Compressors: necessary or not?
 

I guess it would come down to the needs of the project or style you're working on at the time... but for most electronic genres (especially dnb ;) ), would you say that compressors are a necessary piece of equipment?

If so, are there a good number of software programs or plug-in's that can do the same job @ the same quality?

Thanks!

Yes, and yes...

If you know how to use a compressor, they are extremely helpful regardless of the genre.

And there are plenty of very good quality software compressors. The UAD one's spring to mind, and there are plenty more

I like compressors on busses to 'gel' several individual sounds/parts into one, or to get them to sit nicely with each other. Or to shape their transients or add sustain if needs be. I also sometimes quite like the rather unconventional method of placing a reverb before the compressor, it really gives it loads of depth if used sparingly.
I also like using multiband compressors almost as a dynamic EQ.

Quite like the un-subtle aspect of compressors, and haven't really found many software compressors that 'pump' easily. The only one I use in that sense is Cubase's own rough n ready 'VST Dynamics' plugin.

I hope your joking ?!
Compressors are very important but hard to understand..
Watch these two Videos to understand more
Its to do with the Reaper compressor but the theory is the same

http://www.cockos.com/wiki/index.php...ReaComp_Basics
http://www.cockos.com/wiki/index.php..._Using_ReaComp

There was an article on the Radio One news yesterday about a group of Sound Engineers that are trying to get a motion to reduce the amount of compression used on tracks. They claim that it is dangerous to people listening to the music in headphones.

They must be making quite an impact if they made it onto Radio One news...

wtf lol imho

Compressors are a godsend and also the devil's work. You just have to know and trust your monitors and mixing environment 100%.
Very difficult to tweak a compressor correctly and not overdo it. I also put all guitars and vocals through a Joe Meek VC3 direct.

I don't think hardware compressor are necessary when tracking synths and samplers.
I would prefer a verity of different flavorers in software form.

Uad1 has some great compressors emulated after vintage HW,
Sonalksis over some amazing tools for a great price ,Blue tubes aswell.

They've got a point. Modern mastering seems to be all about making the album as loud as possible which usually involves compressing the living fuck out of everything. Which means that when you are listening through headphones it's constant loud noise. Also means that the albums are fatiguing to listen to and sound pretty shitty.

That is different to using compression when recording though.

"Recording and mixing: necessary or not?"