Gates listen to the clean signal
All gates react to the undistorted input. That way they cut even the heavily distorted, reverb-heavy chain cleanly.
Plugins / Mess!
Double Destruction Chain
Distorted, drenched and chopped.
Distortion, reverb and gate run twice in a row. Then a third gate with bounce chops the whole chain. Good for drums, vocals and anything that should sound dirty and rhythmic.
Listen
One drum loop in four stages, from the dry signal to chop + bounce. The loop keeps playing when you switch.
Chop Scope
Input What gets through
How it works
After distortion a normal gate barely works, because the quiet parts get pushed up too. That is why Mess! drives its gates differently.
Chop
A third gate across the whole effect chain, also driven by the input.
Bounce
After every hit the gate opens several times, shorter and faster each time, like a dropped ball. New hits only restart it once the ball has stopped. This creates uneven, polyrhythmic patterns.
Chop Scope
Shows live what gets through. Grey is the input, white is what the gate lets through.
up to 37%silence between the hits
20+cuts per second
Signal chain and controls
Two identical stages in a row, followed by chop and the output section.
- Input
- Stage 1dist › verb › gate
- Stage 2dist › verb › gate
- Chop+ bounce
- Output
| Section | Control | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Stage 1 & 2 | Distortion 0–10 · WARM / HARD / FOLD | Saturation, hard distortion or wavefolding |
| Stage 1 & 2 | Reverb 0–100 % | Room size and reverb amount |
| Stage 1 & 2 | Gate OFF … 0 dB | Hard gate, driven by the clean input |
| Chop | Threshold OFF … 0 dB | Third gate across the whole chain |
| Chop | Bounce 0–100 % | How long and how slowly the gate keeps bouncing |
| Output | Mix · High Pass · Gain · Auto Gain | Dry/wet, low cut, volume. Auto gain matches the input level |
| Output | Sidechain + Threshold | The effect only plays while the sidechain signal is above the threshold |
Want Mess!?
Mess! runs as VST3 on Windows. If you want it or have questions, get in touch.