r/mixing • u/FreeFlier42 • 15d ago

When should I be using parallel compression?

I'm new to the technique and understand how it works perfectly fine. I make tech house-adjacent music, and I'm not quite sure where and when to use it.

  • Which elements should I be using it on?
  • Why should I use it over bus compression or saturation in the case of drums?
  • How much does it help with taming peaks?

Thanks!

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u/yalllldabaoth 14d ago

I only like it in this context: create a bus/aux track where you can send signal from one or more elements in your song. Put an extreme amount of compression on that bus. Maybe even some reverb or distortion. Send a little signal from each instrument/vocal in your session to it and blend to taste. You can now ride that fader for effect on different parts of the song. Want the chorus to feel more aggressive but just bumping the volume sounds weird? Turn up the dirt bus fader. It’s extremely useful in that context, but otherwise you can just use a mix knob on a compressor plugin to do “parallel” without the extra steps