes to rhythmic sounds. The library is insanely large with over 500 presets, each with their own unique sound.
However, take note that this plugin is that it is very CPU intensive. If you don’t have a capable music production laptop or PC, you may want to hold off on this one.
Why Do I Recommend It?
I recommend this mainly for its sounds. You’re not able to tweak the presets in the interface too much, but you really won’t need to. If you’re into bands like The Killers, this will become one of your favorites.
The downside to that is that its sound can distinguishable. I would recommend using Signal creatively as an additional track on your arrangement or use some effects with it, to create something uniquely yours.
Soundtoys 5 Plugin Bundle – For your mixing needs
It’s never just about instruments when it comes to looking for the best VSTs. You’ll need good sounding VST effects for mixing work as well.
For that, look no further than to get the Soundtoys 5 plugin bundle. They are hands down the most popular plugin bundle when it comes to effects, mixing and vocal processing. You’ll find a use for each plugin effect that comes with the bundle for your mix.
In total, you’ll get 21 plugins in this bundle, with effects for saturation, distortion, echo, delay, chorus and even modulation effects like tremolos and phasing. Some of my favorites are the “Little alterboy,” and the “Decapitator.” This plugin works extremely well for indie rock bands and it is all over the mixes of the band “Sir Sly.”
In my opinion, this is one of the most important plugins that you can have as a producer working with modern indie bands.
Soundtoys is really one of those plugins that you will find yourself going to for pretty much every song you work on.
Why Do I Recommend It?
I recommend this plugin because it’s something that you will use a ton with rock bands and mixing rock music. If you listen to anything on Altnation, you will notice the use of this plugin on pretty much 95 percent of the bands.
The best part, you don’t even need a hardware dongle to use them. Getting losing dongle scares can be the worst thing to happen as you’re touring with your band. With its computer-based authorization, this finally takes the stress away.
Conclusion
Using VSTs for indie rock was at one time looked down on, but I feel like we have moved on from those days. All 4 of these plugins are great for rock music and they also give you more as they will work for other genres as well.
What are other VST instrument or effect plugins that you use for your music? It could be something else other than for rock. Let us know in the comment section below.
About the author
This post is written by Chris Senner, most known for his work as the keyboardist for the band Vinyl Theatre, as well for being the owner of Keyboard Kraze.
Although we have all the tools we need to produce extremely clean and precise music without any unwanted artefacts there’s something about the imperfections of analog recording equipment that triggers certain emotions in us.
So if you want to produce lofi music it’s important to pick the right sounds and samples from the start. You could, for example, sample old vinyl records or buy an old drum machine. It would however be easier to just get your hands on a decent LoFi House or Hip Hop sample pack.
Once you have a selection of cool sounds & samples you can further refine your music to sound like it was recorded a few decades ago. Luckily there are plenty of cool lofi plugins available so you don’t have to actually own an old tape machine. Here are some of the best options:
Free LoFi Plugins
I want to start this list with a bunch of free lofi VSTs, because I know that a lot of producers are one a budget, especially when they’re still going to school (or music is their only income lol). That said, you don’t always have to spend money to get some quality software. The freeware in this list can easily compete with some of the paid stuff I’ll mention later on.
BVKER LoFi Rack
The “LoFi Rack” is a free Ableton Rack based on Live’s stock plugins. It comes with 8 macros allowing you to decrease the band width, add vinyl crackles, detune and distort the source sound. Unfortunately it’s only available for Ableton Live users, so if you’re using another DAW you have to pick some of the other options in this list. If you’re using Ableton however, hop on my newsletter and I’ll send you a free download link.
iZotope Vinyl
As the name suggests, iZotope’s “Vinyl” is a plugin emulating the characteristic imperfections of vinyl records. Since the freeware only comes with a handful of parameters it’s easy to use and setting it up won’t take much time. What I love the most is that you can adjust the year of your “recording”. A must have for every lofi producer if you ask me.
Spitfire Audio Labs
Labs is a free software instrument made by the London based sound design company Spitfire Audio. There are several extensions available, including pianos, brass, choirs and synths. Most of these instruments are rather unique and therefore a nice addition to the basic instruments libraries you probably already own. The cool part about Labs is that it comes with only a handful of parameters so you won’t spend 10 years trying to get everything perfect. The sound either fits your production or not.
Tritik Krush
Tritik’s Krush is an effect plugin with 3 different distortion types. A bitcrusher , a downsampler and an analog drive knob. It further comes with 2 filters and an LFO that can be used to modulate every parameter. It’s available for both Windows and Mac in VST, AU and AAX format so really everyone can get their hands on this.
HY-Lofi2
This one is a free bit quantizer, waveshaper & filter plugin made by Tadashi Suginomori from HY-Plugins. It’s meant to process “audio to give it a low fidelity sound”. Just like Krush it combines different distortion modes with high and low-pass filters. More precisely it has one drive knob and a quantizer, which can run in different modes and qualities.
Legowelt Ableton Racks
Legowelt is a dutch producer known for releasing samples from analog hardware units, but you’ll also find some Ableton Racks on his website, including the Smackos Tape Station, the Smackos Lemuria Vintage Sampler Simulator, the Smackos 808 Simulator and the Smackos Amiga 909.
