The Teletronix LA-2A Optical compressor is one of the most venerable pieces of outboard gear in recording history. It has a compression behavior, tone and character that have made it an essential staple for engineers since its release in 1962.
In this puremix exclusive video, world renowned mixing engineer and producer, Fab Dupont, explains what makes the LA-2As compression behavior special, how to listen to the idiosyncrasies of the box, and demonstrates some lesser known features.
Learn how to listen to the Teletronix LA-2A compressor with A/B examples between different plugins and a hardware unit, and discover how to get the most out of this classic in your sessions.
See how Fab Dupont:
Explains how optical compressors work
Breaks down the controls of the LA-2A
Discusses the unique release time characteristics of the LA-2A
Explains the difference between the compress and limit modes
Compares different Universal Audio Plugin emulations to his hardware LA-2A
Explains the emphasis knob and how to use it
Compares the LA-2A with an Oxford compressor to show the differences of an LA-2A
Demonstrates the tone of simply running through the LA-2A without compression
00:00:00 Good morning children!
Today we are going to talk about
the most venerable of desirables.
00:00:05 the LA-2A.
00:00:07 I know what you're thinking.
00:00:08 Could a piece of gear that has
two knobs on it
warrant a whole video for itself?
I don't know. Let's find out.
00:00:23 What is an LA-2A?
It is an opto compressor
an in my opinion, the sound of the LA-2A
comes as much from the tubes
and transformers that are next to the opto
as from the opto itself.
00:00:35 Something I'm gonna
try and show you today.
00:00:37 So, first,
two knobs.
00:00:41 There's a
Peak Reduction knob
and a Gain knob.
00:00:44 Let me show it to you hear
because look,
here's another LA-2A, they're everywhere.
00:00:49 Peak Reduction knob.
00:00:51 Gain knob.
00:00:52 Rather simple.
00:00:54 The way you think about this is,
you input your signal in it,
the opto cell does its thing,
I'm gonna explain
and you choose how much
peak reduction you want,
you compensate with the gain,
and you move on.
00:01:03 For those of you who
have not looked into it
let me do a quick recap
of what an opto cell does.
00:01:08 Imagine a light
and an eye.
00:01:12 You fit signal into the light.
00:01:14 The louder the signal
the brighter the light.
00:01:16 Obviously, the brighter the light
the more the cell will react to it.
00:01:20 And in this circuit
the more the cell reacts to light
the more gain reduction there is.
00:01:27 Simplified but that's what it is.
00:01:29 So, if you have a quiet signal
not a lot of light,
the cell doesn't react a lot.
00:01:33 Not a lot of gain reduction.
00:01:34 For the same threshold
if you have a lot of signal,
a bright light,
the cell freaks out,
brings gain down a lot.
00:01:41 It's really that simple.
00:01:43 And then there's, you know,
idiosyncrasies.
00:01:45 A lot of the sound comes
from the transformers.
00:01:48 When you run any sound
through a transformer
it's gonna change the sound.
00:01:52 And it just so happens
does are UTC transformers
and we like those and
we've been listening to those
UTC transformers for about 60 years
so we got used to them too.
00:02:00 And then there's the tubes.
00:02:01 In the 60s, the way they...
00:02:03 the gain staging and all sorts of
audio electronic design was through
the use of tubes and they have a sound.
00:02:10 So everything contributes
to the sound of the box,
not just the way the gain is reduced.
00:02:14 It's the way the gain is made up,
or the way the side-chain is being fed.
00:02:18 Everything has an impact on the sound
and the speed of the compressor.
00:02:22 As most of you know
and those who don't probably have noticed,
there's no threshold
control on the LA-2A.
00:02:27 There's no input control either.
00:02:29 Whatever you feed to
the input of the machine,
that's your input signal.
00:02:32 So,
better be careful how loud you hit it.
00:02:35 And then there's the Peak Reduction knob.
00:02:36 The Peak Reduction knob
basically takes that input signal
and sends into into the side-chain.
00:02:42 You can think of it
as a volume control into your side-chain.
00:02:45 Remember,
this is a fix threshold compressor.
00:02:48 So the more signal you send
into the side-chain
the more you're gonna hit the threshold.
00:02:53 The more reduction you're gonna get.
