5 Minutes To A Better Mix III: EQ Before Compression

Part 12 of 31 – It seems to be the age old question: should you EQ before you compress? Or the other way around? Well there is no right or wrong way to do this. But here’s a suggestion.

Fix The Sound, Then Enhance

My preference, generally speaking, is to place my EQ before my compressor. I like to think of EQ as a way to clean up or fix a track. You can remove offending frequencies and accentuate the better ones. Then you can use compression to enhance or reveal more intentionally what’s left.