I have always had to hit mute on the spring reverb return channels on the board in quiet passages or at the beginning and end of the song because they are pretty noisy, (think tape hiss, but not as charming).
I have a four channel Drawmer Punch Gate that I bought after I became a fan of Spoon's drum gating techniques, but only had room on my patch bay for two channels of it. Not a problem, I'm just using it for kick and snare.
Then I realized I could permanently cable up the spring reverb units in front of the remaining two channels of gating on the Drawmer and set them to kill the hiss when the signal is gone.
It works really nicely! It also helps me concentrate on things like balance, and emotional impact when mixing, rather than hitting mute on six things at once when the song is ending.
Hope this helps someone.
Respectfully,
Raymond