00:02:55 That's the basic principle.
00:02:56 And then, you raise the gain to
compensate for your gain loss.
00:02:59 It's really that simple.
00:03:01 There are some idiosyncrasies.
00:03:03 And there are some knobs that
we don't really know what they do.
00:03:05 Like, for example,
I see a lot of people
play with the Compress/Limit knob
on an LA-2A knob and go,
click, click, click
click, click, click,
and then they don't know.
00:03:20 The reason for that is
that it can be pretty simple.
00:03:22 depending on how hard
you're hitting the box.
00:03:25 When the LA-2A is in Compress mode
it's a 4:1 compressor.
00:03:29 When it is in Limit mode
it's infinity to 1.
00:03:32 So, like, limiter, limiter.
00:03:33 The reason why it can be hard to hear
is because when you
hit the box really hard
8 dB of compression at 4:1
and 8 dB of compression
at 12:1 sound erringly similar,
especially since a lot of the tone
of the box comes from
other things other
than the gain reduction,
the transformers and the tubes,
as I've mentioned before.
00:03:55 So, that is the number 1 thing.
00:03:57 So if you don't hear a huge difference
between Limit and Compress
on your LA-2A
it's not you honey
it's supposed to be subtle.
00:04:06 Next,
there's no attack,
there's no release setting on this thing.
00:04:12 Because they are fixed.
00:04:13 The attack is
in the 10 ms range.
00:04:18 It's a little bit frequency dependent,
but you can think of it as a 10 ms thing.
00:04:21 Not that you should think of it.
00:04:23 Why would you think of it
since you can touch it, right?
But it's good to know.
00:04:26 The release,
that's a different best altogether.
00:04:30 The release is very program-dependent.
00:04:32 The first half, if you will,
of the release
is in the 60 ms range.
00:04:37 So, it's pretty fast.
00:04:40 And then,
it gets into
a really really slow release.
00:04:44 I've read of just about everything,
but I can tell you,
that
if looking at that needle on this thing
is any indication
this really could be
up to the minutes for the last few inches.
00:04:57 So,
the program-dependent
release and this very slow release
is part of what gives the box
its sound.
00:05:06 Now, why is it that way?
Well, remember last time
you went outside
in the bright sun
and you stayed outside for a while,
in the bright sun.
00:05:17 Right?
And then you went back
inside where it was darker.
00:05:21 How long did it take for your eye,
eyes - I hope you have both
and if you only have one that's fine -
how long did it take for your
eyes to adjust to the inside light?
Right? So you're
basically blind for a while.
00:05:36 You can think of it
kind of the same way.
00:05:40 If you hit the photocell very hard
then it takes a while
for this very analog, very chemical thing
to get back to its natural state.
00:05:50 How long it takes
to get back to its natural state
is the release time of the box.
00:05:55 Yes, it is that crude.
But you know what?
It's being working
pretty well for 60+ years.
00:06:01 Let's listen to it. Shall we?
We have here the venerable Joey Wunsch.
00:06:13 I picked it on purpose,
it needs compression.
00:06:15 So let's turn the LA-2A on,
this is the Universal Audio
legacy LA 2-A,
the first one they came up with.
00:06:21 The one I learned with because
at the time I didn't have that.
00:06:25 And so this is how I was first
acquainted with the LA-2A.
00:06:32 It compresses.
00:06:33 This is without.
00:06:38 Hear that 'eee'. You hear the pick on...
00:06:42 That's really annoying.
00:06:44 If you turn the LA-2A on.
00:06:45 It's not annoying or not as annoying.
00:06:55 If I switch to limit.
00:07:00 Now it's subtle but check it out.
00:07:02 Check how much of the 'aahh'
gets reduced.
00:07:09 That was compression. Again.
00:07:19 It actually catches more of it
for the same Peak Reduction.
Why is that?
Peak Reduction sends it
into the threshold,
I like where the threshold is at
and in compression the
LA brings it down so much,
in Limit it brings it down more.
00:07:31 It is subtle, but in this case
it is better in Limiter mode.
00:07:36 There are a lot of
different kinds of LA-2As out there.
00:07:39 Because there were many different Revs.
00:07:41 And our good friends at UA actually make
several of those.
00:07:45 Let's compare the differences.
