compression & reverb question...after sequencing

If I have my tracks already setup (hats on channel 1, snares on channel 2, etc.) and I have a reverb send, where I have so much of the reverb added to my Hats and so much added to my snares and so on...If I have something like an SP 303 and wanted to apply Compression to my overall beat... would it screw up the reverb that I have going to each of my tracks? (un-natural, compressing the reverb...)

If I muted my Reverb send in my DAW and had all my sounds playing DRY with no Reverb and then sent all my solo'd drum parts to the SP 303 (to pick up the COMPRESSION effect) and then back into Ableton on a new audio track... all the drums (hats, kicks, snares, cymbals) would all be on a single track and I would no longer be able to add specific amounts of reverb to each drum part.

Would it actually be more "natural" to get all my drum parts on a single track (as if they were an actual drum set in a real room) and then add Reverb to them all at once on a single channel?

How do you guys go about adding reverb to your drums? All at once or individually? Do ya'll know of any songs or beats that have reverb that is being compressed, so that I could tell if it would be something I could live with hearing or if it sounds really un-natural, particularly coming from the SP samplers...

Appreciate any insight I can get regarding this matter.

i would add reverb like you are through a send.. with a slight bit on hats and snare.. maybe cymbals too... compress the whole drum section but not extreme compression...

then the rest of the samples and bass could get added... and a compressor over the entire master of all of that combined if it needs it... but if there will be an MC on the beat, mix it low enough in volume so you don't need a compressor or even a limiter if possible so that way the whole thing can be compressed after vocal stems have been added.

i see...i don't do any stuff with MC's really, but good info about mixing it low in volume just in case.

I started thinking about... if you're recording drums being played, in a room setting for example, then those drums will have natural reverb on them to begin with... so if you add compression to those drums, you'll actually be going: Reverb -> Compression (which is opposite of what a lot of people do in mixing situations)

Straying over to Side Chain compression... Say you have a bassline, side chained to your kick. If you wanted to compress all your drums at once and have them recorded onto a separate track altogether, (where hats snares kicks, etc. are all on the same channel) what would happen to the sidechaining of the bass and original kick drum? Could you just mute the original kick channel, so the sidechained bass is still getting the kick's signal, so the bass would be ducking still? Because you wouldn't want the original kick played ALONG with the compressed drums (ie the kick within the new compressed drum mix)

It also seems like it would be tricky, trying to line up the original kick sequence with the newly recorded compressed drum track. Even if they are off by a few ms, when the bass would duck (while still being chained to the original kick), it may duck slightly before or after the kick drum that is playing in the new compressed track.

Is there any surefire way to make sure the new recording of the compressed drums, would have the same exact start time? Specifically using the Sp 303 sampler and Ableton Live 9? Would MIDI help in this situation or would it just depend on me going back into Ableton, zooming in as far as I could get, in order make sure they line back up right?

About drum recording:
You are sort of correct. Drums are usually mic'd as individual instruments and THEN as a a single source with room mics/overheads. The reverb will only be heard to a great effect on the room mics. Overheads don't catch the 'verb as much as they catch the whole image of the kit, and spot mics are usually heavily gated/baffled to prevent any bleed/sympathetic overtones or ring.

Your assumption is correct but can be refined. Studio drums are either 100% authentic OR damn near the least natural of all the instruments after a certain point (after all the gating, scoops, boosts and sample replacements...) so it can be hard to tell.

Take a test loop, track it as normal then try a few things out. Make a drum bus in your DAW if you have one and go nuts.