It’s a really specific sound though and I feel like whenever I hear people trying to emulate it, it just feels sort of contrived and plagiarized. You can get it for a fraction of the cost of an H9000. If you’re trying to approximate the effect, I think Antares Harmony engine is a good place to start.
I think a big part of the sound is just Justin’s voice and how well it lends itself to these kinds of effects.
The dry vocal is fed through to a laptop running Autotune. It’s basically just a harmonizer patch on an Eventide H8000 or 9000 (can’t remember which but I think the algorithm is the same on both) doing the harmony parts, Justin plays the harmonies with a midi controller. But the Messina evolved into its own thing. The Messina is based on Francis’ Prismizer which is really just a specific setting in the Antares Harmony Engine. It’s not really a secret, it just isn’t a single thing.
I think there’s actually a BBC article out there that describes it exactly. It’s You can actually piece together what the Messina is by reading interviews with with Justin, Chris and Francis.