00:07:47 If I do a search for an la-2,
there's the Gray...
00:07:51 And then there's the Silver.
00:07:55 And then we just saw the Legacy.
00:07:57 We're starting here.
00:08:02 Now let's try and match that on the Gray.
00:08:10 You noticed that
between these two plug-ins
the gain scale is completely different,
the lay-out is different,
there's new stuff.
00:08:16 I'm gonna over that in a minute.
00:08:18 So if I wanna match
I'm gonna go into Limit
and obviously the Gray is louder.
00:08:26 And this is the legacy.
00:08:33 I think the Gray is still a little louder.
00:08:36 We'll bring it down a smidgen.
00:08:42 Legacy.
00:08:47 That's close enough for jazz.
00:08:49 Then let's listen to the Silver.
00:08:52 I'll make sure these
other two are bypassed,
turn the Silver on.
00:08:57 It should probably be in Limit.
00:09:06 A little less, OK.
So now, we have the raw signal.
00:09:13 Fair. The Legacy.
00:09:28 What's your favorite?
Now, don't forget,
it's the same T4 opto
cell on all those things.
00:09:35 So the sound differences
come from the circuitry,
the way the side-chain is handled
maybe the transformer's emulation.
Whatever.
00:09:41 Maybe we should listen to the hardware too.
Let's listen to the hardware.
00:09:46 I have this as an insert
so the rig is,
using the Pro Tools I/O system where,
if you have a piece of gear
on the same input
and output channel,
say this is input and output 3,
in input 3
it acts as a plug-in.
00:10:01 For those of you who are
not familiar with Pro Tools.
00:10:03 So now,
all these being bypassed.
00:10:06 I'm actually going through the LA-2A.
00:10:11 It's a little louder.
00:10:18 And it's not compressing as much.
00:10:24 That's too much.
00:10:29 It's a little touchy.
00:10:35 Let's compare with the plug-in.
00:10:36 Say, the Legacy was our ref.
00:10:41 So maybe I'll have to be a little louder.
00:10:43 This is the Legacy.
00:10:55 Let's listen to the Silver.
00:11:00 In my opinion,
the hardware is closer to the Silver.
00:11:05 Or, if you wanna look
at it chronologically
the Silver is closest to the hardware
but we're gonna compare that again.
00:11:11 So, we have now 4 different LA-2As.
00:11:14 And a raw signal. Raw signal.
00:11:20 The Legacy.
00:11:25 Gray.
00:11:30 Silver.
00:11:35 And then the hardware.
00:11:41 This box is worth 11,000+
on Reverb.com right now.
00:11:48 Maybe in two years it
will be worth 8 bucks,
the way it used to be in 1980s
or it will be worth 800
million trillion dollars.
00:11:59 You don't know,
but it's an insane amount of money.
00:12:02 You can get those
plug-ins for quite cheap
Is the difference worth it?
I'll let you decide that,
that's a debate I'm not get into.
00:12:09 However
there are some very
interesting differences between
the hardware and the software,
one of them being the Emphasis knob.
00:12:17 And there are some confusions so
I wanna help with the confusion.
00:12:21 On this box
and on the UA reissue
this knob right here
is actually the adjustment for the meter
so that your meter can be at zero
when there's no gain reduction.
00:12:32 On the plug-in it's the Emphasis control.
00:12:36 And that has confused a lot of people.
00:12:38 What is the Emphasis control?
Back in the day,
and I think still to this day,
FM radio has a pre-emphasis control
that jacks the level up
17 dB at 15 kHz
to compensate for over-modulation,
it's a complicated thing.
00:12:55 So, the LA-2A has,
well,
some LA-2A have a pre-emphasis control
meaning that you can actually
make the compressor more
sensitive to high-end so it compresses
more high-end
so that it's more compatible,
and more useful for FM situations.
00:13:10 All LA-2As ship
with the pre-emphasis
flat,
that's the more musical way to use it
but I have friends who
use the pre-emphasis control
to change the sound and
how much the compressor
compresses.
00:13:25 And that
control is called the R37,
most of the time,
unless your LA-2As
are heavily modded, like mine for example,
that R37 control is in the back.
00:13:36 It's a screw-hole that looks
exactly like this one actually.
