Audiobus: Use your music apps together.

What is Audiobus?Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.

Download on the App Store

Audiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.

Counterpoint: iMPC Pro

So I was happy to get my hands on BM3. I've been dying for a good sampler in iOS. I dove in, and I didn't expect its mysteries to be revealed immediately. But it's kind of opaque. It's a shame that auto fades (in and out) that were part of sample chopping in BM2 are gone.

So I found myself (after a BM3 crash trying to meddle with Scenes) playing around with iMPC Pro.

Why, exactly, do we all hate this? I get that Retronyms did something egregious a while ago, and that the thing crashed all the time. (I did see a thread where @MonzoPro recounts losing a day of work in a crash, but it has autosave now?) I came to it later, and it seems rather stable for me. It's quirky, to be sure, with its confusing Session/Program/Sequence naming conventions. I still don't know how to name a song.

But that turntable sampling UI is great, it has Link and midi learn. And an earlier post mentioned an update is imminent. (True @Retronyms ?)

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Comments

  • I don't hate it, but for some reason just never gelled with it. Like you, I find the whole project/program thing confusing, and I could do without the faux floppy disk thing (and the duck as an excuse for not having proper side chain compression), but I did really try to like it! I'm loving BM3 so far though...

  • edited July 2017

    @ExAsperis99 said:

    Why, exactly, do we all hate this? I get that Retronyms did something egregious a while ago, and that the thing crashed all the time. (I did see a thread where @MonzoPro recounts losing DAYS of work in a crash, but it has autosave now?) I came to it later, and it seems rather stable for me. It's quirky, to be sure, with its confusing Session/Program/Sequence naming conventions. I still don't know how to name a song.

    I'm not sure I'm up to date with the latest version (it's not on my pad at the mo), but the last time I used it it crashed and didn't save the song I was working on. Again.

    I think I hate it because of the number of times I've given it a second, third, fourth, fifth etc. chance. It's the wife-beater of music apps. Promises that this time it'll behave if you take it back, and then smacks you in the teeth. I bought it on the day of release, and it came complete with a load of critical bugs that stopped it from being used as advertised, and these weren't fixed for weeks/months. And the workflow...yeah. Weird.

    That's my only worry with BM3 - am I buying iMPC Pro 2 with a fancy new UI? From what I've read it comes complete with it's own fair share of bugs, but the sampler looks good enough to put aside any buggy niggles.

  • @ExAsperis99 said:
    So I was happy to my hands on BM3. I've been dying for a good sampler in iOS. I dove in, and I didn't expect its mysteries to be revealed immediately. But it's kind of opaque. It's a shame that auto fades (in and out) that were part of sample chopping in BM2 are gone.

    So I found myself (after a BM3 crash trying to meddle with Scenes) playing around with iMPC Pro.

    Why, exactly, do we all hate this? I get that Retronyms did something egregious a while ago, and that the thing crashed all the time. (I did see a thread where @MonzoPro recounts losing DAYS of work in a crash, but it has autosave now?) I came to it later, and it seems rather stable for me. It's quirky, to be sure, with its confusing Session/Program/Sequence naming conventions. I still don't know how to name a song.

    But that turntable sampling UI is great, it has Link and midi learn. And an earlier post mentioned an update is imminent.

    Retronyms... yes they did an amazing job, until they stopped developing it and went to work on Hook Wej and now Looper. Take the sampler for instance... in BM3 you can set polyphony. a simple and standard straightforward feature that makes a huge difference. The absence of which makes composing kind of dull. Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that. They never got around to developing that. So that's another reason why MPC is a pain to use. You have to import things either through AudioCopy or ITunes. Don't get me wrong, MPC has a lot going for it... Retronyms are very competent and creative. They just have a habit of abandoning things and upsetting their customers and starting another project.

  • @LucidMusicInc said:

    Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that.

    I'd forgotten about that - that is a big thing for me too. Audioshare is one of the best apps out there for this sort of thing, not supporting it for 'political' reasons is cheating users.

  • As a longtime hardware MPC user I always felt that iMPC "Pro" is an uninspired toy version of the real MPC workflow.

