Review: Master Plan by Musik Hack

Master Plan by Musik Hack is an all-in-one mastering plugin released earlier this year by the Grammy-nominated producer and engineer Stan Greene and composer/plug-in developer Sam Fischmann. Not long after its release, Master Plan has already started to make waves in the VST world thanks to its user-friendly GUI and ease of use, designed to increase the workflow, reduce the overly filled master buses, and deliver professional-sounding masters within minutes.

Features:

The plug-in is based around four main knobs, and standing out the most while also being the most important, is the Loudness knob, allowing users to increase the signal’s loudness with a special limiter and clipper circuit, avoiding true peaks. Next to the Loudness, is the Wide knob, controlling the width of the audio signal, and finally, two more knobs that gently control the High and Low frequencies, adjustable up to ±6dB respectively ±8dB.

In addition to the main components, Master Plan also offers a wide variety of effects. Right under the main layer, six more knobs can be found, all with a different attribution. The Thick button adds saturation while the Clean one reduces specific frequencies in the low-mid area. The effects also include a multi-band compressor, a very gentle compressor and two more frequency enhancers, Calm, designed to reduce harsh/high frequencies, and Tape, which brings out the true analog tape glow and also introduces some slight saturation to the audio signal.

To make it the complete mastering plugin, the bottom part is dedicated to the meters, LUFS, Peak, and the additional Crest, displaying the resulting loudness of the signal. The VST also comes with various presets spread over three categories: Loud Presets, True Peak Presets, and FX Presets. The last two presets that stick out from the others, “Quick Preset” and “True Peak Preset”, automatically master the sound at Grammy quality while also keeping the selected Loudness. 

Audition is the feature that stands out from all the other characteristics the VST offers and brings the final touch to its uniqueness. After the final result, the audio signal can be tested out through different audio systems, the VST offering a total of 5 different systems, including mono summing, phone speakers, or NS10 monitors.

Being the brainchild of the Grammy-nominated producer, Stan Greene, Masterplan is working with quite a few music genres, ranging from Pop, Rap, and RnB, but its rich variety of complex presets and universality, makes this simple yet powerful mastering plugin compatible with almost any music genre really.

Compatibility, Availability and Pricing:

Musik Hack’s Master Plan is available on both Mac and Windows platforms, and it comes in three plug-in formats, VST3, AU and AAX.

All in all, with its wide variety of features, presets and simplicity, Master Plan is for sure the ultimate to-go plugin for professional-sounding masters without the need for a stacked master bus. Having two available price options, the users can choose to buy a one-year license for 75$ or a forever license for 175$, but there is also a 10-day demo version which comes for free.

Example:

To give you a better perspective to the VST’s real power, down below you’re going to find two attached audio signals, one being dry while the other one, the wet signal, is using the delicate yet powerful preset, Quick Master, without any loudness being added to the original audio signal. The difference between the two shows how the sound is not only louder and warmer, but how the sounds are seamlessly glued together, without the help of any other VST on the Master Bus.

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