00:13:39 And so,
people got confused and
people get even more confused
because now the plug-ins
have that control on the front.
00:13:46 Obviously the plug-ins do not need
a meter reset.
00:13:52 But the emphasis control can be cool.
00:13:54 What happens when
you actually turn this knob
and you have to turn it down, not up?
Well, when you turn it down
the LA-2A becomes
more sensitive to high-end
so if something is super-bright
it's gonna compress more.
00:14:09 That's all it is.
00:14:10 And it's in the front here,
it's in the back here.
00:14:13 This knob that's labeled Emphasis
on this plug-in
here is really the meter thing.
00:14:19 Another thing that a lot of
people get confused about
is a lot of LA-2As
got modified
and have
for example,
mine has an In/Out on the front,
which I personally am found of.
00:14:33 The Limit/Compressor
was on the back for this model,
this is a Rev 1.
00:14:40 So somebody, before me,
put it to the front and promptly
labeled it with something that
erased itself.
00:14:49 So we can sort of make up that I think
this is Comp and I think this is Limit.
00:14:53 It's hard to say.
00:14:54 Most people don't even
touch this because they
don't know what it does.
00:14:58 And then mine has a cool thing,
instead of having +10,
+4 and gain reduction,
mine has the input
on this side of the meter control.
00:15:07 So I can check out how
much signal I send to it.
00:15:14 How much gain reduction.
00:15:19 And then how much signal I sent out.
00:15:25 Which is great for level matching.
00:15:31 Not bad. So, a lot of LA-2As got modified
to bring the Limit knob
in the front
to have I/O, to change the Input
and so it created a bit of a fuzz
for people who walk into studios and say:
'What's this knob?'
And then the plug-in comes out
and then there's the
Emphasis on the front.
00:15:50 So, to set the record straight,
that's the meter adjust
and that's the Emphasis
and unless you're like Reid Shippen
its unlike you're gonna
use the Emphasis this week.
00:16:02 Now, we know
the basic settings.
00:16:06 Why is an LA-2A so much
more desirable than say
a regular compressor like for example,
an Oxford?
Or is it?
Let's see.
00:16:17 Here's my Oxford Dynamics.
00:16:19 I'm gonna compare between the
Oxford Dynamics and the Silver
because it's easier.
00:16:23 I'll get rid of these guys.
00:16:25 Alright. So we know that
it's gonna be about 10 ms
on the attack and about 60
on the release.
00:16:36 Obviously with this
compressor we cannot get
the program-dependent stuff.
00:16:40 but it's close enough for jazz.
00:16:41 And we know we're gonna be at 4:1.
00:16:46 And then,
in this case we're gonna have to bring
the threshold down,
I'm gonna try and match
levels a little bit and see
what are the differences between the two,
can I get it close?
So, for reference this is our Silver.
00:17:04 About three dB of
compression on the big peak.
00:17:07 So, let me lower the threshold
here and try and adjust that for you.
00:17:18 Alright, it's close enough for jazz,
maybe a little more gain here.
00:17:30 Actually,
probably, no gain, is better.
00:17:35 Here we go.
00:17:41 So what we noticed is that the Oxford
is as good as the LA-2
as getting that peak, right?
Oxford...
00:17:56 Almost as good,
maybe I'll lower the
threshold a little bit.
00:18:03 You also notice that
the Oxford grabs more
stuff than the LA-2 does.
00:18:08 So the Oxford comes into action
on lower levels
when the LA-2 is unphased
by those lower levels.
00:18:17 So, there are different idiosyncrasies,
however, I can compress this
with the Oxford and get the result I want.
00:18:27 This is the Silver.
00:18:33 However the sounds are a
little bit different. Why is that?
Because the Oxford is
a 100% digital compressor it doesn't
try to do anything other than
compress or level sounds.
00:18:43 The LA-2,
the UA one especially has a very
precise modulation
of the transformers, the tubes,
and that imparts a quality to the sound.
00:18:55 Now, that is subtle but that
doesn't have to be subtle.
00:18:58 It can do a lot of different things,
let me show you.
00:19:01 Here's Kristin,
formerly of the band By Atoms Moved.
00:19:04 She sounds great.
00:19:16 It was clearly compressed at the recording
but check out some of the consonants.