    In another post somewhere here on this forum someone wrote that iMPC is an insult to everyone who is used to hardware MPCs. True.

  • @MonzoPro said:

    @LucidMusicInc said:

    Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that.

    I'd forgotten about that - that is a big thing for me too. Audioshare is one of the best apps out there for this sort of thing, not supporting it for 'political' reasons is cheating users.

    Well, Audiocopy is their proprietary software, and it got its ass handed to it by Audioshare. That IS a huge pain in the ass, and I don't know if it's surmountable.

  • regular copy paste works as well

  • @ExAsperis99 said:

    @MonzoPro said:

    @LucidMusicInc said:

    Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that.

    I'd forgotten about that - that is a big thing for me too. Audioshare is one of the best apps out there for this sort of thing, not supporting it for 'political' reasons is cheating users.

    Well, Audiocopy is their proprietary software, and it got its ass handed to it by Audioshare. That IS a huge pain in the ass, and I don't know if it's surmountable.

    Not supporting it as at least an option (or Audiobus for that matter) is denying users a better way of working with their app. If they want people to use AudioCopy, then make it better. Blocking the competition is bad PR, and I doubt it's helped sales.

    It's stuff like this that stops me loving the app, even if it's stopped crashing.

  • @MonzoPro said:

    @ExAsperis99 said:

    @MonzoPro said:

    @LucidMusicInc said:

    Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that.

    I'd forgotten about that - that is a big thing for me too. Audioshare is one of the best apps out there for this sort of thing, not supporting it for 'political' reasons is cheating users.

    Well, Audiocopy is their proprietary software, and it got its ass handed to it by Audioshare. That IS a huge pain in the ass, and I don't know if it's surmountable.

    Not supporting it as at least an option (or Audiobus for that matter) is denying users a better way of working with their app. If they want people to use AudioCopy, then make it better. Blocking the competition is bad PR, and I doubt it's helped sales.

    It's stuff like this that stops me loving the app, even if it's stopped crashing.

    Well, I get it. You still can't use Amazon Prime on you Apple TV — although that is changing, apparently.
    And no AB was a weird decision, although it does have IAA, and it works nicely within AUM.

    I just want to take the sampler out of BM3 and junk the rest, which I kind of already have with Modstep, AUM, Cubasis, Auria and Launchpad....

  • still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation. combine that with the fact that each sequence can have its own tempo and time signature and you can squeeze allot of creative results out of it.

  • @MonzoPro said:

    @LucidMusicInc said:

    Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that.

    I'd forgotten about that - that is a big thing for me too. Audioshare is one of the best apps out there for this sort of thing, not supporting it for 'political' reasons is cheating users.

    Could be technical or financial... could be some issue between Akai and Retronyms... I don't know. MPC Pro was the reason I got my iPad, it literally was the first thing I downloaded and I was loving it... the thing that let me down ultimately was the sense I got that it was completely finished and it was just shy of having everything it needed, e.g. The polyphonic settings. I can't use it until they at least address that, for me personally.

  • I think it was hamstringed by akai, as I for every 10 complaints I made to retronyms, I made at least 5 to akai, and all they only ever told me two things, 1. that they didn't know of any problems, and 2. to talk to retronyms. they've been trying not to undercut themselves and retro was happy to oblige.

  • @ExAsperis99 said:
    So I was happy to my hands on BM3. I've been dying for a good sampler in iOS. I dove in, and I didn't expect its mysteries to be revealed immediately. But it's kind of opaque. It's a shame that auto fades (in and out) that were part of sample chopping in BM2 are gone.

    So I found myself (after a BM3 crash trying to meddle with Scenes) playing around with iMPC Pro.

    Why, exactly, do we all hate this? I get that Retronyms did something egregious a while ago, and that the thing crashed all the time. (I did see a thread where @MonzoPro recounts losing DAYS of work in a crash, but it has autosave now?) I came to it later, and it seems rather stable for me. It's quirky, to be sure, with its confusing Session/Program/Sequence naming conventions. I still don't know how to name a song.

