What is it?
Atlas DSP is the brainchild of Hungarian producer Máté Bognár, who is slowly assembling a fleet of plugins designed for modern metal musicians wanting their music to punch harder than a pissed off Mike Tyson.
Its first products were launched last August, though work on Your Final Steps, which is designed to deliver mix-ready tones for guitarists of all abilities, began in 2023. It has impressed with its signal-savaging boost/EQ Crank and Thall plugins, which act as a shot of steroids to low-tuned guitar signals, giving them more power, clarity, and character. Here, they’re just two tools in Your Final Steps' powerful arsenal.
The amp itself is a Frankensteinian blend of “two famous high-gain amplifiers,” with the hybrid concoction created manually, rather than by utilising Neural modelling software, like many of its competitors. Beyond that, Atlas says, “the true aggressive sound comes when the pedals are added.”
That sees four pre-amp stompboxes – a ring modulator, its Grind and Thall pedals, and a Frytki fuzz – flanked by post-amp reverb and chorus pedals. There’s also a tremolo presented at the top of the plugin next to a pitch shifter and noise gate.
Unlucky for some, but 13 cab options are included, with offerings from Atlas DSP, NSS Audio, and KaosAmps, and it is compatible with external impulse responses. Finally, a nine-band EQ rounds out its litany of tone-tweaking paraphernalia.
Specs
- Launch price: £85/€99/$117
- Type: Amp simulator plugin
- Format: 64-bit VST/VST3/AAX/AU – standalone plugin coming soon.
- OS requirements: Mac OS X 10.11 or higher, Windows 7 or higher
- Features: 1 amp model, 6 pedals, 13 cabs, IR-loader, noise gate, tremolo, pitch shifter, 9-band EQ
- CONTACT: Atlas DSP
Usability
Very much using Neural DSP’s aesthetics as a launch pad, those familiar with those guitar plugins will feel instantly at home here, and many useful features, from a noise gate to a transpose feature, which performs impressively, are present.
It's hard to fault the user experience, then. Being a seasoned Neural DSP plugin user – namely Archetype Gojira, Tim Henson, and the Nameless Suite – it was easy to navigate around the plugin, and I can’t see it being any different for users new to this kind of interface, although finding the tuner took me a minute.
Neural’s girth-inducing doubler is notably absent, but in truth, with tones this thick, is it really needed?
The cab blend feature that can totally transform a dialled-in tone, helping players really get the most out of the one amp
One feature that quickly stands out to me is the Blend slider on the cabinet page that takes two cabs – be they stock or external IRs – and fuses them together for unique results. And the stock options are not to be sniffed at. Some are named to indicate the flavours they offer – NSS Audio Oldschool has a feisty, early death metal character, while Custom Bright 4 is more about subtlety than savagery.
The slider can be moved at my will, rather than by preset increments, and it’s a feature that can totally transform a dialled-in tone, helping players really get the most out of the one amp. It’s particularly useful for double-tracking.
The lack of lead guitar-friendly features, like a delay, hinders it somewhat, but its speaker-rattling rhythms are imperious, and third-party delays will likely elevate the plugin even further.
Sounds
Despite only packing one single-channel amp, there's diversity to be found in droves. Beside a three-band EQ and Gain knob, there's a control for Presence and three handy switches. The High/Low output switch, meanwhile, delivers a big difference without being ridiculous, and the Bite/Core switch offers more or less metallic clangour. The Lo-fi feature is great for intros (think Periphery's Icarus Lives) and shoegazing glory, and a fine example of Atlas DSP's 'mix-ready' mantra bearing fruit.
It’s a forgiving amp when it comes to crafting tones
As Aymerick Guiliani's presets prove, Chainsaw Fuzz is full of gristle and body, and Clean But Dirty wades into more ethereal, Gilmour-esque waters. It's far from one-dimensional, and the tone-mangling impact of its pedals ensures Your Final Steps continually shape-shifts.
It’s a forgiving amp when it comes to crafting tones, although going all out can result in very saturated, artificial sounds. Dialling in a fairly hot rock tone for a six-string electric guitar is simple enough, but there’s so much bite and snarl in the lower ranges.
On a six-string LTD RZK-III with Fishman Fluence pickups, tuned to drop D, a lot of articulation of the pick hitting the string comes through, and tones can feel on the scratchier end of things. Swap that for an eight-string Strandberg Boden (also with Fishmans) tuned to F standard, and the same tone feels so much more at home. Those harsher frequencies are gone, and the brute force of the amp can shine.
The lower you go, the more hellish its tones become; it’s addictive. So much so, I was grabbing my Bare Knuckle Nomads-loaded Telecaster, and boy, does it growl through this amp.
The lower you go, the more hellish its tones become; it’s addictive
But it isn’t all about aggression. Half-decent cleans can be manipulated by rolling the gain right back on the amp, and reducing the Volume on your guitar. The amp proves very responsive to my picking with harder picks pushing the tones just past the edge-of-breakup.
The preamp pedals are absolutely vicious, and though they can take some taming, I found reverse engineering their demonic gruff via presets really effective. Grind is one of the most unrelenting boost/EQ pedals I’ve come across, and Thall does the same with a more grating bite. The ring modulator and fuzz are also ideal tools for making things even nastier.
As for the post-amp pedals, the chorus is pretty brazen, but it subtle applications see it handling overdriven broken chords superbly. It can also get weird, belching out Korn-like garish tonalities.
The Reverb has a very natural ‘amp in big room feel’ with sensitive Width and Size dials, while Darkness’ impact is subtle and Blend turns a versatile 'verb into a monolithic soundscaping tool. In certain instances, that can be very empowering; at others, it's a pedal that should be approached tentatively.
Verdict
Ultimately, Your Final Steps will do little to win over non-metal players, but it’s bound to capture djent and thall-loving audiences because of the fine balance of brutality, customization, and ease-of-use. It’s also far more versatile than I imagined, and it excels when it’s kicking and screaming.
MusicRadar verdict: For modern metal guitarists wanting more venom from their rhythm tones, Your Last Steps hits insanely hard, and a unique stock of virtual pedals and on-amp switches that offer plenty of character-changing control. It’s unlikely to replace plugins from the big hitters outright, but it can stand as a viable tonal companion, and you can’t fault its price.
