Compression is a powerful, sometimes helpful and sometimes dangerous, audio effect for giving your audio a great deal more perceived presence, shine, polish, and production. In this article I’m going to cover why compression is so effective, why it’s so abused, and how to get the most out of it without going overboard to make your mixes sound better.

Compression gets its name from the fact that it literally compresses the wave form of your song in regards to its dynamics. The dynamic range of a song refers to the disparity between the loudest and softest moments of it as measured in dB of volume. Dynamic range is a great thing to pursue in the recording and mixing stage of a song because it makes a song sound exciting and engaging to the human ear. The best examples of dynamic range in music lie in classical and orchestral performed music which is comprised of quiet to loud swells, crescendos, and everything in between.

Many people appreciate classical music for this very reason, because it takes their ears on a journey and engages them on a level which most pop music has no business doing.

Just look at this waveform of the same song (in stereo) below. The top two forms represent the uncompressed song. The bottom two represent the same song but with too much compression. It’s difficult to identify what was initially the quieter part of the song as that dynamic range has been removed so that the waveform looks like one never changing piece of sound. In other words, using too much compression can remove the identity of the music.

There is such a thing as too much dynamic range, however, and when a mastering engineer encounters one such song, they can apply a bit or a lot of compression to it to smooth everything out and make the entire track a bit more uniform top to bottom. This gives the song a sense of stability which is often perceived as a glossier or more professional sound with a great deal more presence, making compressors one of the most powerful tools at a mastering engineer’s disposal, provided that they don’t go overboard.

Speaking of going overboard with compression, I previously mentioned that plenty of dynamic range is perceived as being exciting and engaging to the human ear. It keeps the listener’s ears “on their toes” so to speak.

This is in contrast to a mix which suffers from very little dynamic range, meaning it all plays at the near same (typically loud) volume for the entire track. This lack of range means you’re listening to the song at near the same volume the whole way through, and conversely to having dynamic range, having too little range means that it’s difficult to distinguish any difference in a song as it progresses, and the listener’s ears quickly become fatigued at hearing the same level throughout.

Applying too much compression to a track literally squishes the wavelengths to the point where any difference in volume is imperceptible. This is where you get that big fat block of sound which doesn’t have any peaks or valleys, it’s just one long plateau of noise. This is the shape which you want to avoid in your own music.

The problem is that loudness wars have dictated that albums continue to grow louder and louder and compression has been a major culprit in achieving this effect in order to keep up with other contemporary records of the day. It takes a very skilled mastering engineer to get the most out of compression and find that sweet spot where it’s just enough glue the track needs and not a fraction of a dB of sacrificed range more.

Our engineers at Online-Audio-Mastering.com know how to preserve your song’s dynamics with just the right amount of compression, EQ, and other effects to unlock the true and full potential of your music. Discover that true potential for yourself at no risk or cost to you by submitting one of your songs for a free sample master from us today to decide if our engineers are the right fit for your music.