Best Slate Digital Plugins for Heavy Mixes

Let’s cut through the noise. You’ve seen Slate Digital plugins all over YouTube tutorials and pro mixing breakdowns. With their All Access Pass, you suddenly have a metric ton of virtual gear at your fingertips, which can feel both awesome and overwhelming. It’s easy to fall into the trap of “plugin acquisition syndrome,” thinking the next shiny emulation is the key to a killer mix.

Here's the real talk: it’s not.

Your skills are what matter. A pro can get a crushing mix with stock plugins because they know what they’re listening for and how to achieve it. But the right tool can make getting there faster and more intuitive. Slate has some absolute workhorses that have become staples in modern metal production for a reason.

This isn’t just a list of what’s popular. This is a breakdown of the best Slate Digital plugins for metal, why they work, and some go-to settings to get you started.

Virtual Mix Rack (VMR): Your Go-To Channel Strip

The Virtual Mix Rack is Slate's 500-series style rack where you can load up a ton of different analog-emulated modules. It’s the core of the Slate ecosystem and insanely useful for building custom channel strips for guitars, drums, and vocals without opening ten separate plugin windows.

H3: The EQs: Surgical vs. Musical

Inside VMR, you’ve got a buffet of EQs, but for metal, two really stand out for different jobs.

• FG-S (SSL 4000 E Emulation): This is your aggressive, punchy, surgical EQ. When you need to carve out space in a dense mix, this is your tool. The filters are tight, and the boosts have a distinct bite that’s perfect for adding snap to a snare or presence to a kick beater.
  • Pro Tip for Drums: Use the FG-S on a snare top mic. Put the High Pass Filter around 100-150Hz to clean up kick bleed. Find the ugly "boxiness" around 400-600Hz and pull it down with a tight bell curve. Then, add a touch of top-end bite around 5-8kHz to make it crack through the mix.
• FG-N (Neve 1073 Emulation): This is your broad-strokes, musical EQ. The curves are wider and more "vibey." It's less for fixing problems and more for sweetening a source that’s already pretty good.
  • Pro Tip for Guitars: On a rhythm guitar bus, a tiny 1-2 dB boost at 1.6kHz or 3.2kHz can add midrange aggression and clarity without making things harsh. The high shelf is also killer for adding "air" and sizzle without the fizz. Getting this right is a huge part of modern metal guitar production. Need a deeper dive? Check out our guide on EQing modern metal guitars for max impact.

The Compressors: Glue vs. Annihilation

Just like the EQs, VMR gives you a ton of compression flavors.

• FG-401 (SSL Bus Compressor Emulation): The ultimate drum bus "glue." Set it to a slow attack (10 or 30ms) and a fast release (auto or .1s) with a 2:1 or 4:1 ratio. Aim for just 2-4dB of gain reduction on the loudest hits. You’ll feel the drums tighten up and punch more cohesively.
• FG-Stress (Empirical Labs Distressor Emulation): The Distressor is a studio legend for a reason—it can do anything. It can be super transparent for leveling out a vocal performance or bass guitar, or it can absolutely nuke a drum room mic.
  • Pro Tip for Parallel Drums: Set the FG-Stress to a 10:1 ratio (or the "Nuke" setting), fast attack, fast release, and just smash a parallel drum bus with it. We’re talking 10-20dB of gain reduction. Then, blend that crushed signal back in under your main drum bus. You'll get massive sustain and body without losing transient punch. Learning how to apply different types of compression is a game-changer; we've got a whole breakdown on metal compression secrets that goes way beyond this.

Trigger 2: The Modern Metal Drum Standard

If there's one plugin that has defined the sound of modern metal drums, it’s Trigger 2. In a fast, dense mix, inconsistent drum hits get buried. Trigger allows you to blend or completely replace drum sounds with perfectly captured samples for ultimate consistency and punch.

A Practical Trigger Workflow

It's not just about replacing drums; it's about enhancing them.

1. Isolate: Put Trigger on your raw snare track. Use the built-in gate to filter out hi-hat and cymbal bleed so you're only triggering from the actual snare hits.
2. Select: Choose a sample that complements your original snare. If your snare has a great woody body, maybe you need a sample with a sharp, cracking attack.
3. Blend: This is the key. Don't just go 100% sample. Use Trigger's mix knob to blend the sample in underneath the live snare. A 50/50 blend is a great starting point. This gives you the consistency of the sample and the human feel and ghost notes from the original performance.

Virtual Tape Machines (VTM): Getting That "Finished" Sound

People love to throw around words like "warmth" and "analog vibe." Virtual Tape Machines delivers, but let’s talk about what’s actually happening. VTM emulates the sound of analog tape, which adds subtle harmonic saturation, gentle compression (especially in the low end), and a natural rounding of harsh high frequencies.

Where to Use VTM

• Mix Bus: This is the most common use. Slap it on your master fader. Set it to 15 IPS (inches per second) for a tighter low-end response, which is great for metal. The FG9 (Studer) model is a classic choice. Don't overdo it—just tickling the meter into the yellow on the loudest parts of your song is enough to add cohesion and a polished sheen.
• Drum Bus: To get more character, try the 30 IPS setting and drive the input a little harder. This will add more noticeable saturation and can really help tame overly bright cymbals in a pleasing way.

VerbSuite Classics: Space Without the Mud

Reverb in metal can be tricky. You want depth and space, but you can’t afford to wash everything out in a sea of mud. You need a reverb that sounds incredible right out of the box, and VerbSuite Classics is exactly that. It’s a convolution reverb that uses impulse responses from legendary hardware units.

Go-To Verb for Metal

The Bricasti M7 is a modern classic reverb unit, and its impulse responses included in VerbSuite are pure gold.

• Pro Tip for Vocals & Snares: Load up an M7 plate preset (like "London Plate" or "Sunset Plate"). Put it on an aux send. Send your lead vocal and your snare to it. On the reverb channel itself, use an EQ to high-pass it at around 500Hz and low-pass it around 8-10kHz. This carves out space for the low-end punch of the kick and bass and removes any harsh sizzle, letting the reverb create depth without cluttering the mix.

It’s Not the Plugins, It’s the Producer

Having all these great tools is awesome. But remember, they don't make decisions for you. They won't tell you that your guitars are masking the vocals or that your kick drum is fighting with the bass. That comes from ear training and experience.

The best mixers in the world—guys like Jens Bogren, Nolly Getgood, and Joey Sturgis—use these plugins, but they could get a face-melting mix with a basic DAW setup because their fundamentals are rock solid. They've spent thousands of hours learning the why behind every EQ boost and compression tweak. You can check out the work of many of our Nail The Mix instructors to see who we're talking about.

Watch the Pros Use These Tools in Real Mixes

Reading about settings is one thing. Watching a world-class producer actually dial in these plugins on a real song from a band like Lamb of God or Trivium is a completely different level of education.

At Nail The Mix, that’s exactly what you get. Forget abstract tutorials. You get the raw multi-tracks from a massive metal song every month and get to watch the original producer mix it from scratch, explaining every single decision. You'll see them push the FG-Stress on a drum bus, surgically carve guitars with the FG-S, and dial in the perfect tape saturation on the master.

If you’re ready to stop collecting plugins and start mastering them, check out the full catalog of Nail The Mix sessions and see how the pros really do it.