Sonible smart:chain review: drum and vocal mixing

This review tests Sonible smart:chain on a drum kit and a vocal, comparing its suggested processing with the speaker's existing mixes. The speaker treats the plugin as a starting point that still needs mixing knowledge and manual adjustment.

On drums, the reviewer selects the drum kit profile and finds the suggested compression too restrictive. Disabling auto release, reducing the ratio toward 2:1 and adjusting the threshold gives a result he prefers. He also engages saturation and discusses a slower attack to let more transient detail through. After matching output levels, he describes the result as similar to his original processing chain.

The vocal example uses the vocals high profile. The reviewer finds the initial result boxy and compares it with his Pro-Q 3 settings, which cut frequencies between roughly 300 and 600 Hz. He then adds a cut around 300 Hz within smart:chain and discusses de-essing and saturation. External vocal effects remain part of the demonstration, so the comparison does not establish that smart:chain alone replaces the entire vocal mix.

The closing overview briefly covers grouping and auto leveling across multiple instances. The speaker's conclusion is that the suggestions save work, but users still need to judge EQ and compression settings by ear.