Andrew Scheps Reveals How to Approach Parallel Compression

[@JibberJabJones]

i would kill-KILL-to get an in-person clinic with andrew scheps. when he talks, it's in a language i understand. he's one of the few i truly comprehend when he explains something. and the fact that he's prepared to demistify his art to the extent that he does is so, so rare. everyone else makes it sound so exclusive. andrew scheps makes it accessible.

[@progressionspod]

He does such a good job at explaining things. Put one of those mix with the masters seminars on the wishlist!

[@SantaAnaCreations]

Bro there is nothing to demistify just learn ur craft properly and u will understand and realize 99% of what u hear on youtube about audio is Absolut BS learn ur own tricks and how the tools in the studio actually work and ull realize u dont need most of what people try to feed u

[@diegooliveirabenjamin]

EXTREMELY well put, sir!

[@stridersongs]

This is pure gold!!

[@gnthr7992]

Scheps has a Behringer Model D and also a Behringer Neutron !!! How cool is that !!!!

[@MKD371]

Parallel comp is a great way to manage the RMS levels to give body to a signal and character.

[@toslinked]

good to hear that even scheps isn´t playing the loudness game anymore.

[@progressionspod]

And he did win the loudness war. haha

[@gulagwarlord]

Two things here. Yes, the reason I love compression is it makes the quiet stuff louder, I call it "hype". Two, designing your own kicks and snares and having control of a production from start to finish allows for those kicks and snares that make you laugh every time... and with this new ring mod sidechain stuff, it will really make you smile. Electronic music is crazy.

[@3L3V3NDRUMS]

Great video and such cool tips to parallel compression.

[@SylvanPaul]

This is insightful

[@progressionspod]

Andrew is an insightful person. Check the full interview out if you're into longform. It's my personal favorite conversation on the podcast.

[@SylvanPaul]

@@progressionspoddef will. I always value what he has to say.

[@englishoakrecording]

Andrew's explanation made parallel compression make a lot more sense to me. Thank you :)

[@progressionspod]

He's so great at breaking ideas down!

[@aceedmond8053]

Gonna experiment with this! thanks.

[@progressionspod]

Glad you dug it!

[@TWEAKER01]

Thats's the key: the parallel comp path needs to be fast attack and at least 2:1, if not high higher ratio. And threshold so that on lowest parts of the signal there's *no* gain reduction. ie: the lower the signal, the more the two paths simply *sum* . Thus, lifting the low stuff judiciously also brings up overtones. ie "warmth". Good for adding density - *if* needed.

[@cbrooks0905]

What people should really take from this is that mixing is an art form, and like any artist, whether painting, sculpting, making music, etc, you don't want to become stagnant. For the love of God, do not take what he's saying as "parallel compression now bad". He's simply run his course with it, and now he's on to something else, much the same as how a painter might switch from chalk to pastels. It doesn't mean chalk can no longer make great art; it simply means the artist wants to make great art with a new/different tool/technique. Hope this makes sense

[@progressionspod]

Totally. All of our tastes change over time. I always get frustrated with mix projects that are an album split out across a year, song by song. The earlier mixes feel like another person did them to me. We don't even realize how much we change.

[@cbrooks0905]

@@progressionspod I absolutely know what you mean. I’m working on an album right now, and for the exact reason you just explained, I’m doing it in steps so that each step is done at the same time. I’m producing each song first, then mixing, etc.

[@gordocojones]

@@progressionspod the newer one is in the game, this obviously rings even more true.

[@gordocojones]

I usually squash one and run the other light. Then I set the volume on the squashed one a bit lower so the squashed one is “hidden” under the other one.

[@SantaAnaCreations]

So u double a signal for absolutly no sonic gain if its "hidden" under the other one? Whats the point ur only adding noise not clarity or width. Its almost like some engineers dont actually like sound ...clean clear transparent sound that dosnt hurt ur ears at any level. All that crshed shit is just noise ruining ur dynamics and stereo imaging smh. Try mixing with that and see how much bigher ur sound gets

[@pedrosilvaproductions]

​@@SantaAnaCreationsThats not what they Said. They Said they Run the squashed sound lower volume than the uncompressed sound, just to blend. You dont need to have everything cranked max volume just because you re using parallel compression

[@gordocojones]

@@pedrosilvaproductions exactly. The point is to backfill the sound making it thicker while allowing the transients to be more audible than the compressed signal.

[@LukeSchneiderEWI]

This guy is great ! 👍

[@progressionspod]

One of the best. And a great hang!

[@Denver_Risley]

He has transcended P. Compression.

[@OneFingerSnap]

Am I understanding this wrong or the last sentence by Andrew was a mistake? Shouldn’t it be Fast Attack, Fast Release? Because he says otherwise transients will double up, right?

[@edsohovocals]

I understand Andrew's 'No' as a response to the second part of the question: Q: So, listening to everything you said, I translate as: faster attack though...cause you...are you... [1] do you wanna kill those transients in those parallel tracks or [2] do you wanna let those live? AS: No! [answering 2] Cause it will double them up [if you use slow attack on parallel]... Compressors in general [on insert]: I'm slow attack, fast release [to allow transient, in contrast to fast squashed parallel]

[@zachary963]

I think he means if he’s using a compressor as an insert?

