One of the biggest mastering problems for modern music involves consistency. You’ll get to a place where one part of the track has a fantastic mix, but other sections of it feel muddy or overcrowded because you’ve included more textures.
The fastest way to solve this issue is to use sidechaining. This compressor works to ensure that a specific instrument receives attention relative to the others in the mix.
It also allows you to create music from non-instrument sounds.
What is sidechaining?
Sidechaining is a production technique used in several music genres. It is where an effect gets activated by an audio track. That means it uses an alternative sound source to trigger a processor, set to a threshold that begins once a specific point gets reached.
Sidechain processes let you use the output of one track to alter the compression of another. One of the easiest ways to experiment with this technique is to use the kick to change the bassline.
Most sidechaining efforts use compressors in the context of where the gain of one track needs to get lowered while another keeps playing. It’s a process that is sometimes referred to as ducking.
Although that sidechaining option is the most common, producers have developed other creative ways to incorporate this technique into various mixes. When used appropriately, it becomes a powerful tool for your mixing arsenal because it produces more moments of clarity for the listener.
Sidechaining helps you create more room in the composition
When you have a busy track or a massive soundscape to manage, it is often difficult for other sounds to stand out in the eventual mix. Hi-hats, guitar lines, and woodwinds often get masked because the layers and frequencies don’t have enough separation.
Sidechaining allows you to make room for the mix. When you hear music on the radio, the combination of a big kick, some low-end bass, and frequencies under 20 Hz will create lots of muddiness if they were allowed to play without separation.
Clashing frequencies always reduce the crispness of the eventual mix, causing the melodies and harmonies to get lost in translation.
With sidechaining, you can clear out the clashing frequencies to make whatever sounds you want start popping.
This option also works well for harmonies, loops, and samples on the higher end. You can turn samples into unique rhythms and beats that add extra depth to your eventual mix by sidechaining sounds. Depending on how excessive the compression is when included, you can produce something where the entire piece always makes way for the rhythm.
When you want to achieve a cleaner mix, sidechaining is a helpful tool that helps to get the work finished. It can also be used stylistically to introduce new sounds, concepts, or non-instruments to a track while innovating the role of traditional audio accompaniment. If it gets used too often or aggressively, the result can be tacky – but have some fun to find the balance that works for your creative approach.
