Originally Posted By: Gordon Scott
I feel exactly the same also about the amount of compression and 'ducking' used in so many modern recordings. It makes me feel like someone is squeezing my head.

I can't vouch for the accuracy of the story, but I remember reading that since so many people listened to music compressed into lossy MP3 format, they actually preferred that sound for cymbals over the true sound, since that's what it "should sound like" to them.

The same thing goes with pitch correction. What I might hear as the sickly-sweet sound of auto-tuning, others hear as normal.

Just last week, I saw a plugin that allowed you to emulate the "classic" sound of pumping, a byproduct of compressors having an overly slow release that's often associated with dance music. It's not usually considered a good thing, but again - people have gotten used to the sound.

Railing against pitch correction seems to me as akin to complaining about drum machines. It's just a tool.

-- David Cuny
My virtual singer development blog

Vocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?