00:19:27 Especially the 'can't wait'.
00:19:38 Now let's put a Silver on.
00:19:43 And remove the compression.
00:19:46 And match levels, I know from experience
that it's voiced pretty loud.
00:19:50 So, without.
00:19:54 Still too loud.
00:20:00 Maybe it's still a smidgen loud.
00:20:04 I should really reset
this to have the default
at unity but I'm too lazy to do this.
00:20:14 Listen to 'I can't wait'. Without.
00:20:20 Hear that thing that
just sticks out a little bit.
00:20:22 The compression is off, right.
00:20:24 Again.
00:20:29 And even the...
00:20:35 Now with just going through an LA-2
UA Silver plug-in with no compression.
00:20:46 It's smoother. Again.
00:20:47 Flat.
00:20:59 What's going on?
Transformers and tubes,
that's what's going on.
00:21:03 And by the way, then I can compress.
00:21:37 When we started playing the file
clearly it was a lot of compression and
we felt we didn't need more compression
but the transient control
of the LA-2 circuitry
plus a little bit of steadiness, right?
So this compressor is a little slower,
at least on the attack,
than what they used for tracking,
I don't know what they used for tracking.
00:21:55 It creates this kind of steadiness
that's interesting,
you can hear all that 'shh, shh shh'
that comes from heavy
compression with the slow attack.
00:22:02 Let's listen to a bass
to show you what just
the tone of the box does.
00:22:13 The faithful puremixers will
recognize where this bass-line is from.
00:22:21 Hear that?
Hear how loose that second one is?
It just like, bleeds everywhere, right?
So let's use a Gray on this.
00:22:33 Why?
Because form experience
using these boxes and this one
I know that the Silver
is a little brighter
and the Gray is a little
darker and a little thicker.
00:22:43 And for this I like to
use the Gray for bass.
00:22:47 That's just me.
00:22:49 Your experience may vary.
00:22:51 So I'm gonna turn the Peak Reduction off,
I'm gonna try and match this.
00:22:55 Without.
00:22:56 Too loud. Go down.
00:23:01 That's close enough.
00:23:04 Without.
00:23:20 You can hear the note
better and it's more pointy,
it's still a little loose
but a lot less loose
More compact. That is the tubes
and the transformers on this.
And then you can start compressing.
00:23:45 What would the hardware
sound like on this?
Let's figure it out.
00:23:49 I wanna bypass this.
00:23:57 Let's go back to compression.
00:23:59 And a little more compression here.
00:24:05 A little more compression. This is
really finicky compared to the plug-in
which is much easier to set.
00:24:16 Let's compare.
00:24:23 They're more or less the same level.
This is the raw track
Right. So we have that 'brrrr'
on the low note
and then the attacks
are a little disconnected.
00:24:41 Then we listen to the Gray.
00:24:48 Way tighter.
00:24:50 And now we listen to the hardware.
00:24:57 Three very different sounds.
00:24:59 I could go with either the hardware
or the plug-in. Actually most of the time
I use the plug-in because
my hardware unit
is in the tracking room
and I can't really pull it out every day
otherwise I get screamed at
so I use the plug-in very happily.
00:25:11 And I use the Gray on
bass most of the time
because I like that extra little...
00:25:15 Let me show you something
that I see that confuses people.
00:25:18 Here's a bass track.
00:25:31 It could use some compression.
00:25:33 I wanna use a Gray.
00:25:38 This is what I see a lot.
00:25:40 And I see like
a phenomenal amount of
compression and a little bit of make-up.
00:25:45 It sounds like this.
00:26:07 And then people say:
'Oh, it doesn't do much.'
Well,
the needle says it does quite a bit.
00:26:14 What's going on here is
that you're compressing so much
and you're pushing so hard into the box
that basically the opto cell
is flooded with lights
and it's always in compression,
it never really lets go.
00:26:27 So basically what you're doing
is you're... it's just a gain
control it's no longer a compressor.
00:26:32 Well, a compressor is a gain control,
but it's a volume knob,
you're turning your LA-2A
into a volume knob if you hit it so hard.
00:26:38 If you like the sound of the saturation
of the transformers
and tubes being pushed, OK.
00:26:44 In this case you'd rather do this.
00:26:53 Think about it for a second.
