What's a plugin? Where do we put 'em?

Plugins are audio effects that we can apply to instruments and FX channels in the Mixer. If you want your sound to be reverberating and huge, there are effects for that. If you want your instrument or sample to sound dirty and raw, there are plugins for that as well. Plugins are used to help shape the timbre of the sound and give us something more interesting.

Plugins are usually applied to a project when the project is getting ready to mix down. There are exceptions, though. Sometimes, we need to use plugins to take a sound that's vanilla and make it more of a spiced curry. This way when we use that sound in our song, we are more inclined to use it in a more emotionally appropriate way.

When we are using plugins to create a sound we want to play with while we are composing, we usually put it directly on the instrument of choice. Remember this menu?

There's an area called FX that we want to check out.