Adding front end Attack (Compression?)

[rnilson]

I am playing a very fast driving tune and I want the bass to drive the sound. I would like my attack to sound like a bass drum hard attack with a quick, but tapered decay. It seems difficult with the effects I am using (octave down, low pass filter, gated fuzz). It is more of a swell than a front end punch. Can I fix this with compression? If so what compressor?

[Mark Olson]

I think compressor would be more like the opposite of what you're looking for. A bass expander is I think what you're looking for, check out the EHX Steal Leather.

[bongomania]

Tough call with all the fx. I think actually a combination of compression and expansion/gating would be needed. There's no one pedal that would do it (other than maybe the Pigtronix ADSR, I'm not sure); and I wouldn't even really recommend two pedals (although it could be done). The cheapest and most effective method would be a rack unit that contains a compressor with adjustable attack, threshold, and ratio, and a gate with adjustable attack and threshold. Of course then there's the hassle of running cables to and from the rack, and the question of whether a given rack unit will interface well with the instrument-level signal from the fx pedals, etc.

If you had to pick only one processor to get what you want, then I would go with one of these:

1) a gate with adjustable attack and threshold
2) a compressor with adjustable attack, threshold, and ratio

The idea in each case to to turn the overall envelope into more of a hard square. I can't tell you exact settings, but you would need to listen and observe as you adjusted the parameters with the goal of that hard square wave.