ROUTING EXPERIMENTS

Find out how to funnel, split and combine signals in creative ways with our guide

In today’s world of insanely technical plugins and DAW packages, it’s easy to forget that some of the most hallowed techniques used by producers and engineers today originated from the use (and abuse!) of the auxiliary sends and buses provided by mixing consoles. Parallel compression, gated reverb… many of today’s workhorse techniques came about as the result of flagrant abuses of the norms of technique.

Indeed, revered engineers such as King Tubby and Lee “Scratch” Perry took the use of aux sends and buses to extreme lengths when creating original dub versions of reggae classics back in the 1960s and 70s, turning their mixing consoles into musical instruments in their own right, with on-the-fly tweaking of plate reverbs and tape delays to create dubbed-out soundscapes and feedback loops that came to define whole genres.

There’s obviously tons of scope for adding creativity to your music by using aux sends and buses, but where do you start? Don’t worry – we’ve got your back with our guide to routing, merging and piping signals in unusual ways. Over the next few pages, we’ll help you get up to speed with your sends and buses by running through a heap of great techniques including some awesome sound design chops, explaining the difference between pre- and post-fader sends, and a pile of top send based tips; as well as lifting the lid on some classic manoeuvers you can use from the comfort of your DAW. To complement these golden nuggets of information, we’ve supplied the usual detailed tutorial files, audio examples and tutorial videos so you can follow along with ease. So, let’s get our DAWs fired up and delve deeper into the world of creative routing!