Remarkable analog saturation and color

The Phil's Cascade plugin recreates a one-of-a-kind hardware unit made from highly esoteric vintage components, combined into some truly unique circuitry. It is anything but your typical audio processor. Think of Phil’s Cascade as a toolbox that will open a whole world of interesting sonic flavors to you.

Modeled after a unique hardware unit that would be impossible to mass produce

Like all of elysia’a plugins, Phil‘s Cascade was modeled on a piece of real analog hardware. But this particular one-off hardware unit was exclusively designed and built to become a plugin! This approach removed all practical limits to designing an ideal analog device for saturation. Bespoke NOS (New Old Stock) components which are anything but standard in audio applications were arranged to make a novel circuit that is a creative celebration of what’s possible in the analog domain.

A wide array of analog colors in a single box

Now you can spice up virtual and natural instruments with ease, transforming standard sounds with all kinds of gritty, organic and aged flavors. There are no right or wrong settings: Saturation, harmonics, distortion, colouration, filtering, interaction—anything goes. This is a plugin designed to encourage experimentation and make it truly rewarding.

Incredibly difficult to make, incredibly easy to use

The central element is located in the middle: the Gain! The left side of the plugin is where all the magic happens, allowing you to shape your sound with the Boost, Bias, Grid, Resonance and Peak controls. The right side controls and tames things if necessary, using knobs for Filtering, Level and parallel Mix.

Nothing like it before or since

Rest assured that the original hardware that this plugin is based on will never go into production. Most of the parts are so rare that they would last for just a handful of units, with environmental restrictions forbidding most of them to be used in new products, and the price point it would have to sell for being prohibitive to say the least. Thankfully, the painstaking analysis and modeling of the circuit and its components’ behaviors gives you the perfect basis for creating truly wonderful, new and unheard sounds.

FEATURES

Unique Sounds From a Rare Device: Experience true vintage goodness from a 21st-century device that relies on boutique components and old-school topologies with some interesting twists.

Unusual Transformers: Colorful and rare NE and NX series transformers made by Philips in 1975 add the sound of iron to Phil’s Cascade, helping shape the unique sound of Phil’s Cascade.

Uncommon Tubes: The rare ECC91, EF183 and EF86 tubes are everything but your typical audio tubes, and that’s exactly what makes them so valuable. Their special sound signature is plain and simple, unique.

Perfect Power: Hardware rule #1: The heart of any audio device is its power supply! The 12 lb power transformer used for Phil’s Cascade originally came from vintage Tektronix measuring equipment, surviving the times when even this was based on tubes exclusively.

Easy to Use: Incredibly simple operation focuses around a few key controls: Gain, Boost, Bias, Grid, Resonance, Peak and Filter.

home page: