Don’t let the title of this article fool you. It’s not about compressors. Well, it is and it isn’t. It’s about all DSPs in general and whether or not you really need to spend $200 on a compressor or whatever plugin it is you’re thinking of getting.
If you recall, if you’ve been following my articles on a regular basis, I wrote one on using effects effectively. So this isn’t going to be a tutorial on using this stuff. It’s more about your ears. I know meters are there for a reason and yeah, it’s great to know what your sound looks like. I personally love my graphic EQ so I can draw my line just the way I want it depending on what the sound “looks” like.
But it still ultimately comes down to the sound. And the ultimate question I’m going to ask today is this. Is the sound that you get from a $200 thingamajig going to be $200 better than the sound you get from a free or relatively cheap plugin?
Now, with synths, for the most part, the answer is quite obvious. After having downloaded hundreds of free synths, with the exception of very few, sound wise, the top of the line synths blow the free ones away. Yes, there are exceptions. I have a few free synths, including Synth1 and Sonigen Modular, just to name two, that sound very good. But for the most part, free synths are pretty bad.
But I haven’t found the same to be true with DSPs. Now maybe that’s because what a DSP does is relatively subtle compared to the rich filters and oscillators of the top synths.
Now granted, I don’t own many “premium” DSPs. In fact, you can probably count them on one hand. Now part of that has to do with how many of these things you really need for music production.
I mean really, what do you really need to do basic music production? In my opinion, these are the only DSPs that are absolutely essential for getting a good sound out of your mix.
EQ
Gate
Delay
Reverb
Compressor
Limiter
That’s it. Six plugins. If you have these six plugins you pretty much have the essentials.
Now, any decent DAW comes with all these things. I know Cubase does. How good are they? Well, I guess that depends on what you’re comparing them to. Personally, I’ve found them satisfactory for getting a good sound out of my mix. They do the job.
When I bought NI’s Complete 9, it came with some plugins that I guess people would call better than free if not premium plugins. Do they sound better than the ones I had previously? The EQ is absolutely much better than the Voxengo Curve EQ that came with Cubase. In fact, comparatively speaking, it’s like the Voxengo doesn’t even do anything. I was genuinely surprised.
But here’s the kicker. I’ve listened to demos of a couple of $100 to $200 EQs. I didn’t hear that much difference between them and the NI Solid State EQ. Certainly not enough to justify plunking down $200 on it.
And this is what really got me thinking. There is no question that a professionally mixed song sounds better than my own. For me to argue this would be foolish and make me look, well, just plain stupid. And I am sure these professional producers use the most expensive equipment in the world.
But how much of that great sound is the equipment and how much of it is the skill of the producer himself?
Let me put it this way? In whose hands will that $200 EQ or compressor sound better in, his or mine? I think the answer is pretty obvious. As good a sound as I’m going to get out of it, the pro is going to get an even better sound.
Okay, let’s now take this one step further.
If the pro is going to get a much better sound out of that $200 EQ or compressor than I will, how much better a sound will I get out of that $200 EQ or compressor than out of my free or cheap plugin? Will it be worth the extra cost?
See, a $200 DSP may technically sound better than your free DSP but that doesn’t mean you’re going to get $200 worth of sound out of it in your hands just like not everybody can get the best sounds out of a $500 synth plugin or a grand piano. The skill of the artist does come into play.
Well, the skill of the producer absolutely comes into play. He knows exactly what knobs to turn and how much. The novice is going to just fumble around and hope for something that sounds good.
But what about us guys who are somewhere in the middle? We’re not pros but we’re not green either. We’ve been mixing music for a while. How much of our money can we soak out of that $200 plugin? For some of us it might be no more than $25. For others, maybe $50 or even $75.
And that’s making a very big assumption that this $200 plugin is actually worth $200.
Come on, let’s face it. We’ve all bought expensive things that turned out to be disappointing. Not everything with a high price tag sounds like it comes with one. Or do I really have to point out how badly old analog synths sounded and how much they cost?
And then there is this? Are YOUR ears even trained to hear the difference between your free limiter and Voxengo’s Elephant? I was only able to tell the difference in side by side tests where they boosted up the DB by +8. Who does that? I don’t. So if I don’t, will the Voxengo, which I think is about $129 right now, sound that much better to me than my free Limiter 6?
If you can’t hear the difference then you can’t produce the difference.
And ultimately, that’s what it comes down to. So download the demos. Try them out. See if you can “hear” the difference. If you can’t, the answer is obvious.
You don’t really need a $200 compressor.
For The Love Of Music,
Steven “Wags” Wagenheim