    But that turntable sampling UI is great, it has Link and midi learn. And an earlier post mentioned an update is imminent. (True @Retronyms ?)

    To name a song just hit the pencil icon on the floppy disk once you save and exit whatever you're working on

  • I'm beta testing impc Pro and its a lot more stable now. Sliced samples now correlate with the mpc software on pc and mac. Mute groups and tune still don't but ive messaged then again about it. Hopefully they fix it. They're now back at making it better again. Dunno why maybe Akai

  • @kobamoto said:
    still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation. combine that with the fact that each sequence can have its own tempo and time signature and you can squeeze allot of creative results out of it.

    Exactly what i've been saying. I don't think Retronyms understand that this app can be great. So much potential. If they add a sub mixer for banks like BM3, a more advance sampler, better IAA intergration, auv3, audiobus and better export features they will have a really dope app. Why dont they ask us for help, why dont they ask us what we want to see from this app? It's like they dont want to make more money.

  • Fingers crossed after IOS 11 hits BM3 and MPC get sorted out...

  • @LucidMusicInc said:

    @MonzoPro said:

    @LucidMusicInc said:

    Secondly, AudioCopy... AudioShare kills AudioCopy because of the directories. It's not a stretch of imagination for retronyms to see the utility of that.

    I'd forgotten about that - that is a big thing for me too. Audioshare is one of the best apps out there for this sort of thing, not supporting it for 'political' reasons is cheating users.

    Could be technical or financial... could be some issue between Akai and Retronyms... I don't know. MPC Pro was the reason I got my iPad, it literally was the first thing I downloaded and I was loving it... the thing that let me down ultimately was the sense I got that it was completely finished and it was just shy of having everything it needed, e.g. The polyphonic settings. I can't use it until they at least address that, for me personally.

    It's because they want us to use Audiocopy and Tabletop instead, which unfortunately aren't as good as the alternatives.

    Doug's vid demonstrated how easy it is to create a custom kit in BM3 via Audioshare. Regardless of how many bugs they fix, iMPC Pro is never going to be a better option than BM3 because the connectivity isn't as good.

  • After a while you just learn that Retronyms will disappoint you. There's no point getting annoyed about it, it's just their nature.

  • @kobamoto said:
    still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation.

    Such a cool feature but this is actually one of the things that frustrates me most about the app. If you're working on building up a set of sequences, mixing a bit as you go, the levels wind up different in each sequence! I'd be real happy to see a 'copy mixer settings' feature to equalize settings across sequences. Then, once the thing is built up and the base is where I want it, I'd want to be able to go back and adjust it per sequence. Think I'm probably still too attached to a traditional 'master' mixer. I don't fault the app for this though.

  • @syrupcore said:

    @kobamoto said:
    still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation.

    Such a cool feature but this is actually one of the things that frustrates me most about the app. If you're working on building up a set of sequences, mixing a bit as you go, the levels wind up different in each sequence! I'd be real happy to see a 'copy mixer settings' feature to equalize settings across sequences. Then, once the thing is built up and the base is where I want it, I'd want to be able to go back and adjust it per sequence. Think I'm probably still too attached to a traditional 'master' mixer. I don't fault the app for this though.

    This feature does exist through some kind of long tap... however once you set it if you wanted to automate across sequences as per Gadget for example you will be fighting against the mixer automatically going to the state you set it to. I can't remember if automations could be cleared or not but obviously they ought to.

  • @LucidMusicInc said:

    @syrupcore said:

    @kobamoto said:
    still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation.

    Such a cool feature but this is actually one of the things that frustrates me most about the app. If you're working on building up a set of sequences, mixing a bit as you go, the levels wind up different in each sequence! I'd be real happy to see a 'copy mixer settings' feature to equalize settings across sequences. Then, once the thing is built up and the base is where I want it, I'd want to be able to go back and adjust it per sequence. Think I'm probably still too attached to a traditional 'master' mixer. I don't fault the app for this though.

