Denver Recording Studio

Greetings recording community and gear junkies alike. Last time we started talking about how the NY style of compression works and talked about the process of re-recording a stereo drum track and making sure that it is in phase with the original track. So, now that we have a duplicate track set up in phase with our original tracks we can apply our compression and add our new track back into the mix.  What youll want to do is smash the new stereo track, dont be afraid to liberally apply compression. Crank the ratio, and threshold until you really see the compressor working everytime a transient strike occurs. Try setting your attack time around 10-15 milliseconds and your release time about 50 ms. Next put and eq after the compressor on the stereo track and try adding about +10 db at 100Hz and +10 db at about 10 kHz. This is a good starting point, dont be afraid to experiment though. Once this is done bring the fader for the stereo track all the way down and then back up until you find a desirable spot for it in the mix. What we are looking for here is that we get a good strong transient attack from our original takes and then we get some length and depth from our compressed track sitting just a little underneath the mix. When done right It can really add some umph to your drums and also just helps glue things together making it easier to build a mix on top of your drum tracks. Have fun and experiment until it settles in with you, I have found this and extremely helpfull tool when I have either a wimpy sounding kit or a performance thats less than tight. Thanks for reading, until next time- guitar junkie