From inSync reader David H:
| "I would like to respond to your advice on running guitar effects, where you suggested running the compressor first in the chain to give a strong signal to the other effects (TTOTD 7/25/97). Actually, this can cause a problem, since any noise in the signal is amplified by the compression. My suggestion is to use noise reduction in the chain before the compressor, which is what we do in our studio, where noise is a critical factor…
Actually, because most guitarist’s rigs contain some pretty noisy effects that add incrementally to the noise, I suggest starting with a good strong signal, but routing noise reduction/expansion then compression last in the chain. This allows the noise reduction to operate on any incremental noise added by the effects, then adding compression for an overall cleaner sound." |
Thanks for your response, David! Certainly, there are a variety of ways to link effects in a chain – probably the best advice is to experiment, and find what works for you, and the particular sound you are going for.
In our (grantedly somewhat purist) opinion, running compression later in the chain has a tendency to degrade earlier effects (this is less true if the compressor you are talking about is a studio-grade unit, versus a stomp box unit), so we’re willing to make the trade off of slightly higher noise produced by running compression first. Also, to the player, it will feel and sound different to place the compressor earlier or later in the chain; this is definitely a fact worth considering when going for the "perfect take".
Adding noise reduction is a good solution to the problem; as you correctly point out guitar effects are often far from clean! Again, our "purist" tendency is not to use noise reduction because of artifacts, but if the situation calls for it, plug it in and go – whatever works is the correct solution!