00:26:55 You have an opto cell,
you flood it with light,
it's gonna be
blind to any changes that happen.
00:27:02 So it's just gonna compress and compress,
there's no fluctuations,
without the fluctuations
you don't hear the stuff work
because it's just
basically all the way down
all the time.
00:27:12 I see that a lot,
not a good look.
Let's try this for the hardware.
00:27:36 That was the sound of an A-D converter
slightly distorted.
00:27:51 I'll jack up the gain.
00:28:17 So, when pushed like this
the hardware
adds a little heft from its
particular type of transformers.
00:28:25 The hardware is slower, that's why
you get that click at the beginning
on the first attack.
00:28:33 But then when it sits down it's down.
00:28:43 Without.
00:28:58 Or... The plug-in.
00:29:07 Notice the plug-in does not have
that initial ... thing.
00:29:10 So, your mileage may
vary but one thing is for sure,
if you're gonna slam the hell
out of your LA-2A plug-in,
hardware, whatever,
you're not hearing
what the LA-2A can do
you're hearing just the thing going...
00:29:24 and staying there.
00:29:25 Which is not necessarily
what you want, in this case,
might as well, bring the fader down.
00:29:30 unless you're looking for the
sound of the transformers and tubes.
00:29:33 One more thing,
a lot of people are thinking
that
LA-2As are just for bass and vocals.
00:29:39 It just so happens that
the way the attack time functions,
because of the photocell,
and the release time
are
kind of great for vocals
and for bass and it's really
hard to screw up.
00:29:52 However, you could use LA-2As on
whatever you want,
it doesn't matter,
there's not a compressor for this
or a compressor for that,
it's just a compressor,
it compresses and has a tone.
00:30:01 So
I know for a fact that Jim Scott
who's an unbelievable engineer
discusses on a regular basis,
I've seen it on-line,
I've read it somewhere
that they, back in the day
used LA-2As on Mix-busses, check it out.
00:30:17 And I know it's anathema for
a lot of people but I don't care.
00:30:21 It just so happens that we have now
plug-ins and they're stereo.
00:30:26 At the time you had to have 2 of those.
A lot of studios only had 1 of those
and one 1176 and that was that.
That was a good studio.
00:30:32 Now, you know,
there's a lot of gear everywhere.
00:30:35 And plug-ins are stereo by default.
00:30:38 For example,
this is a song you've heard before.
00:30:58 I have a LA-2A Gray here.
With.
00:31:12 Everything benefits.
00:31:14 Even just from the sound of the box.
00:31:24 Listen to the connection of the bass
and the bass drum
and listen to the
relationship between the vocal
and the bass and bass drum.
Without.
00:31:49 By the way, remember I told you
that the Silver is a little brighter?
This was the Gray, this is the Silver.
00:32:25 Pretty wild, right?
And then it gets even more
intense when you go into the chorus,
when there's more compression.
Check it out.
00:32:32 Silver.
00:32:57 Original.
00:33:09 Well, obviously
the raw know sounds like a
cardboard demo
and I like the Gray on this.
00:33:16 I like the Gray on
broadband material quite a bit
and I like to use the Silver
on things that need
a little bit of a push.
00:33:23 Nos as much of a push
as an 1176 would have
but it does give a little bit of a shine,
it's nice.
00:33:29 So, in conclusion,
this two button compressor
is actually deeper than it seems.
00:33:34 I trust you agree.
00:33:36 And
it's an unbelievable tool,
which is probably it's been around
for 60 years and still selling for
small fortunes.
00:33:45 By the way, there's almost
nothing in there. Wanna look?
Yeah, one knob here
and one knob here
and you open it
and it's messy.
00:34:00 It's just a bunch of caps.
00:34:02 The goodies are on the back
the UTC transformers,
the T4 cell
and the tubes.
00:34:10 If I touch this I die.
00:34:11 You can see the sockets from the inside.
00:34:13 But the goods
are on the backside.
And that's it.
00:34:16 That's really what it is,
that's why it's so shallow.
00:34:19 If these were a modern box
everything would be in close,
it would be this deep
and everything would be protected inside.
00:34:25 Pretty fragile box.
They do have those little
cute little, condoms that they
put over the tubes. Those are cute.
