I’m going to start a new plugin nerdery series: Fanu’s plugin recommendations.
Because there’s a ton of dope plugins I use all the time, and I get asked a lot what I use.
So here’s the first one.
UAD LA3A and LA-2A – my favorite vocal compressors in mixing (I don’t use these on the master bus). I use these a lot to control the dynamic range of recorded vocals. When I get a vocal track that’s unprocessed, the dynamic variation is often large, and that in a song makes it sound immediately “amateurish”. We’ve got used to hearing compressed, smooth vocals. These guys handle the job for you, and I often used them both on a vocal bus. You can use them for smooth vocal leveling, or you can smash things harder and louder into them to get that pleasant “radio voice” type distortion. These can take ungodly amounts of compression, and you can’t “hear” it.
I also love the one-knob operation. If these guys ain’t doing the job…well, they are!
Big ups to @uaudio for great comps!