Over the weeks since I got the Warm Audio Bus-Comp, I tried it on everything! First up were entire stereo mixes in Pro Tools as sort of a "faux mastering" processor where the goal was to get the overall mix a little louder with minimal sonic damage. I was able to "pump it up" on average about 3 to 6dB and avoid getting an overly squashed and smaller sound.

Later I tried it on a drum kit mixing bus that had all drum tracks included except the bass drum. It also sounded authentic when used lightly on a set of real drum overheads, acoustic guitars, keyboards, piano, orchestral instruments, and it was also flattering for a big group of background singers.

Even though Bus-Comp is mainly for stereo use, I also tried one channel as a mono compressor on bass guitar. I liked its clean sound--even with massive gain reduction of up to 10dB indicated on the meter. There is an "Engage Transformer" button that inserts two CineMag transformers into the signal path and, depending on the source audio, a sort of "polishing" of the overall sound happens by rounding the attacks and thickening the lower mid-range. It is a nice option to have.

Other controls are: Threshold, Attack Time, Ratio, Release Time (including Auto mode), and Make Up gain. An important feature is the selectable high-pass side-chain filter. It ranges in six steps from Off to 185Hz and prevents the low frequencies from driving the compressor excessively.

Warm Audio does it again with a low cost version of a classic VCA bus compressor. The Warm Audio Bus-Comp sells for $699.