please don't murder me.... compressor???

[sleewell]

i notice they are used on some of the high gain presets in the helix and QC. when i toggle it on and off its not a night and day type of block but sometimes i do prefer it on, kinda levels things out and you hear the saturation more - is that how you hear it or ? the misha preset in the helix even had the level at like 7 if i remember correctly so it was kinda like another boost.


is that just a modeler thing thats more suited for digital and frfr and recording situations or does anyone use one with pedals and a tube amp and a cab in live band situations? if so which one do you like?

 

[metropolis_4]

I love compressors and I do often use them with overdrive and distortion. It all depends on the sound I’m going for. I tend to mostly use it with distortion if I’m using single coils, it helps balance things out. The sound with it on is a little less “raw”, a little more refined, and has a little less depth to it.

My favorite are 1176 based. They’ve got a quick attack, they aren’t overly squishy, and they give a nice “sparkle” to the tone.

I don’t currently own a digital modeler, and I don’t record. I’m using them with a pedalboard and amp

 

[DrewJD82]

I recently became a pedal compressor fan after over 30 years of not being one, but definitely not on high gain. High gain is compressed already.

I use it on pretty much anything but metal tones, the closest to metal I get with it is using it as a lead ‘boost’ on a Plexi I’m already pushing with other dirt pedals, which can work great for chord work but still lack a bit of sustain/singing quality when it comes to leads.

It can even things out, but it can also go in the opposite direction and squish a tone so much it loses any life/dynamics. It’s been the hardest thing for me to learn to use properly because it can be transparent while still doing what it’s supposed to, good or bad. When I listen to my first studio mixes I just hear a mess of compression as a result of using too much and not hearing what was going on back then.

I currently use the Keeley Compressor +, but I’ll be snagging a Suhr Woodshed Comp soon enough (Andy Wood sig pedal) as he’s using it exactly as I’ve found I dig as well, you can pretty much turn any tone into a lead tone with it.

 

[Mongillo19]

Hey I just added one to my Christmas list

I currently have the Keeley Comp+ listed. Seems to be overall a good choice!

 

[holoholo]

I'm probably regarded but I have a love hate with comps. Sometimes I think they don't do anything, sometimes they sound great. I use one up front for leveling my pickups and it seems to make my strat 2 and 4 positions have more sparkle. Then in the amp block I'll sometimes use the gain enhancer for IEMS or output comp if I'm playing loud at gig volume and need better leveling between clean and dirty and this has helped me sit a lot better in the mix. Also helpful so I don't have to go into every drive or amp block to set levels on the fly in the heat of battle.

 

[spawnofthesith]

I never turn my keeley compressor + off, regardless of amp, guitar, type of tone I'm going for. It literally just makes everything sound better

 

[DrewJD82]

I'm probably regarded but I have a love hate with comps.

I’ve got a bit of that as well, but I’ve come to realize that it stems from my desire to beat on myself until I get the results I want. I’ll think “Just play the damn guitar so it sounds like the compressor is on”….when it’s not really my hands or guitar that’s the culprit of a lack of ‘fullness’ in tone, but the amp and how it needs to be dialed in to get the sound out of it I want.

I definitely don’t view comps as cheating in any way, but I can certainly say my hate aspect comes from the sentiment of believing it’s cheating or an easy way out.

 

[DrewJD82]

Also, for anyone mixing their own music, parallel compression has become my favorite trick for getting things to stand out in a mix and is the one area I’ll use compression on high gain guitars. I mostly use it on drums, but recently started using it on guitars and vocals as well.

I’ll load up a couple busses with a compressor (Waves DBX-160) and put a send on the full drum kit, another for just the kick/snare/toms, then one for guitars and one for vocals. I’ll keep the bus channels at 0, play the song and slowly push them up until each instrument starts popping out of the mix. It’s really minimal but goes a LONG way. Once I’ve got the sounds where I want them to be and adding any additional high end to something will start screwing with it, I’ll rely on a parallel comp.

And my bass tracks are basically walls of compression. There’s 2 compressors, pre and post amp, in my AxeFX bass preset, I track a DI along with the AxeFX audio, compress the shit out of the DI and then route the outputs of both tracks to a bus with another compressor on it.

 

[JiveTurkey]

I'm probably regarded but I have a love hate with comps. Sometimes I think they don't do anything, sometimes they sound great. I use one up front for leveling my pickups and it seems to make my strat 2 and 4 positions have more sparkle. Then in the amp block I'll sometimes use the gain enhancer for IEMS or output comp if I'm playing loud at gig volume and need better leveling between clean and dirty and this has helped me sit a lot better in the mix. Also helpful so I don't have to go into every drive or amp block to set levels on the fly in the heat of battle.

Let's Get Regarded In Here™

 

[JasonE]

I recently became a pedal compressor fan after over 30 years of not being one, but definitely not on high gain. High gain is compressed already.

