Reverb types: room, plate, hall, chamber, spring, convolution, shimmer, gated

Overview

Every type of reverb has a history, a tail shape and a role in the mix. Choosing well matters more than the parameters.

Room

• Character: obvious early reflections, short tail (0.3–1 s), a sense of closeness and realism.
• Uses: drums (a room "glues" the pieces together), percussion, guitars, rap and rock vocals (discreet ambience), instruments that must sound like they were played in the same place.
• Starting point: decay 0.4–0.8 s, pre-delay 0–10 ms, high ER, high diffusion, HP 200 Hz on the return.
• Plugins: Valhalla Room, Fruity Reeverb 2 (small SIZE, high ER), LuxeVerb (Size 10–30), Pro-R 2, room convolutions.

Plate

• History: a metal sheet suspended and set vibrating by a transducer, with contact microphones; the EMT 140 (late 1950s) is the reference. Damping was adjusted by moving an absorbing panel closer.
• Character: no "room" early reflections, a dense and bright tail that starts immediately, high diffusion, silky highs. It doesn't sound like a real place but like "the sound of records".
• Uses: vocals (the pop, soul, rock standard), snare, guitars, horns.
• Starting point: decay 1.2–2.5 s, pre-delay 20–40 ms on vocals (0–10 on snare), HP 250–300 Hz, LP 8–10 kHz, medium damping.
• Plugins: Valhalla Plate and VintageVerb (Plate mode), Arturia Rev PLATE-140, UAD EMT 140, Soundtoys Little Plate, Abbey Road Plates; in FL, LuxeVerb with Size 0–10.

Hall (concert hall)

• Character: large space, distant early reflections, long tail (1.8–3.5 s), lows that decay more slowly.
• Uses: strings, orchestra, pads, piano, choirs, ballads, big choruses, EDM breakdowns.
• Starting point: decay 2–3 s, pre-delay 20–60 ms, bass multiplier 0.8–1× (reduce in pop), HP 150–200 Hz, LP 8 kHz.
• Plugins: Valhalla VintageVerb (Concert Hall), Lexicon (Arturia Rev LX-24 from the Lexicon 224, Lexicon PCM Native), Fruity Reeverb 2, LuxeVerb (Size 50+), Pro-R 2.

Chamber (echo chamber)

• History: dedicated rooms with reflective walls, a loudspeaker and a microphone: the signal was played into the room and picked up again (from the 1930s; in 1947 Bill Putnam used a studio bathroom for "Peg o' My Heart"). The chambers at Abbey Road and Capitol are famous.
• Character: realistic reverb but "colored" by the room, loudspeaker and microphone; dense, warm, with present mids.
• Uses: vintage vocals (1950s–60s), pop orchestration, soul, crooners, strings.
• Starting point: decay 1–2 s, pre-delay 10–30 ms, LP 6–8 kHz.
• Plugins: Waves Abbey Road Chambers, chamber convolutions (Fruity Convolver with IRs), Valhalla VintageVerb (Chamber), Altiverb.

Spring

• History: one or more springs with transducers at the ends; Hammond patent of 1939, then in guitar amplifiers (Fender) and tape recorders (Space Echo).
• Character: metallic "boing" tail, dispersive (the highs arrive differently from the lows), hits that go "crash" if pushed. Lo-fi, vintage, surf.
• Uses: surf and rockabilly guitars, dub and reggae (spring on snare and skank), organ, lo-fi, effected vocals.
• Starting point: decay 1.5–3 s, pre-delay 0, HP 300 Hz, LP 5 kHz, noticeable level in dub.
• Plugins: Arturia Rev SPRING-636, Softube Spring Reverb, UAD AKG BX 20, Fruity Convolver with spring IRs.

Convolution

• How it works: you record the impulse response (IR) of a real space or piece of equipment (a sweep sequence or a gunshot) and "apply" it to the signal. The first real-time convolution processor on record is the Sony DRE-S777 (1999).
• Character: absolute realism of the captured space (churches, studios, auditoriums, old plates and springs, even guitar cabinets). Less flexible: decay and shape depend on the IR (they can be shortened with envelopes and stretch).
• Uses: orchestral, acoustic, jazz, post-production (placing vocals and instruments in the same real location), cab IRs for guitars.
• In FL: Fruity Convolver (load IRs by dragging them into the editor; Dry, Wet, initial Delay, Stretch which changes the length and pitch of the impulse, volume/pan/stereo envelopes on the IR, EQ on the impulse, Normalize); Edison also has a non-real-time convolution reverb.
• Plugins: Altiverb, Waves IR-1, Liquidsonics Seventh Heaven (Bricasti), Space Designer (Logic), free IRs from collections such as those mentioned in the Fruity Convolver manual.

Shimmer

• How it works: in the reverb's feedback loop there is a pitch shifter (usually +12 semitones, sometimes +7 or −12): on every pass the tail rises by an octave and adds up, creating a halo that grows upward. It is associated with ambient and post-rock.
• Uses: pads, ambient guitars, intros, breakdowns, ethereal vocals, transitions.
• Starting point: decay 4–10 s, shift +12, shimmer amount 20–40%, HP 300–500 Hz, LP 8–10 kHz, medium modulation.
• In FL: LuxeVerb Pitch section in Feedback mode (pitch from −12 to +12 semitones, Gain, Delay, High/Low Cut, Reverb Mix): this is the stock shimmer; Feedforward mode generates up to two cleaner pitched voices (harmonies, doubling).
• Plugins: Valhalla Shimmer and Supermassive (free), Eventide Blackhole, Strymon BigSky (hardware), Arturia Rev INTENSITY.

Gated reverb

• How it works: a large, bright reverb cut off abruptly by a gate (or by an envelope that closes it) after 150–400 ms. Made famous by Hugh Padgham and Phil Collins in the 1980s (with the room recorded, heavily compressed and gated); it became a trademark of the 1980s drum sound.
• Uses: 1980s snare and toms, synthwave, retro pop, effects on vocals.
• How to do it in FL: send track with a long, bright reverb (decay 2–3 s, high ER) → heavy compressor → gate (Fruity Limiter Noise Gate or Pro-G) with sidechain from the snare, hold 150–300 ms, release 10–50 ms. Or LuxeVerb with Envelope on a positive scale (native gated reverb). Some reverbs have "nonlinear/gated" algorithms (Lexicon, Valhalla VintageVerb).
• Starting point: total length 200–400 ms (in time: 1/8 or 1/4), noticeable level.

Quick comparison

Common mistakes

• Long halls on vocals in fast songs: muddiness.
• Spring on instruments with many transients without control: metallic "crashes".
• Shimmer without HP: the octave above also brings up the mud, which grows on every pass.
• Convolution with very long IRs on everything: CPU and a confused mix.
• Gated reverb with a long gate release: it loses the truncated character.

How to hear it

• The same snare with room, plate, hall, spring, gated at equal level: hear how the perceived era of the song changes.
• Shimmer: listen to the tail in solo and hear the octave rise after 1–2 seconds.