i've never had actual faders so i would know how to do what you do
having always mixed in the box i would try to use automation to do what you are describing.
Well, I should explain myself better, probably; when mixing ITB (which is most of what I do these days also), I consider the gain automation track as being "the fader", and a typical gain automation track for me winds up looking like a Six Flags roller coaster
. Well, OK, maybe that's a wee bit of an exaggeration
, but the point is that for my particular style of mixing, I depend greatly upon gain automation, and if I'm producing, I prefer to add a lot of "texture" to the mix through selective automation curves.
It's funny, because there is this perception that this is a "slow" way of doing things. I was, coincidently enough, almost accused of that by my producer just about a week ago or so, but only because the producer was used to working with an engineer that only rarely used automation. But once he saw me do what he wanted using automation just as fast as the method his other guy used, it seemed to shut him up pretty quickly
.
which makes me think that...
riding faders and mix compression may achieve similar results as both are ways of dynamically reducing voulme levels. on is general and automated (compression) the other is granular and dynamic (riding).
That's only a small part of it. Yes, automation can be used to keep dynamic levels even, and yes that is part of what I sometimes use it for. But for me it goes way beyond that. I don't use automation to keep tracks flat so much as I use it to support, reinforce or even customize the arrangement itself.
A good arrangement doesn't just expect all the instruments to be at the same relative volume to each other at all times. And when you add the human performance element where this fill or that lick may make this or that instrument provide a naturally great-sounding hook in this or that measure, you have (to my sensibilities) a mix that just begs for more careful, textured mixing than just a big, flat sound with everything glued together in a static relationship.
personally i like everything andy wallace has mixed but then again my favorite bands are:
NIN, Radiohead, Portishead, Jeff Buckley!, The Mars Volta, David Bowie, Elbow, Alice In Chains, Kings of Leon, The Toadies, The Doves, The Police, Soundgarden, Led Zepplin, Rolling Stones, Depeche Mode, A Perfect Circle, Tool, Deftones, The Prodigy, Early RHCP, Rage Against the Machine, Incubus, Pantera, Gorillaz, Black Sabbath, Muse, Stone Temple Pilots, Spoon, The Temptations, The White Stripes, The Commodores, Al Green, Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, etc...
I like many of those acts also, but it's important to separate the *content* from the *production*. It's also important to compare the albums by an act that were engineered or produced by one guy vs. the same act engineered or produced by another.
As far as the older stuff - Commodores, Al Green, etc., I could be wrong, but I believe those were before Wallace got heavily into the whole compression thing.
I like Jeff Buckley, but I personally think that Wallace approached that album wrong (again to my tastes). It's waaaaay too hot and pushed and artificial sounding for that kind of music. For me that was a typical post-70s Wallace production; too in-your-face.
I'm not much into the metallic/heaver bands like Slayer, Pantera, etc.. But it's those metallic bands that benefit the most from the Andy Wallace approach of the last 25 years I think. So maybe those of you that are into recording that stuff, buss compression may make more sense. But for other stuff, it starts sounding awfully "loudness wars" to me.
IMHO, YMMV, HDMI, 1080P, etc.
G.
