In the early days of recording an engineer had to work with what they had, often in the form of a console with its own character such as a Neve or SSL mixer. However, in modern recording with plugins there are almost limitless options for both corrective and characterful EQ.

EQ can fall into two categories; firstly EQ is used to solve issues to remove unwanted frequencies. For this task EQs need to be as clean and phase accurate as possible so that no colour or other unwanted audio artefacts are added during this corrective process.

The second use for EQ falls into the more creative category when flavour and character can be added to the sound.

In this article we highlight some EQ plug-ins that add lots of character to your sound - some are classics and based on either vintage boards or outboard gear. You’ll find versions of these plugins in most pro engineers plugin folder and there’s a good reason for that. We include reviews, tutorials and other information you may find helpful.

Pultec EQP-1A

The Pultec EQP-1A is the unit most people think of when they refer to a “Pultec”. Pultec is short for “Pulse Technologies” apparently. Its unusual design offers a variable width bell filter treble boost which operates at 7 switchable frequencies, a switchable low pass filter, referred to as “atten” which operates at 5, 10, and 20KHz, and the famous low-frequency cut and boost controls which, while sharing a 4 position frequency switch, have independent cut and boost controls. In true engineering fashion, the term Hertz isn’t used. Frequencies are quoted in Cycles Per Second and Kilocycles Per Second. White lab coats and Brylcreem are mandatory here!

The passive design and the valve amplification make Pultecs very sweet and at the top end it is difficult to coax a harsh sound out of them, but it is at the bottom end that the EQP-1A has its hidden weapon. The famous low-end trick has been an open secret among producers and engineers for a long time but rather than just demonstrate it I decided to look at it in some more detail.

Check out the content below to find out more about passive EQs and see why so many people love using them.

Maag EQ4

The Maag EQ4 is an EQ plug-in many of us on The Production Expert Team reach for when we need to shape the tone of an instrument musically. Vocals, acoustic guitars, piano, drums, you name it, Maag EQ4 sweetens it. It's effortless to learn how each of EQ4's fixed bands sound, which is an essential aspect of these types of EQ plug-ins. The AIR band is the special sauce of this plug-in, it doesn't sound harsh when pushed beyond what your instincts may tell you could be too much. The same goes for the 2.5 kHz band, that range typically sounds harsh when boosted but somehow in EQ4 it doesn't, it sounds natural and fitting. The Maag EQ4 plug-in is available natively, however, there are DSP versions for Pro Tools HDX from Plugin Alliance and UAD.

The SSL Console

The SSL Console became as popular as it did largely because it addressed the problems mixers were encountering with increasingly complex mixes. it’s hard to appreciate how significant the SSL automation computer was back then today when we have DAW automation but as well as that the SSL 4000 series of consoles featured dynamics on every channel, that bus compressor and of course the SSL EQ.

So many discussions persist about brown vs black EQs and all the other changes which happened through their production life but the SSL EQ played a huge role in the expectations mixers had about how flexible channel EQ should be. It happened to sound very distinctive too and it’s available in all its permutations in some truly excellent plug-in emulations from the likes of UAD, Waves, and Brainworx. Check out some examples below.

What is your favourite flavour EQ? let us know in the comments.