Recording - June 2016 - 22

I grew up playing electric guitar, and for me
a good guitar tone was just as important as the
playing itself. The interaction between playing
dynamics and tone was essential, and this
practice carries over to my use of distortion in
mixing. Even on instruments other than guitar-
including and especially vocal tracks-I love a
tone just on the edge of breaking up, where
louder, more dynamic passages are distorting
audibly but softer passages are cleaner. Gain

Figure 2: Softube's Saturation Knob plugin-sweet, simple, and free.

Figure 3: The RedLightDist distortion plugin
bundled with PreSonus Studio One. Note the
Mix wet/dry control in the bottom right.

Figure 4: Studio One's Channel Editor
routing view.
22

RECORDING JUNE 2016

structure and dynamics, and how the recordings respond to both over time, are
essential to dial in a sound like this. You have to "hit" the distortion generator with
just the right amount of gain, and the results can sound exquisite when done right.
Parallel processing: it's not just for compression any more
So what are the best ways to accomplish this in a mix? Occasionally it makes
sense to put a lot of distortion onto a sound as an intentional effect, but for
warming up clean tracks without the obvious characteristics of distortion being
discernible, we will usually opt for parallel processing. This approach, as with
compression or other effects, maintains the integrity of the original signal, but
enhances its tone by providing additional harmonic content tucked in just the
right amount with the original signal.
The simplest way to achieve this technique is to set up an effects bus, and route
any audio that needs warming up to that bus. Sometimes it is just one track, or
you can send multiple tracks to it. One up-and-coming DAW is in large part based
on this concept. Harrison MixBus (shown in Figure 1 and reviewed September
2015) began with the full-featured, open-source Ardour DAW, but Harrison was
the first to integrate extensive expertise with analog and digital mixing technology
to create a platform with this sort of tone-enhancing distortion built into the DAW.
While sometimes parallel distortion works well alongside parallel compression-
or even sometimes with both compression and distortion in the same bus chain-it
is important to distinguish between the sounds of distortion and compression, as
well as how compression and distortion interact with one another. For instance, if
you hit a distortion plug-in before a compressor, there will be a wider dynamic
range to explore a wider range of saturation than if you compress it first, which
makes for a smaller dynamic range and more consistent saturation.
Many classic compressors add quite a bit of their own distortion, which is a
big part of their tone and hence their mystique. For many years, to warm
things up I'd turn to a parallel compressor, but these days I'm more likely to
turn to parallel distortion.
Once you have the tone and amount of saturation dialed in, you can then
sculpt it a bit with EQ. I will nearly always use both a highpass and a lowpass
filter; the harmonics I am looking for are usually in the midrange more than
anything, though this can vary. In most cases we are after a smoother distortion, not a harsh, ugly tone (though this is, of course, subjective!).
If the tone seems harsh no matter where the gain is set, then one solution is
to notch out offending frequencies. These are often caused by comb filtering
from poor room acoustics present during tracking, since they are often much
louder than other frequencies and will therefore trigger distortion sooner. In
other words, they are adding additional harmonic content to already problematic frequencies. Get rid of them with a narrow, steep EQ cut before the distortion plug-in, and often the resulting distortion will sound much smoother.
This method of using a bus for the parallel distortion effect is necessary with
plug-ins that don't have a wet/dry control, one (free!) example of which is
Softube Saturation Knob (see Figure 2). I also will sometimes use guitar amp
simulation plug-ins of one type or another on the bus to achieve the distortion I
am looking for.
Dirty it in the mix
A second way to add parallel distortion is to simply use a distortion plug-in
that has a wet/dry mix control. SoundToys Decapitator is a popular choice
here, and I also like the RedLightDist plug-in that comes with PreSonus Studio
One (see figure 3). With plug-ins like this, I will begin by setting them to 100%
wet to dial in the tone I want to add.
Here, selecting the type of distortion (most plug-ins offer multiple types of saturation), manipulating the drive and gain structure, and also the lowpass and
highpass filter combination, allows me to get very close to what I want. Shown
here is a 3-stage op amp solid state distortion, which is more subtle than a
tube setting. Try the different types to get a feel for what the track needs, and
fine tune to taste.
Once I have the distorted signal dialed in, I then back off to 100% dry to
reset my ears for a bit. Finally, I slowly increase the wetness, adding distortion
to fill out and fatten up the tone to taste.
Studio One's Channel Layout
As a heavy user of PreSonus' Studio One DAW, I'm very excited about a
third option to achieve parallel distortion introduced with version 3.1 (3.2 is current as of this writing and is reviewed elsewhere in this issue). The new
"Channel Layout" feature allows me to dial in any combination of series and/or

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