Reviewed: Tokyo Dawn TDR Molot GE
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Molot GE comes after Vladislav G’s Molot compressor which has been around for nearly 10 years. ‘Molot’ means ‘Hammer’ in Russian so here’s a Fairchild-style compressor that lives up to its name.
Putting aside the knobs that every compressor comes with I’d like to talk about some very interesting features of this plug-in:
There are 3 types of compression styles to add colouration:
- Feedback: More musical as the SSL Bus Compressor
- Relaxed/Instant: Makes the sound be a bit less transparent with a little bit of pumping on the release (The original Molot operates on this mode)
- LoFi: It enables the gain reduction to be 8 bit and the output signal 12 bit creating a more aggressive type of sound without depth which can be great for instruments that need to be in the front of the mix.
The Alpha-Sigma knob in between Attack and Release sets the attack curve shape so if you’re looking for transient shaping I’d recommend leaning towards Sigma as towards Alpha would bring more saturation to the sound.
SC HP is the sidechain highpass filter with changeable slope the higher you go. This is an excellent feature for applying compression to mids and highs and leaving the lows intact. Bear in mind, it won’t fuck the sound, only the application of the compressor. There is also the option of using an External SC when selecting on the top menu line, but that would fuck the whole signal.
The Input can be processed in various ways as Stereo, Mono, Left, Right, Sum, Diff and Sum diff opening a whole range of possibilities. When Sum diff is ON the “W Threshold” and “W MakeUp” (W = width) appears to adjust the difference between Sum and Diff and to compensate the loss in loudness respectively.
Apart from that the guys from Tokyo Dawn built in an EQ section, a brick-wall Limiter, and a Saturation section which sounds very nice and crispy.
Final Thoughts:
That’s a very versatile plugin when it comes to colouration. With different compression styles, stereo configuration and even dual-stage creativity can go far! Apart from the saturation that didn’t sound very appealing to me as I’d rather saturate with a dedicated plug-in TRD Molot GE is a beast!
