Swiss-born, but Berlin-based, David Keno is one of the most followed and established underground house acts on the planet. We caught up with him at the start of his current Australian tour for a chat about his current Top 3 plugins.
Fabfilter 2 Pro
There are an endless amount of equalizer plugins out there, but this one is the one I use the most. It is on almost every stem in every track I produce. The integrated analyzer is so helpful and makes it super easy and quick to work with: Clean up the low end and spot problematic frequencies right away. You can even grab a peak in the analyzer and drag it down or up. Absolutely sensational. Why didn’t someone think of this before?
The only thing I am missing is an automatic display of, let’s say, the three highest peaks and show their musical tuning next to them. This would save me even more time but I don’t want to complain.
U-He Diva
Of course there has to be a synthesizer in my top 3. It was not an easy choice because Omnisphere 2 gets used a lot too, but I think Diva is still my number one. When it comes to deep and warm basslines there is no plugin that can do it better than Diva. Endless possibilities for modulations, the great sounding fx and one of the best digital filters I’ve heard so far makes this one of the most important tools in my studio. I could make endless tracks with only using this plugin if I had to. It is pretty CPU hungry but I guess that’s the price you have to pay for a sound with this quality.
Valhalla Vintage Verb
I have tons of other reverbs but this has been on 2 of my send busses for a couple of years now. I compared it to so many other reverbs but I almost always chose the Vintage Verb. It has 3 different sound color modes: 1970s which has a bit of a lo-fi texture, 1980s (a little bit less lo-fi but still gritty) and “Now” which is clean. It doesn’t have too many controls but still enough possibilities to shape the sound. Yes, the most important thing is the sound and this is just excellent. From small ambience reverbs to huge spaces they all sound stellar and creates a beautiful room. The best thing is, it costs something around $50 and is very CPU friendly. I don’t need anything else in terms of reverb.
Wednesday 7th December: Electric Rush, Queenstown
Friday 9th December: Revolver, Melbourne
