OSMIUM Review
Osmium is the latest rack extension effect for Reason Studio. It is a multi-band distortion unit with three effects per band, modulation, and includes a variety of distortions, cabs, and other effects. The UI is Reason’s typical “analog” style interface, it looks cool and “military grade” but many of the actual interface controls are a bit out dated at this point. I apreciate that Reason is consistent, and making changes to this system would mean updating EVERYTHING to maintain this consistency, but their mod matrix style modulation system and dropdown menus are not keeping up with the time. For a company so “forward thinking” with it’s investor friendly licensing plan, you’d think they’d want to keep the UI/UX modernized as well. That said, I’d rather focus on the actual sounds and features instead of my personal complaints towards Reason as a company.
Osmium has three bands that can load up to three effects each with an additional input and output stage. Compared with other multi-band distortions this is quite a nice setup allowing for stacked distortion and processing where needed. Distortion types include saturation, overdrive, wave folding, and bit crushing. Each type has a variety of sub modes as well for even more variety.
DISTORTIONS
The saturation and overdrive have quite a bit of overlap, both even have a tube mode. These cover pretty typical distortion sounds that as are useful and versatile as ever. I particularly enjoyed the “velcro” overdrive mode
The Wavefolder gets into some of the more interesting distortions, there’s 10 different shapes available covering most of what you’d find included in other shapers. Bitcrushing is also always fun, this one has a couple unique modes and a neat UI.
TONE
Osmium also offers a basic filters and EQ, these are very useful for shaping the tone of each band, but they do make me wish for a few more effects slots. There are a couple neat selections in this category though.
The morph filter provides some unique filter shapes, some of which can be transformed for some nice tonal motion. Additionally the resonator and cabinet offer a pretty solid variety of acoustic simulation, which I think is incredibly useful and lacking in most multi-band distortion effects. being able to place these anywhere in the chain is an added bonus.
OTHER EFFECTS
I apreciate the inclusion of a gate and transient shaper, both of these would be more than welcome in other multi-band distortions. They’ve also included a compressor which can be a nice output effect to glue it all together.
I think the coolest addition is the feedback, it seems to behave much closer to acoustic amp feedback than most “feedbacks” that are included in other MB distortions. The feedback here seems to be harmonically related to your audio source, I can’t say I understand what it is doing but it’s quite nice to see.
There’s also a simple delay, which is what others use for their “feedback” systems, it sounds nice with short resonant delay times for getting that “comb filter” quality. This delay can go down to 0 ms with 1 ms resolution, however it does not include a tempo sync mode.
A simple pitch shifter rounds things out, an odd inclusion, but useful for creative sound design.
Finally there’s external routing that can be placed anywhere in the chain, 3 external sends means you can use a different external effect per band, might I suggest an entire instance of osmium per band?
MODULATION
The modulation here is simple, and as cool as modulation is in multi effects, I find it to be less than necessary when it comes to distortions. An envelope follower is great, I’d rather have more as these are the most useful for distortions. LFOs tend to push you away from distortion and into creative effects processing, which is cool but changes the “purpose” of the plugin.
Osmium features two LFOs with all the typical “Reason” shapes. There’s also a “curve” step sequencer that has a smooth mode, but I wish they’d use their MSEG that they introduced with Europa/Grain and seem to have abandoned.
Each modulator can route to three pairs of destinations that share a scale modifier. This is a very strange and outdated way of doing modulation, they’ve even dropped the drag and drop system they’ve used in the past. It’s honestly more than enough to get cool results, I just find it a bit odd.
Osmium is a nice addition to the Reason environment, using Reason rack as a multi-effect has always been fun, and now a nice alternative to Scream 4 opens up some more destructive options. While I’m not a fan of Reason’s licensing and subscription model, I think as a plugin it can do some cool stuff. I would prefer if all of Reason’s devices could be used standalone however, this one included. Compared to other multi-band distortions, this one is a bit on the simpler side, though I do prefer this layering system over being able to use only one distortion per band. I think the feedback and cabs give it some unique spice, but I’d have loved to see a couple more bizarre distortions like those you find in Hate, Triad, or Ohmicide.
OSMIUM can be picked up for Reason Studio from Reason’s website: https://www.reasonstudios.com/devices/osmium