Preset
A ready-made set of effect settings. Instead of adjusting ten knobs from scratch, you pick a preset (e.g. Warm Vocal, Small Room, Bright Guitar) and it applies a sensible starting point. For your demo, using a preset is completely fine.
Reverb
An effect that simulates acoustic space: the way sound bounces off walls, ceilings, and floors in a room. A small room reverb sounds tight and close. A hall reverb sounds large and open. Adding reverb to a vocal or guitar makes it sound less dry and more placed in a space.
Compression
A compression effect automatically reduces the volume of loud moments and brings up quiet ones, making the overall level more consistent. On a vocal, it means the quiet words are easier to hear and the loud notes don’t jump out uncomfortably.
Levels and Gain
How loud a track or signal is. Every DAW shows a level meter: a bar that bounces up and down as your audio plays. Green = good range. Amber = getting loud, usually still fine. Red = too loud, the audio is clipping and will sound harsh. Turn the track down until it stays green.
Clipping and Distortion (the bad kind)
When a track is too loud, the level meter goes red and the audio clips. You’ll hear it as a harsh, crackling or crunchy sound — not the same as intentional guitar overdrive. Fix: turn the fader down until the meter stays in the green, then re-record.
Panning
The position of a sound in the stereo field: how far left or right it sits. Panning two similar sounds (like a double-tracked vocal) slightly left and right of centre creates a wider, richer stereo effect.
EQ (Equalisation)
An effect that adjusts the balance of different frequencies in a sound: making it brighter or darker, thinner or fuller. Think of it like the bass and treble controls on a speaker, but with much more precision. You don’t need to use EQ for your demo.
