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.
Song Of The Month Club - November 2022
What is the Song of the Month Club?
It's a place where musicians come to give and receive feedback on their work. Anyone is welcome, whatever their level of ability.
The spirit of the club is to contribute: if you submit a song for others to comment on, you should also have the courtesy to listen to everyone else's contributions and give as much feedback as possible. Posting a track and not listening and commenting on others is not cool.
The purpose of feedback is to be honest. Essentially you should give your truthful impressions of the song, whether good or bad. Negative feedback, if done in the right spirit and with courtesy, can be the most useful and can help the artist to grow and improve and correct their mistakes.
All submissions are welcome, don't hesitate if you want to contribute. We like all kinds of music and we are particularly fond of vocals (but of course we still love a great instrumental). If you are thinking of experimenting with vocals this is a good place to get started.
We ask that you only post one song per month in this thread - if you're lucky enough to be able to produce more, then please just submit your strongest material
And finally, iOS is not a requirement for posting here. If you've recorded your song using nothing but a ukulele and a Fostex 4 track, that's fine.
Comments
My entry for the month, lyrics in the spoiler:
Lost, crossed, thrown away
And still not sure I know the way
Shake me break me
Let me go
If you want to help me
When I feel so lonely
The shadow that engulfs me
Just won’t go away
But you can say
It’s all ok
Old, cold, washed away
And still not sure what card to play
Love me shove me
Out the way
If you want to help me
When I feel so lonely
The shadow that engulfs me
Just won’t go away
But you can say
It’s all ok
This is a music track that I improvised on an iPad with TC-Data as the MIDI interface.
I used Bome Network software to bring the MIDI notes into Bitwig Studio on a desktop PC. There the MIDI notes were fed into Native Instruments Noire for the piano. I used ZebraHZ, Repro-5, and Lores for the other instruments.
After bringing the audio recording into Vegas Pro, I applied the Lurssen Mastering Console plug-in to the audio mix.
It's titled Dream Fragments.
ok this is my track for this month, as usual started out on my ipad and finished in ableton
I have been struggling a lot trying to make other kind of music genre(more electronic type of music)but cant seem to finish anything good. So this is just my regular stuff with the piano 😄
You became a master with this type of song structure and anyone who knows and like your music with feel home here. I think that during the last 2 years you really worked hard on your guitar sound and it can be heard. You have many distinctive sounds on your sonic palette that you put in good use to outline the different parts of the song. I especially like the sound at 2:08, not sure if it's a guitar, but if it is, it is great. Your voice is great and well controlled, like the way your mixed it, dark and slightly saturated and the backing vocals at the end of the chorus are nicely done. I like the pad used on the outro, it sounds great.
Difficult to tell you more than I already did in the different threads you posted on the forum. You definitely found your sound, aesthetic and sound identity. It sounds great ! Always a pleasure to listen to your creations.
Wow that is really good, I love it!
It is good to keep on trying creating out of the comfort zone. You might not be convinced with your electronic experiments but these might inspire other people here, you never know. Whenever you feel ready why don't you try to share these and see how it goes.
I assume the piano parts are played and not programmed because they sound real, that's great. The drums help bring a bit of dynamic, but maybe you could try to underline each part with some of your electronic experimentations, to bring excitement. I like the idea that comes around 1:30. It sounds like an overdub (I don't think both parts could be played by only one person unless you're Shiva 😜). But I think it could be played by different keys, maybe a Rhodes, and transposed one octave up, with delay and/or reverb, that could compliment the main Piano part. Great playing. Keep experimenting !
My entry for this month is the first release from a project of french songs called Oripeaux, a collaboration with my brother.
Lyrics in the spoiler
PARAÎT-IL
Oh, Dis moi,
Mais où te caches ?
Montre toi !
Je ne te vois plus !
Reprends moi
Quand je fais des erreurs,
Remplis moi
De ces mots rêveurs.
Il paraît qu'il y a
De jolis matins blêmes,
Il paraît qu'on n'y voit
Aucun chrysanthèmes,
Que là-bas on s'embrasse
À y perdre haleine
Et que le temps y passe
Sans rides et sans peine.
