Compressor Settings

This list is a guide only and must only be used as a starting point…

Either hard or soft knee types (soft knee will be less artificial)
Start with a ratio of around 4:1, and then fine tune it by ear (up to around 8:1 for a hard compressed rock vocal)
Use a fairly fast attack time
Release time would normally be around 0.5 sec
You may find that an untrained vocalist may need up to 12dB gain reduction during loud sections
Vocals are often recorded using compression, but you must be careful not to over compress; you can always add more later, but you cannot take the compression off the recording

Treat in a similar way to vocals, except…
The attack time can be set to between 10-40ms to let the guitar's initial attack through uncompressed
Release time can be between 0.1-0.25 secs
Can be compressed both at recording and mixdown

Either hard or soft knee types
Similar attack times as for acoustic guitar
The release time must be set for the bassist's playing style; short notes will need a fast release time (watch out for the background noise 'pumping')
You may need to increase the ratio to 5:1 or more to control the louder notes

You have to decide what sound you want to achieve; for example, overdrive already has an element of natural compression, so you will need to add very little (or no) compression
Clean electric guitar can be treated very much like acoustic guitar
For sustain, set a fast attack time and a release of around 250ms. Set the ratio from 4:1 upwards, and expect to apply gain reduction up to 20dB

Most synthesized signals don't need compression
Analogue filter sweeps with a lot of resonance will need a ratio of 4:1 or greater, with the threshold set high enough that only the peaks are compressed
A sampler's output does not need compression, but it is a good idea to compress signals before they are sampled

Rock and pop; bass drum and toms are compressed
Dance; bass drum, toms and snare are compressed
Either hard or soft knee types
'Peak' will react quickly to loud transients
Ratio between 4:1 and 6:1
Attack time around 10ms to emphasise the start of each beat
The release time must be faster than the time delay between successive beats; try between 20 and 100ms
Set the threshold so that the quieter beats are being compressed slightly; this will mean the louder beats will be compressed harder

Remember that this is a guide only, and should only be used as a starting point for experimentation; if it sounds right, it is right!