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 StoreAudiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.
Comments
The purpose of the Tidy function as I understand it is to remove unused files from the Pool. So doing a Tidy, saving the Song and then re-opening the Song should have only the files in use on the timeline and nothing else. That is the expected behavior. The Pool is a repository for used files, not general storage. If you want to use it that way don’t Tidy but I think the idea is to avoid bloat.
You do end up with a lot of redundant clips, especially if you have to process or edit them.
That is what Tidy indeed does. It purges the clips that are not currently used in the Timline.
That's the whole purpose of TIDY.. clear out unused tracks - as in "don't need them anymore EVER".. if you still want those unused tracks in your song (for later maybe), DON'T USE TIDY.. just save the song and ALL tracks (used and unused) will still be there.. TIDY is a gone-forever action.. use with caution..
I didn't realize the Tidy function doubled as a Save Song function.
In my experience with most most Apps, including Mac Apps. Saving a file results in a copy of your work, as it is, at the moment it is saved. I never would have expected that the Tidy function would effect the state of a previous save.
The weird part... Is that when I was testing this earlier today... I'm pretty darn sure I was working in a file I Named "Test File 3". And every time I opened a 2nd instance of MTR in AUM, the Pool in the 2nd instance was showing the contents of "Test File 3".
That's why I said using Tidy in the 2nd instance was deleting the tracks in the 1st instance.
But now, as I'm trying to replicate what was happening earlier, each instance is now opening as "New Project", and not as "Test File 3".
Maybe I was hallucinating earlier....
I'll repost if I can find a sequence of actions that will reproduce what I was experiencing earlier.
The only "unusual" thing I can think of that I was doing in the earlier testing, is I was testing on the first run of the updated App.
I don’t know who it was, but I tried using it in bm3 and it actually works!! Way better than the bm3 sequencer mess ,
Make loops in mt recorder than send those to pads also a good thing
I think TIDY is too polite.. it should be renamed Obliterate..
At least I now know the power the TIDY button.
Perhaps using "Backup Song" periodically might be prudent insurance whenever one has recorded anything using MTR that they absolutely don't want to accidentally loose.
+1 Completely agree.
Has anyone figure out a way to get MultiTrack to record...
[1]
... from AUM
... w/ Sync Quantum enabled
... loop recording starts on 'play' or 'record'
... loop recording ends at end of loop (per bar setting in Sync Quantum)
... and continue.
Best solution I've found so far is:
[2]
... record perfect loop in AUM
... go to MultiTrack's 'Audio Pool'
... 'import file'
... navigate to Audio Share > AUM Recordings > Project > Sample
... 'insert sample'
Unfortunately, observed behavior for [1] is:
Hoping the gurus here have a creative solution!
You have to mark the section of the timeline in MTR using the Loop marker, turn on Host Sync in MTR, turn on Punch In/Out in MTR, arm master Record in MTR, hit Play in AUM.
It will record the marked section perfectly.
So, this is similar to using the sync quantum method, except you have to know where you want to record in your Timeline and mark it first, rather than recording by ear and listening for when the right section is about to play/end.
Yup.. I was doing a bunch of guitar layering last night using this exact method.. effortless because once you mark the desired loop length, just push play in AUM and you get perfect loops.. the recording will stop at the end of you're designated loop length without touching anything else.. it's quick, easy, painless etc...
Doug's video does a great job of showing this technique and much more
@inakarmacoma Yes.. he did a great job of covering all this.. try around 34:30 in Doug's video ^^ for this punch-in, punch-out looping.. He mentions that recording won't work in Host Sync mode - BUT - he meant Remote mode..
Only issue with this is the AUM and MTR tracks are locked in sync. So for example, if you wanted to record in bar 4 in MTR, from a sequence in AUM that started on say, bar 1, you can’t, the AUM output is locked to the AUM timeline and will begin from that point.
This is a bit of a pain when say, recording a long drum pattern, as you want to record your clip from the beginning of the drum pattern. If the start of the pattern isn’t in sync with the MTR timeline, then you’ll have to manually shift the recorded clip afterwards.
I’ve been recording new clips on a new track, rewinding to the beginning so I know the recording is starting at the beginning, and then moving them into place. Which is a bit crap as you can’t really audition what you’re doing.
Unless I’ve missed it, there needs to be a way to record in sync, but without being tied to the AUM timeline. So I can place the cursor anywhere on the MTR timeline, hit play in AUM, and it’ll record the start of the AUM input (e.g. drum pattern), wherever I want it to in MTR.
You can disengage Sync, engage Remote, and set the tempo in MTR to match the host tempo. Then you can place the timeline anywhere you want and also set loop points and punch in / out points.
