A few notes:
Compression, as hinted at and stated earlier, can be used to make decay 'hide' and bring out attack; if you don't like ringy decaying snare you can just set the attack late and have the compressor pull the decay to a lower volume, setting the release time about as long as you can so that you aren't cutting out the next hit, or just gate it if you really want to cut the tail off and worry less. After doing this you'll have a very big 'smack' and a whole lot less tail; compressing with a fast attack and release, limiting, or clipping will then get the attack to behave the way you want it in the mix.
Attack and release are also important tools against pumping - unless you want the volume to sound like it's being jerked around like a porn star's date, you want your attack and release to be set so that your compressor can handle what you're asking it to do. There are a lot of factors in that, of course, but attack and release are the first things I go to.
For smashing things quickly, you of course have the option of clipping (an effect that doesn't have to sound scratchy or buzzy; the cranked 'tube clean' on old Fenders at high volumes are an example of this - no 'distortion' is audible but the harmonic content is changed and the sound is noticeably compressed), but for sticking to straight compression you might also want to try lookahead compression units - they 'look ahead' at the signal (hence the name), take a certain average measurement, compare that to other dynamic measurements, and then fiddle with the gain accordingly.
The Slipperman FAQ had an analogy relating well to this, worth looking up to be certain. To borrow a few of the Smurfs that were taking care of our loudness in the Getting Your Loudness thread (
http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/andy-sneap/278894-getting-your-loudness.html ), I'll abuse the train of thought slightly:
You have Smurfs in a box with knobs. Their sole purpose in existence is to fiddle with these knobs - knobs that happen to control volume, of all things - according to your wishes. You've given them the Threshold setting, which tells them when to fiddle with knobs; you've given them the Ratio setting, which tells them how much fiddling to do. However, I don't think of Attack and Release knobs as parameters they're given directly; the Smurfs actually have intravenous tubes that sustain them, because feeding compressors would make your clients think you're crazy, and into these intravenous tubes we shoot a dose of amphetamines corresponding to the Attack and Release settings.
In this box, one Smurf just sits there and waits for the threshold to be hit, and when it gets there he smacks the fader down according to the Threshold, Ratio, and Attack parameters; another waits for the signal to drop below the threshold, and smacks the fader out of the first Smurf's hands and back to unity. When you shove more liquid energy into their veins, they move faster... and start to get a little fidgety. And then a little more fidgety. And then they start getting into speed-fueled rages about where the volume should be, fighting over the knobs ruthlessly and maniacally, until they get worn out and lose track of what they're doing while arguing over imaginary Smurfettes and eventually trying to have their way with cute blue hallucinations in fuck-me boots waiting to be abused on the volume knobs... which sounds like pumping to you.
So be nice to your Smurfs - they get lonely in those boxes, and when they start imagining females things are bound to get ugly... giving you a whole new mental image of what's going on in your compressors when things start pumping.
Jeff
), so that's where I thought having the fastest attack would be advantageous; what sayest thou?
