The digital version of the classic hardware captures its curves and flexibility while adding saturation tools that weren't possible in analogue form.
The MPEQ-1 has made the jump from hardware to plugin, finally available as a digital tool for mixing and mastering. The digital version tracks the original’s character, with the four super-parametric bands, Vari-Phase mode and wide-range Q control, but adds something the analogue unit couldn’t: independent saturation control on every band.
Catch up on all the latest news here.
You can push the top end into saturation while keeping the low end clean, or add harmonic weight to a snare’s fundamental without affecting the transient. The EQ bands respond to both standard parameter controls and a graphic interface modelled on the hardware front panel. Built by the same team behind Undertone’s UTEQ, the plugin includes automation, instant A/B compare, integrated spectrum analysis and factory presets. Full recall means you can pull up a tone from a previous session without hunting through settings.
Eric Valentine, Undertone’s founder, notes that the plugin wasn’t rushed. “Engineers have been asking us when we would release a plugin version of the MPEQ-1 and our answer was always: only when we could do something genuinely new. The MPEQ-1 has always been about expanding what an equalizer can do.” The combination of EQ and per-band saturation control gives you control over tone itself, not just frequency balance, something most conventional EQs can’t touch.
The MPEQ-1 plugin is available from Undertone Audio.
