A quick question on compression.

[Thez_Valken]

Hi all,

Just wondering, After compressing each track, is it advisable to compress the stereo mixdown?
or: Under what circumstances would you compress the master and what circumstances wouldn't you?

FYI:
Rock song, MIDI drums, Bass, 2 guitars, one vocal track.

 

[Ronan]

I alway compress the final mix, but you need to be really careful to make sure that you have a decent comressor for this ( I use a Manley Vari-Mu) I do not comrpess much only a dB or 2 at most since I know it will get limited in mastering.

If you do not have a good compressor that you know really well I would lay off the stereo compression until mastering.

 

[masteringhouse]

Hi all,

Just wondering, After compressing each track, is it advisable to compress the stereo mixdown?
or: Under what circumstances would you compress the master and what circumstances wouldn't you?

FYI:
Rock song, MIDI drums, Bass, 2 guitars, one vocal track.

I agree with Ronan, if you are going to compress it should be with a high quality compressor, of course I feel that this applies to individual tracks as well.

In general I would stay away from overall compression and normalizationfor the overall mix except as a temporary check like if you are comparing your mixes to a commercial CD reference.

My first cardinal rule in audio is:

"Do not do that which cannot be undone"

Once a mix is overcompressed it is very difficult to undo the damage. Even using tricks like expansion will not bring back transient material that has been lost back to it's original form.

That said, my second cardinal rule is:

"There are no rules"

Times where I may use a compressor on a mix is if I was going to a 16 bit format like DAT and I wanted to attempt to use the available bit depth without getting "overs". Another time may be when I like the effect that the compressor has, maybe a pumping quality that works for the song.

I would recommend not using it to just raise the level though if you plan on mastering. There may be situations like a bass guitar track jumping out that will cause the overall level to be brought down when it shouldn't be. A mastering engineer can control this better if the overall mix hasn't been compressed and triggered by tracks that are going to skew the level incorrectly.

 

[Massive Master]

I'm with Tom - If the mix NEEDS IT, use compression judiciously.

Do NOT compress (or limit, or normalize, or Finlalize®, or ANYTHING) just for the sake of sheer volume. If you need it louder, TURN IT UP.

 

[Thez_Valken]

Thanks guys, lots of excellent advise, I'll try it out and let you all know.