The only BIG downside to this is there’s no way to arm the track in the app! You have to use AUM’s record button. But AUM won’t let you arm recording unless you have one of its tracks armed. So, to manage it this way, you have to record something you don’t need in AUM, then go back and delete the unnecessary file. In Audiobus, you can’t even record this way since there’s no record button.
I really wish @4Pockets would simply allow you to arm recording in the app with Remote activated. This is the missing piece IMO.
Cheers Wim. You explained this to me before but I can’t get it to work. Even though I’ve armed MTR, and set AUM to record, nothing is recorded in MTR. Even when I try punch/in/out.
Just tried again with no joy.
Humm ... I’ll give it another look. Kinda hard to get enthused about it though since it’s a dumb workaround for something that seems like it could be pretty simple to solve in the app tho...
@MonzoPro Ahhh, now I feel your pain.. I only picked up MTR a couple days ago and just from watching Doug's video (above) I haven't had any issues (other than my own stupidity at times - forgot to HIT the RECORD button in MTR - again + again). BUT everything I've recorded has started pretty much at the beginning of AUM's timeline.. Now I understand the issue(s) that you've brought up and I can't believe that MTR doesn't work the way you need.. this should've been on the 1st page of the original design.. hopefully v-e-r-y soon..
On the brighter side - I love this for tracking guitar + layering + getting a "guitar army" (Jimmy Page's description) effect in AUM.. it is really quite effortless..
@wim Sounds like you really have this app dialed - or - at least understand the intricacies involved when using it.. I'll have to try the trick you described above using Remote mode.. thanks for that..
Does that do what you need?
Yes, but what I need and what @MonzoPro needs to do are different.
Thanks! Very helpful, all!
This might be a dumb question, but how do you determine the stopping point for your loop, when there's an effects-tail? If you stop at the exact beat, it feels jarring. If you extend the clip to add the effects tail, then try to copy/paste things back together, it's difficult to get it 'just right' -- is there a general best practice? Thanks!
You can experiment with trimming off the FX tail and then placing that in a separate track just below the start of the main loop.
A better approach is to record before the FX that is creating the tail if possible. That way the tail is going to play out as it should no matter whether you loop or not. That’s only an option if whatever is creating the tail is an external FX, though. (Which is why I try to avoid the reverb and delay built-in to synths in favor of external FX.)
Thanks! I'll give that a try!
Yep, using that method the AUM and MTR timelines are chained together, which is not what I want it to do. Most of us at some point will need to trigger and record say, an AUM drum loop, at a point in MTR that doesn’t tie in with the AUM timeline.
You can do this by disabling Host sync, and then trying to hit record at the right moment, but it’s almost impossible to get right.
I just want MTR to sync to AUM, but not be chained to its timeline. Most DAW’s can do this, it’s pretty standard.
Thanks for the regular updates, would love to see midi/AU parameter triggerable markers in this @4Pockets
So you could playback from different positions on the timeline live.
Seems to me it'd be a lot easier to just export the drum loop and drop it on the MTR timeline where you want it if this combo doesn't do exactly what you want. Contact the dev I guess.
@4Pockets really enjoying Multitrack.
Nice to haves:
Thx!
Yep, but whichever way I do it, I'm not able to jam/monitor/practice the overdub first to see how it sounds - as it'll always be out of sync. I have to record the drum loop another way, move it into place, and then see how it sounds. Which defeats the whole object of a multi-tracker, which is to be able to overdub and hear what you're doing while you're playing over the previous track, so you can hear how the finished result will sound before you hit record.
It's not the end of the World as it does a remarkable job for seven quid, but the whole beauty of working with AU's is that you can put together a number of apps, all in sync, and then record the output. Not being able to record them on the MTR timeline in sync where I want them to go, is an important missing bit of functionality, but hey - seven quid - it's not a complaint, just a suggestion for improvement.
It'd be great if the dev could work this in somehow - but maybe it's a limitation of how an AU/AUM sync works.
@4Pockets, thanks for making an app that fills a need so well. I've appreciated the tight integration of AUM and AudioShare, but being able to capture and export audio in this mini DAW is a great improvement IMO.
I'm gonna try by email one more time. Paul has been super-responsive to earlier suggestions, and went 90% of the way on this with the enabling of the No Host Sync / Remote option. That last 10%, which seems to me like it should be easy, hasn't materialized. I don't know if its because he disagrees with the idea or if I just haven't communicated it well enough, or if it's under consideration. It's worth a try though as I think it's perfect for just about any use case with just that one small change.
What a wonderful tool though, eh?!