Fruitless Research is giving away Clew, a physically modeled spring reverb plugin, for free.
This article covers the giveaway details and an overview of what Clew does.
1. What Is Fruitless Research Clew?
Clew is a physical modeling spring reverb plugin based on the long two-spring tank found in many guitar amplifiers. Rather than playing back recorded impulse responses like a convolution reverb, it emulates how the signal actually travels through the springs. In a real spring tank, different frequencies propagate at different speeds, and that is what produces the metallic splash and short rising chirp that spring reverb is known for. Clew reproduces that behavior itself.
Key Features
- Two-spring tank recreated through physical modeling
- Decay: behaves like the damper in a physical tank, varying how much energy is lost on each round trip through the springs across a 1.2 to 4 second range (the timing of the drips and chirps stays unchanged)
- Stereo mode: runs two slightly detuned tanks, one per left/right channel, so stereo material keeps its image while mono material returns with more width
- Mono mode: runs a single tank
- Limit: places a fast stereo-linked limiter in front of the tank to tame transients that cause excessive “boing”
- Drive: with Limit switched off, it ranges from a slight grit to aggressive amp-like distortion (it is not simply a volume increase)
- Low Cut: filters the wet signal before it enters the springs
- Mix, Output, and tail-aware Auto Gain
- 10 factory presets
2. How to Install and Activate Clew
Enter your email address on the official page and check out. The email you receive contains a link where you can download and install the plugin. Note that the download is a single installer containing all eight Fruitless Research products, so plugins other than Clew will be installed alongside it. After installing, launch Clew and click the “FR” mark in the interface. Copy and paste the license key from the email into the field that appears, and activation is complete.
Fruitless Research Clew is a free physically modeled spring reverb, and it is worth grabbing while the giveaway is running.