The History of Music Production Effects Processing (Section 4 Introduction)
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This section is very lengthy. Please take at least two weeks to go over all the material and to practice with the various effects.
It’s important not to be too narrow-minded when it comes to effects processing. The volume fader can be just as powerful an effect as a grain delay frequency shifter. Like so many other parts of music production it’s all about context. Do you want the reverb effect to really stand out or would you prefer the listener to not even know it’s there? There are so many questions you need to ask every time you think a sound needs additional processing. This is partly the reason why this section is so long. It’s easy to randomly throw effects at sounds and get something cool. The problem is a bunch of really cool sounds may not blend well together into a song. Understanding what your effects are capable of really helps you make important determinations about how you process all the sounds in order to make a full song.
Just remember for something to sound big something else has to sound small…for something to sound bright something else has to sound dull. In one record the brightest sound might be considered incredibly dull in another (compare grunge to modern pop).
But effects processing can also just be about having fun. As long as you understand the parameters there are NO rules. If you are able to get the desired effect or sound you are after there is no such thing as a wrong setting.