Sound-Base Audio Retro Boy
The Retro Boy is a Windows only VST synth. It comes with one oscillator, 7 waveforms and controls for ADSR, vibrato and decimation, which makes it perfect for Chiptune or 8-bit music. Since there isn’t much processing going on, the synth is quite CPU-friendly.
Best LoFi Plugins
Although you can definitely do some cool stuff with the freeware I mentioned so far there are some paid options no lofi producer should miss out on. A lot of them do more or less the same thing so in the end it’s up to personal preference (and budget), which ones you should get. Luckily most of these plugins aren’t that expensive compared to some of the stuff by other brands.
XLN Audio RC-20 Retro Color
Probably the most hyped plugin of this list is the R-c20 Retro Color by XLN Audio. It combines 6 different effect units, including noise, wobble, distort, digital, space and magnetic. Combining these options basically allows you to recreate any lofi characteristic you could possibly think of. If I could only pick one plugin of this list I’d probably go for this one, since it comes with the most features.
Baby Audio Super VHS
Considering that Baby Audio is a rather new plugin company, their products already gained quite much attention. Super VHS again combines multiple effects, including a distortion unit, a retro sounding VST reverb and detune knob labeled “drift”. All knobs sound surprisingly good and I really dig the design.
D16 Group Decimort 2
Decimort 2 is a bitcrusher on steroids. It offers two optional anti-alias filters, adjustable jitter, two quantization methods and controllable dithering. If you’re looking for a cool bitcrusher, this is definitely the one you should get your hands on. With less than 50 bucks it’s also pretty affordable.
Free Lofi Plugins Fl Studio
AudioThing Vinyl Strip
The Vinyl Strip is just like RC-20 a multi-effect plugin consisting of 6 different modules: Distortion, Compressor, Bit Crusher, Tilt EQ, Vintage Reverb, and something they call Vinylizer. In contrast to most plugins mentioned in this list, you can change the signal flow simply via drag-n-drop. On their website is stated that you can activate your license without an internet connection, which is pretty cool if you still live in a cave 😉
Devious Machines Texture
Texture is a plugin I just recently found out about watching Virtual Riot’s production workshop he did for Cymatics. It allows you to add noise to any kind of source sound. The cool part is that unlike similar effects you can even load your own noise samples and can adjust the exact frequency range, amount, ADSR and stuff like that.
Cableguys ShaperBox
When it comes to beat making, there’s one plugin every FL Studio user slaps on their melodies: Gross Beat (you’ll find plenty of memes about this). The problem is that it can’t be used in other DAWs (at least on Mac). This is where the Cableguys come into play. Their ShaperBox combines different effects that can all be modulated. The Time one is especially interesting for lofi producers, because it allows you to play back your melodies in halftime, add cool pitching effects and mix everything in with the dry signal.
Initial Audio Analog Pro
Analog Pro is once again a plugin meant to bring your digital audio tracks to live by simulating analog hardware. It comes with a variety of adjustable controls, including Noise Level, Noise Type, Impulse Type, Impulse Mix, Emphasis, Stereo, Lowcut, Highcut, Wow, Flutter and Amount. While I’m writing this the plugin is on sale for €26.10 (which is 64% off) so feel free to check out if this offer is still available.
Aberrant DSP SketchCassette
SketchCassette is a VST inspired by 4-track cassette recorders. It comes with most features the other plugins in this list have. Since it’s however available for only $20 it’s particularly interesting for producers on a tight budget.
Goodhertz Wow Control
Wow Control focuses on the weird and random modulations of analog playback devices. According to their website Goodhertz has carefully studied the essence of three different tape machines to make sure their plugin is the most comprehensive tape model they ever heard. I haven’t tried it out to be honest, but there are some videos about it on YouTube so feel free to check them out if you’d like to learn more about it.
PSPaudioware VintageWarmer2
Free Lofi Vst Plugins
The PSP Vintage Warmer is a tool simulating the saturation of analog compression / limiting. It comes with classic compression controls, such as knee or release time, and since it can run in multiband mode you can further control the individual bands a bit. In contrast to most usual compressors it comes with a big drive knob. Since it also comes with a mix knob you can drive the compression / saturation quite hard and mix it in just a bit to make your drums or vocals or whatever a bit fatter.
Wavesfactory Cassette
According to Wavesfactory’s website “Cassette is an audio plugin that imparts the unique character and sonic imprint of an often maligned recording medium”. You can also get your hands on their free Cassette Transport plugin, which “simulates the sound of tape speeding up and slowing down”. Or with other words: it’s a pretty cool tape stop plugin.
Psychic Modulation EchoMelt
Echomelt is “designed for adding character, texture and warmth to your sounds”. It doesn’t look that stunning, but it comes with an echo and chorus unit, which sets it apart from the other options in this list.
Aphex Vintage Exciter
Free Lofi Vst
The Aphex Vintage Aural Exciter by Waves is modeled on a tube-powered hardware unit. It allows you to increase high frequencies without raising the level too much.
Conclusion
Lofi Piano Plugin Free
As you can see, there are plenty of lofi plugins available that make your productions sound like they were recorded with a toaster (or something like that). The free offers, especially Vinyl and Labs are no brainers, since .. well, they’re free, so make sure to download them straight away if you haven’t done so yet 😉