Il paraît qu'il y a
Un immaculé bleu
Qui attend au delà
Du tapis nuageux.
Je revois
Ces iris acajou
Qui m'envoient
Dans un rêve Andalou
Oh, je n'ai
Pas perdu la voix,
Non je n'ai
Pas perdu la foix !
Il paraît qu'aussi loin
Que le bout du monde,
Plus rien ne se redoute,
Terre et mer se confondent.
Il paraît que la route
Se divise tôt ou tard
Entre deux sentiments
Nous reste l'espoir
Il paraît qu'au moment
Où l'on s'y attend le moins
La magie de l'instant
Ranime nos lendemains.
Tous ces bleus,
Au corps et au cœur,
Et ces vagues
À l'âme en torpeur,
Ne sont pas
Gravés dans la pierre
Ni dans l'ambre
Enfouie sous la terre
Il paraît qu'au delà
Des moments de tourmente,
S'attise une flamme,
Lueur incandescente,
Et danse l'oriflamme
Au souffle de la nuit,
Brûlant le vague à l'âme
De trop longs jours de pluie,
Il paraît qu'en dehors
Des arts et des manières,
Ce rêve multicolore
Irradie nos hivers
Thanks for listening
The sound at 2.08 is indeed a guitar sound: just a simple 3-note riff on the B string with a drone on the G every other note, with some distortion and delay. Lately I've mostly been using the pedalboard to build the sounds and just recording that directly into the iPad (except for delay and reverb which usually work better in post), that way you can write and record the part with the vibe baked-in, rather than trying to build the sound later. It works really well, and pedal distortion is still much better than software distortion anyway.
My guitar playing is pretty basic, so I tend to write very simple riffs. I've always liked Joey Santiago's approach: simple but edgy riffs with a lot of character. His playing is basic, but you can't imagine Pixies without it, it wouldn't be the same. I guess The Edge is also a bit like that.
Thanks - much appreciated!
I would like to know more about how these tracks are put together: is it one long improvisation on the piano or do you plan ahead? Is the piano recorded from a performance? What I like about them is that they are always very melodic without being repetitive, and the arrangements are well-crafted with some nice ebb and flow, peaks and valleys.
The eighth-note rhythm really lends this one a lot of movement, there a is constant groove coming from the piano itself, and the sections that break this up with a second part create a nice contrast to that rhythm.
The lyrics (as I've mentioned before) are really extraordinarily well-written, and the vocal performance is understated but still very well executed. The piano and strings create a nice musical bed, and the intensity increases beautifully towards the end.
But the key thing here is the beauty in the words, and the musical arrangement is perfectly crafted to show them off and give them center-stage.
Big Pixies fan here! But I don't totally agree with you. Some of Joey Santiago parts are extremely difficult to play right. He is a very under estimated guitarist and as you said, his guitar parts are essential to the pixies sound!
I guess I'm thinking of the classic riffs such as the one in Where Is My Mind, just really simple 3 note riffs that have that edge to them.
I've seen them live a few times over the years, from the 90s to more recently and I agree he is an underrated guitarist (and he really is the sound of the Pixies to my ears). The solos he plays in Vamos are always amazing, sometimes thrashing the guitar with a drumstick thrown over by Dave Lovering, sometimes the guitar is just on the ground feeding back. He's a noisemaker more than a technician (IMO at least) but his playing is still very melodic.
Thank you for your comment! Its actually just me and my ipad and computer! I wish I could play it
but it takes to much time to learn to play well, and I love making music so I have to prioritize with the time I got (fulltime job, children, house etc), Im glad it doesnt sound to robotic. My goal is to implement more electronic music and sound design into my music. Some of my tracks already got a bit of it.
