Bass is one of the instruments that has always worked well with the original Fairchild. You will find
that settings 1,2 or 3 feel very similar to an original 660 or 670. Settings 4 and 5 always had to slow
of a release for bass guitar in my opinion. The same is true on the UnFairchild. The VAR1 - VAR4 al-
low me to do my favorite slow attack/fast release settings for bass. It is really nice for acoustic bass
when you want to accentuate the “thump” of the finger pluck. For this I like VAR2 with an attack of
about 6 or 7 and a release of 1 or 2. It is a great punchy thick bass sound.
Again, this is another situation where the Side Chain feature can make a big difference. If you
boost the 2k-5k range on the side chain, then the compressor will better grab the occasional “Clack”
sound that happens when the bass player bounces the string off of the fret board or pick up. You
can also remove sub frequencies in the side chain to help balance out a bass sound that is over
emphasizing the higher notes.
The UnFairchild has yielded great results for both electric and acoustic guitar.
For electric guitar, I like the slower attack times paired with a slower release time. VAR2 or VAR3 are
great starting points for this. You can get that cool punch when the distorted guitar first comes
in and then it will hold in place after that. For this, sometimes the FEEDFORWARD mode is really
effective. It gets even more of that dbx 160 smack when the guitar first comes in. For clean elec-
tric guitars there is a cool thing that happens with the really fast attack times. Sometimes I find
clean electric guitars to be to pointed sounding and I like to use a limiter type setting to smooth
the attacks. For this, the attack needs to be REALLY fast. Fortunately, VAR1 can provide you with
this effect. VAR1 is with an attack setting on the lower panel of “1”. Is fast enough catch most any
transients and can totally smooth out an unwieldy percussive sound. It is really beautiful on clean
electric guitars.
The UnFairchild has been exceptionally good on Acoustic Guitar. When I am trying to get a really
aggressive acoustic guitar sound (ala Polythene Pam or Space Oddity). Not suprisingly, Settings
1 and 2 are really great for this because they have been used for acoustic guitars a lot over the
years. With the VAR2 setting I can get more punch by slowing the attack and keeping the release a
bit faster. An attack around 5 or 6 with a release around 1 or 2 is great for that. I can play with the
overall gain verses the threshold to get the right balance of compression verses grit/distortion. Be-
cause of the longer release time, VAR4 can be really good for some overall levelling without really
sounding compressed. All of my original Fairchild favorites for acoustic guitar (1,2,3 or 6) feel very
much the same on the UnFairchild.
BASS
GUITAR
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