I use it on pretty much anything but metal tones, the closest to metal I get with it is using it as a lead ‘boost’ on a Plexi I’m already pushing with other dirt pedals, which can work great for chord work but still lack a bit of sustain/singing quality when it comes to leads.

It can even things out, but it can also go in the opposite direction and squish a tone so much it loses any life/dynamics. It’s been the hardest thing for me to learn to use properly because it can be transparent while still doing what it’s supposed to, good or bad. When I listen to my first studio mixes I just hear a mess of compression as a result of using too much and not hearing what was going on back then.

I currently use the Keeley Compressor +, but I’ll be snagging a Suhr Woodshed Comp soon enough (Andy Wood sig pedal) as he’s using it exactly as I’ve found I dig as well, you can pretty much turn any tone into a lead tone with it.

I have one of the Woodshed compressors. It is a very good compressor. It is the one I use the most. I use it with similar settings as to what Andy uses it. I like the attack to be slower than he does. Other than that the settings I use are about the same as his.

I have become a big compressor pedal fan. I used to hate them and I mean HATE. I went down a rabbit hole of buying a bunch of them and focusing on figuring out how to use them. I have used rack mount compressors for a very long time in my sound system (PA) and know how to use them. The biggest issue I have with compressor pedals is they typically don't give you control over the things that matter most to me. I really want a threshold knob on it. So many don't have that. The Woodshed does. The ones without it have to be adjusted differently because they are doing some things in the background that may fight with what you are trying to get it to do. I tend to not use the blend knob on the ones that have it. If I have the other controls set correctly, there is no need for it for me. To me this is a work around for not having the proper controls on the pedal.

I have a pretty good stock of compressor pedals and the Keeley Compressor + is the one I like the least of them all. Their old 4 knob compressor is a better pedal. Their Compressor Pro whips both of the others.

 

[FuzzyAce]

I remember years ago I had built an amp loosely based on a Tweed Super. One of the best, straight up rock tones I ever played/heard was it cranked up and then boosted with a Boss compressor, into a Marshall 4x10. Unfortunately the 4x10 wasn't mine.

 

[JasonE]

I remember years ago I had built an amp loosely based on a Tweed Super. One of the best, straight up rock tones I ever played/heard was it cranked up and then boosted with a Boss compressor, into a Marshall 4x10. Unfortunately the 4x10 wasn't mine.

While just messing around with compressor pedals one day and comparing them I inadvertently drove my Twin Sister into a driven tone from a clean tone. I didn't even have it set that loud. I had never thought about using a compressor pedal for a solo boost or to add some gain/compression to the front of the amp. It worked really well and I learned something about that amp that I had never even thought about.

 

[FuzzyAce]

While just messing around with compressor pedals one day and comparing them I inadvertently drove my Twin Sister into a driven tone from a clean tone. I didn't even have it set that loud. I had never thought about using a compressor pedal for a solo boost or to add some gain/compression to the front of the amp. It worked really well and I learned something about that amp that I had never even thought about.

I tend to prefer compression more so as a boost, other than for the choked, sustainy sound they can sometimes "suffer" from. Even when not boosted I will keep the compression level fairly low most times. But I don't use a compressor that much anyways, unless dealing with a higher headroom clean like a twin reverb or similar.

 

[ChordInversion]

I never enjoyed compressor pedals until I got a BOSS CP-1X. I find it very easy to use to get results I find satisfying.

 

[Sascha Franck]

Compressors are my go-to pre-boosts for pretty much all lead sounds. I like those not squashing the attack but only giving you some more decay. That way the main character stays intact but there's still more "meat" coming from the guitar.

 

[JasonE]

I tend to prefer compression more so as a boost, other than for the choked, sustainy sound they can sometimes "suffer" from. Even when not boosted I will keep the compression level fairly low most times. But I don't use a compressor that much anyways, unless dealing with a higher headroom clean like a twin reverb or similar.

I like to run them so you can't really tell that they are doing anything, until you turn it off. You then know it was doing something you really want it to be doing.

Compressors are my go-to pre-boosts for pretty much all lead sounds. I like those not squashing the attack but only giving you some more decay. That way the main character stays intact but there's still more "meat" coming from the guitar.

This is how I tend to do it too. That is one reason that the threshold is an important thing for them to have for me. I never really go over 4:1, unless I am looking for that quick hard squish for something more like a clean country sound for a Tele. I tend to be around 2:1 to 4:1 but closer to the 2:1 most of the time.

 

[unix-guy]

kinda levels things out

Pretty much what they do...

 

[FuzzyAce]

I like to run them so you can't really tell that they are doing anything, until you turn it off. You then know it was doing something you really want it to be doing.

That's mostly how I like them too. Although I don't mind squeezing a clean tone a bit in a recording, if it calls for it. But that's usually post.