An Empirical Labs Distressor is a pretty versatile unit as is the Crane Song Trakker.

Any great compressor will "pop" and have bad artifacts if it is not adjusted correctly. But my all time flexable favotites are:

Distressor w/Brit mod.
Manley Vari-Mu
Crane Song STC-8
dbx 160SL
LA2A (not as flexable but awesome tone)
TC DBmax

- Bruce -

My vote is for

Cranesong STC8

or

Distressor (brit mod)

Both are v veristile

:)

I must be the only one who doesn't like the Distressor on voice (with or without the British Mode)...and I had four of them before selling two recently.

Personally, for all-around vocals and guitar I would recommend an 1176LN, a LA2A, and a Tubetech CL1B. All three have a different tone and are about as good as it gets at what they each do well.

Jon

John, he is after ONE versitile unit!

:)

I personaly, one day, want an EAR compressor, it's a Fairchild style compressor.. And they are known as THE top of the pile.. while an origional mono fairchild unit may run to over $20,000 and stereo units MUCH more, the EAR is much less.

http://www.earpro.com/cl660.html

If money REALY was of no object, I would buy a stereo Fairchild in a heartbeat.

:)

Originally posted by Julian Standen:
John, he is after ONE versitile unit!

:)
thanks for all the responses my shorlist is the distressor / cranesong trakker or STC-8 at the moment... BTW when I said money was no object I was speaking in the 3-5 K range - 20K+ is in my opinion craaaaaazy...
;)

What do folks around here think of the Pendulum Audio compressor? It never seems to make most people's short list for some reason.

I'd check out the BUZZ Audio SOC 1.1

Jack.

"What do folks around here think of the Pendulum Audio compressor?"

I have heard good reports on that one too.

:)

Jules

Do you have one of these? I was looking at it on the site, and based on the rep of the company, it may be a bargain. What do you think of it?

Originally posted by jack2cannon:
I'd check out the BUZZ Audio SOC 1.1

Jack.

I use an original Joe Meek SC2. It's very colored by I like what it does - that and a Manley tube mic pre in front. I find this combo has a nice character for rock stuff.

I agree with what Jon Atack stated...

As for the 3 mentioned, my vote for 'just one' would be the 1176. It works well with almost anything.

Although the LA2A is great on many sources, there are things it is not appropriate for.

The CL1B is probably the most versatile of the 3 (more knobs), but consequently a little tricker to set up.

Again, for the 'desert island' approach, I would choose the 1176.

YMMV

Exactly.

I agree with Casey's additional points, too.

Jon

I have no friggin idea how to quote here, so;

THE MIX FIX posted:

<>

YMMV

Manley ElOp. Two knobs/channel. Hard to screw up. Sounds warm and sweet. Not an LA2A, but does the job. My .02.

Probably the most versatile compressor on the market today is the Distressor. Old would be the Neve 32264a. If you are doing vocals maybe a CL1B. I don't use compression when tracking guitars, but the few times I had, the CL1B did a nice job of staying out of the way. It is more neutral than colored, if that matters any.