[@danserogermusic104]

@@edsohovocals thanks for clearing that up, I too was not sure if it was a mistake or not

[@estudiosmasterlogic]

Just so I'm clear, when Andrew says he hardly uses parallel compression anymore, does he mean he doesn't use his REAR BUS technique anymore? Or that he doesn't use parallel compression on the master bus anymore? Thanks a lot for sharing.

[@progressionspod]

I took from it that he wasn't using less parallel compression overall. I should have followed up with that in the chat.

[@FashF345]

Hmm, the thumbnail is a bit confusing as Andrew meant "it doesn't matter what it sounds like IN SOLO" and not what it sounds like over all. The thumbnail is causing wrong thoughts.

[@grinpick]

Maybe the takeaway here is that the mix engineer (whether he knows it or not) produces a mix based only partially on absolute guidelines. The rest is based on his aesthetic judgement. But the latter may change over time. Mr. Scheps, refreshingly, is quite aware that his constantly evolving aesthetic judgement plays a significant role.

[@progressionspod]

Totally! We get into some of that in the full interview. They idea that fundamentals guide your learning and once you understand the tools you can break the rules. Ultimately what sounds good is good (Andrew quote). He also brings up that all of the educating he does helps him reflect on how his process has changed over time because he has to verbalize it to people on podcasts and in masterclasses. I hope you dig in on the full chat, it's a personal favorite of mine.

[@PARISONFIRE]

Took me some time to understand but always soloing stuff is just bs. The context is all that matters

[@progressionspod]

💯 Mixing in context is the fastest way to increase quality and decrease amount of time spent. Once you understand that it's the sum of the parts your whole approach changes. I do think you need to do the solo thing until you understand that basics of mixing and how all the processors work, it's all part of the journey.

[@Chaos-Dynamics]

Yeap I need more busses on my console 😢

[@progressionspod]

+50 points for having a console.

[@Chaos-Dynamics]

@ Did five mixes on it today, need one revision. Only has 4 busses but it does the job well 😀

[@robshrock-shirakbari1862]

The reason to keep a lot off of your mix bus, if possible, for me has mostly to do with creating stems (a label requirement) and also when moving to the Atmos mix. For Atmos, I want to work with the stems; but those stems ideally should recreate the stereo mix with little deviation from the final master. If there is a lot on the mix buss, the stem creation won't react the same and the stem levels and dynamic reactions to compressors are incorrect. Otherwise, you have to go through some very complex sidechaining to create stems that react correctly to every step in the mix bus plugin chain. It's not easy to do correctly. It's also a more proper, old school approach to mixing... where you know how to get the sounds at the individual track or group level... and not rely on an extravagant mix bus chain to hold a mix together. Frankly, that's a bit amateur-ish and indicative of people not really being that skilled at actual mixing. For me, the ideal goal is that the stems combine to essentially recreate the final mix; and it's close enough at that point that any final mastering of the stereo mix is minimal.... maybe tiny EQ adjustments and final level. That allows you to better match the Atmos mix to the stereo mix baseline without having to creatively and subjectively rebuild it. While Atmos should sound more exciting and dynamic... if you venture too far from the stereo mix, it is highly likely either the artist or label will reject the Atmos mix for being too far off from the stereo version. You don't want to chase your tail in this stage.

[@progressionspod]

Totally agree with all of this. The aggressive "top down" mixing approach that a lot of people are into is nearly impossible to stem out. I definitely have a fair number of processors on my mix buss, but they aren't doing the work. My stems nearly phase cancel to the mix. In the full interview we touch a bit on the challenge of working on mixes that have been created with aggressive master processing. The files for mix never sound like the rough so you really need to find out what people were doing with the master to even get the balance back. Thanks for jumping in and sharing! I hope you check the full chat out.

[@fakshen1973]

If someone hands you stems, you're going to change the mix anyways. So you put your own hot-sauce on it to your own tastes and go from there. It's a given that stems won't sum up to a full mix. They are stems, not the whole plant.

[@robshrock-shirakbari1862]

@@fakshen1973Nope. Sometimes the requirement is for the stems to recreate the final mix as closely as possible. There is some creative leeway when creating the Atmos mix from stems. But listen to what I'm saying.

[@LoveItDirtyOffroad]

I love the kaleo stuff

[@DrOtumbo]

Caveman said in the end it will double them up?????

[@VinnieLeeStudio]

He means the transients on the smashed track. He lets some transients poke out on the smashed track instead of "use fast attack to kill the transients on the parallel compressor" way, AKA "the right way of using parallel compression". Therefore, if you leave the transients intact on the compressed track (slow attack), when you blend it in with the uncompressed track, the transients on both tracks will double up.

[@DrOtumbo]

@VinnieLeeStudio right, why would you want that?

[@SantaAnaCreations]

Ive tried this whole stupid fad and its stupid and pretty usless i hate it and i can get way better sound without it. You must like crap if u wanna mix in a shitty version of a sound and think that sounds better smh yall are smoking crack all these so called modern technics are dumb and most dont work. I mix properly like Oldschool analog mix engineers and use minimal plugins and processing and my mixes sound light years more transparent, wider and cleaner than pretty much any one else. I mean he said it himself and ive proven it with my mixes. Everyone wonders how i do it and i tell them stop flooding ur mixes with usless plugins and learn how to use the tools of the studio properly dont just use it cuz it looks cool or everyone else uses it

[@siriusfun]

Hardly a fad. It's been around since the 70s and was known as 'New York Compression' back then. It's a technique to achieve a specific sound/goal. Period.

[@MB-pn7tb]

Get a grip of yourself and grow up.