Thank you very much for the comments, I often start with something like the app piano motifs, or a melody from some other app the you can get inspiered , from that I sometimes play to it on the ipad to get some more stuff often in Zenbeats, the its ableton live on my computer, to make a song I can compare it with a painter?, painting some kind of picture, from the beginning its just some melody or chordprogression then I paint it out step by step. Lots of interesting stuff i max for live, arps, sequncers and stuff to play with, I mostly work in session or loop view to later take all my ideas to the arrangment view. Its the hardest part, to make a good arangement with all my little bits, keep it together and make it interesting. But all I do is just me and my ipad and computer, wish I could play better, but I love making music more than to learn play better piano
You do a great job, the arrangements flow beautifully and sound like one coherent performance, listening to your pieces I would never have thought they were put together from loops of different ideas.
Second that. Impressive how it sounds like a real performance.
thank you for your possitive comments! very motivating to keep making music
Great driving guitars - I can imagine watching this track being played live and really digging the grove. I am getting used to your "style" now (well two tracks!) and I like the way you present your vocals with that dreamy reverb thing going on. It's a really well put together song, and you sing it well. I like the way you link "Lost, crossed, thrown away, And still not sure I know the way" with the "Old, cold, washed away, And still not sure what card to play" later in the song - sort of trick I try to pull off lyrically.
Good stuff!
Beautiful production and presentation. So chilled out...can I ask how you did the video?
Somehow you managed to keep my interest throughout without introducing a load of instruments - that's not easy for an instrumental of 5 minutes plus. I'd like to do more instrumental stuff myself, but whenever I do I feel the urge to throw the kitchen sink at it!
I was away from my (desktop) studio for a couple of weeks and I wrote, and subsequently fleshed out the bones of this song on my iPad. I would have liked to have done the whole production in Cubasis and AUM but once I got back to the studio, I found it impossible to resist – so, full disclosure, this is a desktop production.
The role of honour includes the Mellotron flute in Omnisphere and EZ Drummer 3, although I played real guitars and electric bass guitar. I tidied up my vocals and harmonies a bit using Melodyne and VocAlign Project.
In the late 90s and early 2000s, professional rugby was really beginning to take off. Everything ramped up, including routine and pretty brutal training regimes. Some players have paid a heavy price and the consequences will last a lifetime.
https://soundcloud.com/bill-saunders/cauliflower-ears
Nice and tight production, with a very clean mix and a great vocal performance.
I would probably like the mellotron flute to be a bit dirtier and grungier sounding, with more of the character of a real mellotron, just to contrast with the cleanness of the rest of the production. Some dirt to go against all the well-separated hi-fi sounds.
The arrangement is well-crafted, with the different sections of the song offering dynamic contrasts throughout that keep the track flowing and are interesting to listen to.
I don't speak French, but I Googled translated it - probably doesn't do it justice, but still some gorgeous lyrical ideas and emotion. The production builds nicely but then stops a bit abruptly - I guess that was a deliberate choice but I was expecting some sort of outro. Nice job.
I usually start with a computer graphics visualization that is unrelated to the music. I tend to use Astrofox, Magic, or other PC-based visualizer for that. Then I use Vegas Pro’s Mirror and Swirl video FX plugins to make the graphics more symmetrical and dynamic.
Because the video plugins can be adjusted while previewing the music and visuals, you can experiment in real-time to find the FX settings that best match the mood and pace of the music.
Arrangement and production are very precise and serve the songwriting well.
Each instrument has a well defined role and the parts are written so that they will not clash in the mix. Very smart and clearly shows that you have a long experience in crafting your sound.
I like the Piano part which reminds me a bit of Roy Bittan's works in the E Street Band or Alan Clark in Dire Straits.
Very strong vocal performance. For some reason, both sarcasm and interpretation reminds me of Roger Waters.
Great job !
@JanKun very kind, thank you for listening. Made my evening! @richardyot thanks very much for listening and the nice comments …How do you guys do that “spoiler” thing hiding the lyrics?
Select your text first, then look for the Paragraph formatting when you write a post:
Nice atmosphere in the intro, I like the part ”But you can say, its all ok” the best, because its somehow not what I expected in tonality (im not skilled in music theory), it feels like a warmer tone than the more obvious choice for me in that part, well great songwriting as always, and production!