Blue Cat's Destructor, a Distortion and Amp Simulation Modeler - Now Available! [Updated 1.01]

[Blue Cat Audio]

We are happy to introduce today Blue Cat's Destructor, our new distortion and amp sim modeling plug-in, capable of simulating many types of distortion - and it works for subtle and clean tones too!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euXcf4dSY2I

The plug-in is currently being demonstrated at the AES Convention in Los Angeles (check it out on booth #410) and will be available for purchase on October 11th.

Wether you are a guitarist, bassist, into electronic music, or mixing and mastering, this plug-in was designed for you! If you cannot be at the AES, read more information about Blue Cat's Destructor and listen to the plug-in on the product page or on our blog.

This is also the opportunity for us to introduce a new guitar software category, listing our most useful tools for guitar and bass.

Price: 79 EUR or $99 (excl. VAT)

[hellishvictor]

[Blue Cat Audio]

Looking for more details about Blue Cat's Destructor before you can try the demo in a bit more than a week?

You might be interested in this in-depth Q&A session about the "dark side" of Blue Cat's Destructor!

[Blue Cat Audio]

It's time to listen to the plug-in! Here is a short guitar demo video, by Hans Van Even:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16RGQ87YdGg

[Blue Cat Audio]

Despite its name, Blue Cat’s Destructor can do far more than distortion: compression, tube saturation, tape saturation, bit crushing… But also clean guitar or bass amps simulation! Here are a few clean and crunch examples on a simple funky riff:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=beZwOdyK-Tk

[Blue Cat Audio]

Here is a short review of the plug-in by Pro Tools Expert, from a guitarist prospective. Available for demo and download tomorrow!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wFW9apDoHM

[Blue Cat Audio]

It's time to finally unleash today Blue Cat's Destructor, our tone shaping channel strip and distortion modeling plug-in, capable of simulating many types of distortion, as well as more subtle and clean tones.

The plug-in is now available for purchase with 20% off until 11/11, while existing customers get an extra 10% discount (check your email!) during the same period. More details about the plug-in and demo downloads can be found on the Destructor plug-in page.

You may also want to check out these first reviews of the plug-in:
- Pro Tools Expert Video Review of Blue Cat's Destructor (for guitar)
- Studio One Expert Video Review (for guitar)
- Blue Cat's Destructor Review on Audiofanzine (French), with tons of audio examples

But don't get it wrong: this plug-ins has a wide range of applications besides guitar and bass amp simulation.

[kylie]

As much as I would like to try this, but...
I (still) run winxp, and I can't load it in either savihost, savihost3 and cantabile2. I (almost) always try plugins here first. All hosts just crash (savihost3 throws a cryptic error message, the others just disappear from screen and process explorer's list).

Have you tried BlueCat Patchwork?

Yes, I did (installed the standalone demo), and it crashes as well.

Don't want to spoil the party, but do you really support Windows XP, as stated, or were the currently displayed system requirements just a copy&paste error? It would be okay for me if you ditched XP, I'd just want to know...

[Blue Cat Audio]

Thanks for the heads up. WinXP should still be supported, but with th latest service pack (SP3 if I remember well). Is it what you have installed?

For Patchwork, does it crash instantly or when you load the plug-in? Also, can you maybe send a screenshot with the cryptic error message? It looks like a problem with dll dependencies.

[Blue Cat Audio]

You might be interested in checking out this new in depth training for Blue Cat's Destructor that you can watch for FREE:



We have partnered with Groove3 to offer you a 30-day access pass to all their videos, including this one. The offer expires in 2 weeks, so don't miss it!

[kylie]

Thanks for the heads up. WinXP should still be supported, but with th latest service pack (SP3 if I remember well). Is it what you have installed?

Yes. It was patched till the last day of support. That includes, of course, SP3.

For Patchwork, does it crash instantly or when you load the plug-in?

Patchwork itself loads fine. As soon as Destructor is inserted into a slot the running patchwork instance is gone.

Also, can you maybe send a screenshot with the cryptic error message? It looks like a problem with dll dependencies.

[Blue Cat Audio]

It took quite a bit of time to investigate, but the root cause was found: we finally hit a Windows limitation/bug that was fixed in Vista and later only. Unfortunately it is not possible to change this on our end, and it causes random crashes and memory corruption in plug-ins when loaded. So I guess XP is now definitely out of the game

We were about to explicitly get rid of Windows XP shortly anyway (it has been deprecated by Microsoft 2 years ago and it has become difficult to support it without an impact on newer systems). So system requirements have been updated on the website, and I am afraid you cannot use XP anymore for our new plug-ins. Really sorry for that!

[dmbaer]

On the whole, I think the Destructor documentation is first rate. But I can't get my head around this:

Phase Shift
Additional phase shift can be applied to the signal before it hits the destruction curve. You can select here the enter frequency and amount of phase shift.

First of all, why "additional" phase shift. Where does the initial amount of phase shifting happen in the first place? But more significant, what does this capability do, additional or not? If we, say, we shift a 20Hz signal by 180 degrees, isn't that just the same thing as adding a delay of 1/40th of a second? Can you please provide a little more detail on this control?

[kylie]

It took quite a bit of time to investigate, but the root cause was found: we finally hit a Windows limitation/bug that was fixed in Vista and later only. ... So I guess XP is now definitely out of the game ... Really sorry for that!

well, what I wanted is a clear statement. to be honest, I did not expect it to be fixed, really. (although there are some developers that obviously found a way for their plugins, see the audiority polaris thread for example, but your development environment may differ).
thanks for your explanation, though. excuses for switching are going to be pretty thin on the ground...

-kylie-

[Blue Cat Audio]

First of all, why "additional" phase shift. [...] But more significant, what does this capability do, additional or not? If we, say, we shift a 20Hz signal by 180 degrees, isn't that just the same thing as adding a delay of 1/40th of a second? Can you please provide a little more detail on this control?

I guess " additional" is just poor wording to say that it shifts the phase of the signal, that's it.

It is actually quite different from a delay: this is a phase shifting filter that continuously shifts the phase, and the frequency you choose is the center frequency for the shift. So all frequencies are delayed with a different amount, resulting in very strange "wah-ish" effects around the center frequency when using large amounts.