Gain Stage Acoustic

What it does

An AUv3 that makes electric guitars sound acoustic and makes piezo equipped acoustics sound more natural. You pick the input profile closest to your guitar, single coil at bridge, middle or neck, humbucker, piezo, cigar box or one of two aimed at GeoShred, and it reshapes the tone from there. An eight band EQ, a mono to stereo control, four room reverbs, a peak limiter and a hiss suppressor sit alongside. The App Store lists it as Gain Stage Acoustic, while the video and the icon use the short name GS Acoustic.

In the demo

Jade runs it in AUM on an Ibanez acoustic fitted with a magnetic single coil she finds thin, then on an electric, switching profiles and bypassing to compare. She toggles the hiss suppressor, walks the room sizes, and tries it on GeoShred, on GarageBand’s smart guitar and on SampleTank.

Worth knowing

It reshapes with an algorithm rather than modelling a particular guitar, and the processing adds hiss the suppressor only partly clears. Levels matter: a peak from a hot electric makes it buzz, so the interface gain needs riding.