00:34:33 So that's it,
that is the LA-2A.
00:34:38 That is the most venerable of desirables.
00:34:41 Et voilà!
Once logged in, you will be able to read all the transcripts jump around in the video.
Fab Dupont is an award-winning NYC based record producer, mixing/mastering engineer and co-founder of pureMix.net.
Fab has been playing, writing, producing and mixing music both live and in studios all over the world. He's worked in cities like Paris, Boston, Brussels, Stockholm, London and New York just to name a few.
He has his own studio called FLUX Studios in the East Village of New York City.
Fab has received many accolades around the world, including wins at the Victoires de la Musique, South African Music awards, Pan African Music Awards, US independent music awards. He also has received Latin Grammy nominations and has worked on many Latin Grammy and Grammy-nominated albums.
I found this very interesting and useful, but I think there's an error in the video - when Fab compares the LA-2A with the Oxford the LA-2A is set to Limit, which as Fab pointed out earlier is a 10:1 ratio, but when trying to match the settings on the Oxford he sets it to 4:1. To get as much GR on the highest peak he has to set the threshold lower, so no wonder the Oxford compresses lower parts of the signal.
So, if I understand correctly, the comparison is void as far as compression is strictly considered. The other differences apply.
Thanks for a great lesson!
Grabuster
2022 Apr 10
Amazing trip on LA-2A comp/limiter !!! I enjoy it a lot…Inlove to see the hardware in action! Merci ;)
rielly.m
2022 Feb 09
Wow I feel like I hear more low end and warmth in the hardware. Seems like the Legacy is the most "unbiased" or clean. Then the silver is prob my fav plugin.
billabong859
2021 Dec 22
Can you please discuss stereo vs. dual mono compression on the mix buss?
I am working on a percussion track with lots of independent instruments in the stereo field. dual mono makes is really different feel. Would be great to get your take on it.
DannyOwl
2021 Nov 09
Simply exceptional...thanks FAB!
gigantemorgante
2021 Nov 04
Subtítulos en español por favor!!!
fuck.mai
2021 Nov 01
spanish please !!
gerard.u
2021 Oct 29
please add the Spanish sub
OldvintageFC
2021 Oct 26
How long will it take to have the subtitles in Spanish?
yann.swerve
2021 Oct 25
Good Videos !!! attention quand tu compares le LA2A avec le comp Oxford, le LA2A est en mode limiter ;-)
surtronomer
2021 Oct 23
How To Listen is my favorite series of a phenomenal platform. Thank you Fab!
diogobenjor
2021 Oct 21
Love this series, thanks Fab!
FabienGirard
2021 Oct 21
Trop bien !
velvetgeorge
2021 Oct 21
Ha! I loved the sound of the smashed bass. LOL
Pearlpassionstudio
2021 Oct 21
Very interesting.....as I own the UA plugin, but this explanation help out even more, thanks
Castor X
2021 Oct 19
Fab is back. Thanks for this wonderful and educational video. Please even more nerdy knowledge. Greetings from Germany.
SebastianA
2021 Oct 18
Thx !
qcarson
2021 Oct 18
LOVE the hair by the way.
Stormwarner
2021 Oct 17
Finally Fab is back. Thx you! :)
Ken Matsuda
2021 Oct 16
Thanks for making this video! It is really helpful to follow what you are pointing out to listen to and then to hear the sound of the hardware and different versions of plugins. When you pointed out the connection between the vocals and the bass and drums with the gray version, I was surprised to hear it so clearly.
jaycarlinmusic
2021 Oct 16
Your timing on this was perfect. I was just thinking "I have all these LA2A's from UA, but I always use the same one. I wonder what the others sound like?" I was playing around first, and then saw your video and compared. Great great stuff. Thanks!
jessrho
2021 Oct 15
Thanks Fab, good stuff!
Kingwhistle
2021 Oct 15
I use the emphasis knob, but I didn't really know how it worked. I move it slightly off of flat and notice it will leave alone some of the low freq transients. Now that I know how it works, I can use this trick better (or maybe not at all).
hughettos
2021 Oct 15
Oleeeee, Welcome back Fab, i'm in love with this series!
rmvstudios2@gmail.com
2021 Oct 15
Does the LA2 A more a Tonal compressor when use with the 1176?
