I used to have all sorts of compressors - cause I love themīut in all honesty… I don’t do “real” drums, or singers or horns… Just synths, drum machines, samplers and stuff… And find it much better to just make sure my sounds don’t need compression to control levels… Only to add glue/extreme paralell comp/and a touch of loudness… I have an Overstayer Stereo VCA inserted on my master bus… Just chewing the occasional 2-3 db…adding that bit of GLUE that somehow makes everything sit right :)) Later…compressors of varying designs began to give NEW options…just think what the French guys did when they discovered that a compressor on the bass - that listened to the kick…could give a new kind of pumping… And that the same trick could change the dullest pad synth to the most draggingly new feeling pumpypad…oh man…things started to happen… And with digital - you could squeeze your whole mix thru a tiny dynamic range of only 2-3 db…making it LOUD… Compression can be anything you need it to be - be it software, or hardware… Opto or vca…they all have their place… But be carefull - don’t kill the dynamic range…'cause that kills the drama, and without drama - no art!

Is the lead allways too loud in the chorus - but not quite loud enough in the verse? That’s where you’d originally use a compressor… To smooth it out a bit - so you could leave the faders in place, To begin with, compression was only invented so that a single mixing engineer could control a whole mix, without riding the gains of more than a few faders!ĭo you often feel the need to move your faders during the different stages of a track?.

Cytomic the glue channel