Harrison Mixbus Forum

Hello! Can we discuss bass compression philosophy & technique using the Leveler, Compressor or Limiter included with MB?
A lot of the videos etc I've found deal with either rock, or this new distorted over compressed urban bass. Those *basses are covered. The basses I use cover a lot of other bass heavy music such as old school hip-hop (East & West Coast), R&B, & Neo Soul. We go for a more pure, clean, warm, super solid bass tone in whatever low instrument rules the bottom end. A lot of the sound is leaving it room, but I generally pick a pure sine wave synth, 808 kick, or occasionally the kick drum to be the lowest. Compression wise, some added sustain, not overly slow, nice clean throb.
I used to use the FL Fruity Limiter on the brickwall preset for only this instrument. It was hard & clean. I switched to the Akai MPC software & never found a limiter that clean on that low instrument. T-Racks Brickwall Limiter was close but added distortion. It would've worked perfectly for new school. Not clean enough for me.
I'd been using Slate Digital's FG Stress in pseudo-parallel followed by the Waves CLA 2A.
I want to leave that all behind & get it done in Mixbus.
I'm thinking the Limiter?
Could you guys walk me through your on board compression settings for bass?
Is there a good video on these 3 compressors in use?
Thank you, any reply appreciated.

I think I understand the sound you are describing, but compression settings to achieve that sound can vary quite a bit depending on the player, the instrument, the amp, the room and how it is miced. Really you need to listen to the sound and hear what is not working and then determine which of the available tools will correct the issue.

The best thing you can do is play with all three and learn how they change the sound. Try different attack/ratio/release (depending on mode) at various threshold settings. Switch the compressor on and off to hear how the sound is changed.

Not sure that anyone would be able to help much as there are really only three settings.. threshold, release (I think, I am not in front of 32C) and gain make up. You would really have to experiment and then let us know, lol.

As an aside, I think the dynamics tools in MB and 32C are not necessarily designed to be "clean" (they would have some Harrison colour if I am not mistaken). So whether you like them or not depends on whether you like that colour. On that note I personally wouldn't consider the limiter to be a brick wall limiter, but rather a musical limiter.

For me I haven't yet found a super-clean VST limiter. I notice the distortion on everything I own (L2, BX Limiter etc etc) so let me know if you do find something. The best I have heard is the Sonnox Oxford Limiter. It was impressive but I don't use iLok or have that kind of cash lying around