Steinberg is here to up your music writing and production game with their upgraded Absolute VST Collection 5. The Absolute 5 brings you over 130 GB of sound content, 28 VST and HALion instruments, and 7,500 presets. So essentially everything you’re ever going to need. Let’s start with what’s been upgraded.
First, there’s the HALion 6, which offers six new instrument libraries and a Library creator for all your custom sampled instruments. There’s also the HALion Sonic 3, which is an update of the Sonic 2. The Sonic 3 offers an additional 3,000 instruments and a vast array of sound-shaping options, effects, and filters. Finally, there’s the Groove Agent 5, which essentially brings everything drum-related to the table that you might need. This includes acoustic and electronic kits, as well as new MIDI styles.
So what’s new in Absolute 5? Well, there’s:
- Backbone, which is a plugin for drum sound design and re-synthesis. Backbone allows you to descontruct and re-construct drum samples for sounds that are all your own.
- Amped Elektra, which is a VST modeled after a completely restored rare vintage electric piano. The piano was sampled from the DI signal, and then reamped through amps like a Fender Twin and Ampeg V4. The Amped Elektra also comes with unique impulse responses.
- Electric Bass, which as you might’ve guessed is a bass library. Electric Bass is modeled after everything from J-bass to P-bass and even the MM-bass.
- Polarities for Padshop 2, which allows you to morph and split keyboard sounds. Or as Steinberg puts it, Polarities for Padshop 2 lets you play “with the concept of contrasts and confrontation.”
- Sounds of Soul, which is a Retrolouge expansion that covers the greatest synth sounds from more than four decades of soul music with more than 400 presets programmed by Dave Polich, who programmed and produced for artists like Michael Jackson, David Foster and Sergio Mendes.
- Future Past Perfect, which is a drum toolkit for music in the style of New York House, Future House, Progressive House and Techno.
The Steinberg Absolute 5 is available here for $499.99.
