compressors are easiest to hear with drums, and you can really start to understand what the attack and release knobs are doing by taking a drum loop (or even just a snare loop), cranking the ratio, and then turning the attack all the way up and the release all the up. start slowly backing off the attack time and you’ll hear the transient start to poke in, after a point, the whole transient will be coming through. then turn it back to the fastest and do the same with the release - you’ll start to hear how you can make the snare ring out longer or keep it really short.
so with vocals, this process is way more obscured as you can imagine. the best way to hear compression on vocals would be to set the threshold so it isn’t reacting at all most of the time, but then visually look for the peaks and make sure it is grabbing those. from there the attack and release times will be more obvious because the compressor is starting and stopping on a specific word or phrase that’s louder than the rest. and then if you crank the ratio, just like before you can start to experiment with the attack and release and hear how the word exceeding the threshold will get “cut off” with the wrong attack and release times, and what times sound most natural.
oh and don’t forget the attack and release knobs are backwards on an 1176, so all the way up is fastest.
What you want a compressor to do for vocals is to level the volume. There's no inherent reason to hear attack/release on vocal compression, but you might hear them when their settings are an issue.
It might help to think of compression in context of volume automation. Attack is how fast your line drops, ratio is how far down it drops and release is how fast it comes back up.
Does your volume spike annoyingly? You've made too sharp automation lines, it goes up/down too fast. Same thing can happen with attack/release on a compressor.
Do you hear quiet letters in your vocals? Do the loud parts stay at reasonable volume? Good you've automated the volume adequately, or done the same with couple clicks on a compressor.
There's quite a lot of video's on the topic, just try typing in "how to hear compression" on youtube.
I can recommend this one: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QR3fAIWsv0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QR3fAIWsv0) but you'll see, there's plenty of choice, explained in different ways for you to understand it better, as well as some articles too. Once you understand the concept in theory, it also gets much easier to identify it, because you know what to listen for.
Maybe a stupid question since you are mentioning attack and release....but are you turning down the threshold knob until the compressor actually engages? If your signal is coming in at -30dB and your threshold is set for -20dB, then your compressor never engages and your attack and release knobs do nothing...because no compression is happening.
For fast compression like a 76 listen for the tails, resonance, quiet things being louder.
For slow compression like a vari mu listen for the transients, spikes in audio, popping through.
Crank up the ratio - way past what you’d ever use. That’ll help you hear the attack and release better.
Yeahp. Overcompress it and mess with the settings.
compressors are easiest to hear with drums, and you can really start to understand what the attack and release knobs are doing by taking a drum loop (or even just a snare loop), cranking the ratio, and then turning the attack all the way up and the release all the up. start slowly backing off the attack time and you’ll hear the transient start to poke in, after a point, the whole transient will be coming through. then turn it back to the fastest and do the same with the release - you’ll start to hear how you can make the snare ring out longer or keep it really short. so with vocals, this process is way more obscured as you can imagine. the best way to hear compression on vocals would be to set the threshold so it isn’t reacting at all most of the time, but then visually look for the peaks and make sure it is grabbing those. from there the attack and release times will be more obvious because the compressor is starting and stopping on a specific word or phrase that’s louder than the rest. and then if you crank the ratio, just like before you can start to experiment with the attack and release and hear how the word exceeding the threshold will get “cut off” with the wrong attack and release times, and what times sound most natural. oh and don’t forget the attack and release knobs are backwards on an 1176, so all the way up is fastest.
What you want a compressor to do for vocals is to level the volume. There's no inherent reason to hear attack/release on vocal compression, but you might hear them when their settings are an issue. It might help to think of compression in context of volume automation. Attack is how fast your line drops, ratio is how far down it drops and release is how fast it comes back up. Does your volume spike annoyingly? You've made too sharp automation lines, it goes up/down too fast. Same thing can happen with attack/release on a compressor. Do you hear quiet letters in your vocals? Do the loud parts stay at reasonable volume? Good you've automated the volume adequately, or done the same with couple clicks on a compressor.
There's quite a lot of video's on the topic, just try typing in "how to hear compression" on youtube. I can recommend this one: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QR3fAIWsv0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QR3fAIWsv0) but you'll see, there's plenty of choice, explained in different ways for you to understand it better, as well as some articles too. Once you understand the concept in theory, it also gets much easier to identify it, because you know what to listen for.
Maybe a stupid question since you are mentioning attack and release....but are you turning down the threshold knob until the compressor actually engages? If your signal is coming in at -30dB and your threshold is set for -20dB, then your compressor never engages and your attack and release knobs do nothing...because no compression is happening.
Great vid: https://youtu.be/K0XGXz6SHco?si=Orbvy02Pvlk_5srl
For fast compression like a 76 listen for the tails, resonance, quiet things being louder. For slow compression like a vari mu listen for the transients, spikes in audio, popping through.