I use Tracktion 2 for all my recording needs. It came free with my soundcard, and is a joy to use. The built in EQ is pretty good, and very intuitive. The MDA plugins included, however, leave a lot to be desired. For those of you interested in this sort of thing (hi Andy), I present to you my list of usable free VST plugins to get you started:
- Steroid Bouncer - processing for stereo tracks that aren't really stereo, i.e. bass direct and mic'd amp
- Cyanide - simple sigmoid type distortion
- endorphin - excellent dual band compressor, intuitive controls, good for heavy squashing
- Bionic Delay - nice dub type delay - make left and right delay times different and you can get nice Haas effect placement
- newB - bass enhancer, can be good if used subtly
- Freeverb - the daddy of free reverbs. Only really has one sound (medium room) but it's a good one
- Ambience - good reverb for when you want an obvious effect
- SIR - impulse reverb. Get impluses here and here.
- Tapeworm - Mellotron VST. Nice flutes