    This feature does exist through some kind of long tap... however once you set it if you wanted to automate across sequences as per Gadget for example you will be fighting against the mixer automatically going to the state you set it to. I can't remember if automations could be cleared or not but obviously they ought to.

    Really? That's very good news! Will investigate.

  • edited July 2017

    @hansjbs said:

    @kobamoto said:
    still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation. combine that with the fact that each sequence can have its own tempo and time signature and you can squeeze allot of creative results out of it.

    Exactly what i've been saying. I don't think Retronyms understand that this app can be great. So much potential. If they add a sub mixer for banks like BM3, a more advance sampler, better IAA intergration, auv3, audiobus and better export features they will have a really dope app. Why dont they ask us for help, why dont they ask us what we want to see from this app? It's like they dont want to make more money.

    I think that they develop for the 80%. I feel that on the AB forums we are the 20% minority who are vocal, passionate and have well defined (but more niche) needs. I'm not advocating that the policy is good for us, but i can understand that developing for the 80% may likely yield a better cost / benefit ratio.

    I was going to delete iMPC pro now I have BM3, but will check the update as I generally liked it :)

  • I saw it on one of their videos, maybe it's a two finger tap or sth...

  • @skoptic said:

    I think that they develop for the 80%. I feel that on the AB forums we are the 20% minority who are vocal, passionate and have well defined (but more niche) needs. I'm not advocating that the policy is good for us, but i can understand that developing for the 80% may likely yield a better cost / benefit ratio.

    I don't disagree that they develop for the 80%, but that's their problem. They shouldn't have put pro in the name.

    I hated BM2 but bought BM3 anyways. Ispent an hour with BM3 last night and it is infinitely more usable than iMPC Pro. For a week one release, that says a lot.

  • @robertreynolds said:

    @skoptic said:

    I think that they develop for the 80%. I feel that on the AB forums we are the 20% minority who are vocal, passionate and have well defined (but more niche) needs. I'm not advocating that the policy is good for us, but i can understand that developing for the 80% may likely yield a better cost / benefit ratio.

    I don't disagree that they develop for the 80%, but that's their problem. They shouldn't have put pro in the name.

    I hated BM2 but bought BM3 anyways. Ispent an hour with BM3 last night and it is infinitely more usable than iMPC Pro. For a week one release, that says a lot.

    Good to hear.

  • I don't think akai wants to allow them to make it what it could be, because of the mpcL

  • @hansjbs said:

    @kobamoto said:
    still the only beatmachine on iOS, pc, Mac, or hardware that each sequence has it's own mixer/fx automation. combine that with the fact that each sequence can have its own tempo and time signature and you can squeeze allot of creative results out of it.

    Exactly what i've been saying. I don't think Retronyms understand that this app can be great. So much potential. If they add a sub mixer for banks like BM3, a more advance sampler, better IAA intergration, auv3, audiobus and better export features they will have a really dope app. Why dont they ask us for help, why dont they ask us what we want to see from this app? It's like they dont want to make more money.

    they are walking a fine line as the app is so good already that I don't think they can take it much farther. For $12bucks it would slay allot of competition when it comes to the primary uses for this kind of app which is sample based production. Hopefully this coming update will squash bugs.

  • @LucidMusicInc said:
    Fingers crossed after IOS 11 hits BM3 and MPC get sorted out...

    Also BM3?

    :-O

  • edited July 2017

    Well, having used both apps...I can honestly say that BM3 is the future standard of what an MPC workflow should be like on iOS. I wanted to use iMPC Pro so many times, but it consistently failed and crashed and fought with me that I just gave up.

    Right now BM3 is working splendidly with Samples and AU Synths and FX...it still needs to sort out it's Midi and IAA sequencing...but I can get by ok without that right now.

    It's a full featured thing of beauty as a 1.0 app.

  • Retronyms is amazing.

    I still use iMPC orig app as well.

    I love Hook.

    I look Looperverse.

    I got BM3.

    First impression, unfortunately, same as BM2 for me.

    I never made one whole song with it.

    I also thought for $20 INTRO price meaning a $40 app I would get a real synth and not be expected to pay $4.99 per synth type............sample style player..................

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