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.

Apps that waste time and space for you

After trying AutoFugue for all of a couple of minutes, I got to thinking about apps that I really should have deleted many moons ago....they just waste space and time.

iElectribe Gorrilaz Edition - Why do I play with this and do nothing constructive with it ever!

Photophore - So I can make the sound of a swarm of bees coming closer hmmmm

I really need to start deleting some apps...

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Comments

  • I have installed and deleted waaaay more apps than I have kept. But I get the impression that I'm just an amateur compared to some of you folks..... ;)

  • Waste time or SPACE?

  • Generally I don't waste space on apps. If I don't use it and if it takes up a large chunk of HD space I delete it.

    Time is a different story. Auria is probably my biggest time waster. I like noodling about and I don't consider it wasted time. But after I come up with a usable idea I want to record it and that is when he trouble (and bad words ) start. Half the time things go smoothly and the other half it goes to hell. I swear Auria is possessed and it just likes to mess with my head. After wasting time trying to get it all to work smoothly I usually just say 'fuck it' and give up.

  • edited August 2015

    Owning a 16 GB device makes you a lot more... app-conscious... if such a thing exists. I downloaded/bought & tried several dozens of music apps but only those that fell in my 'must have' category survived. 'Nice to have' apps had to go, usually very soon. I know it's almost heresy to admit this, but Gadget, to me, is such a 'nice to have' app. It's amazing but after buying, briefly using, deleting, reinstalling and using it briefly again I re-deleted it after a couple of days. Not because it's not amazing, it surely is. I just had to realize that I primarily use my iPad for performing live and sculpting loops, beats, samples and I don't really need a DAW or a tracker. If I had a 64 GB device I might change my mind though. Some apps, however, would never get back on my iOS rig, probably because I'm too narrow-minded for them or just am used to different workflows; Samplewiz, Reactable mobile - I could never make any decent tunes with them.

  • @MrNezumi said:
    I swear Auria is possessed and it just likes to mess with my head. After wasting time trying to get it all to work smoothly I usually just say 'fuck it' and give up.

    Auria would have been on my list, as it is a very ugly and very grumpy app. The reason I put up with it, and have learned to work with it's idiosyncrasies is that I don't have an alternative at the moment. There are a lot of good things about it, and it has the potential for great results, but it seems intent on making life as hard as possible for it's users.

  • Tabletop --- Crappiest app ever made and sold @ high price. Kinda Beats by Dre types.. Cheap rip off of Reason.
    iMPC & iMPC Pro - It's just a sampler with Pads and MPC graphics on it. I pulled out all the drum samples and deleted the apps.

  • @supadupa555 said:
    Tabletop --- Crappiest app ever made and sold @ high price. Kinda Beats by Dre types.. Cheap rip off of Reason.
    iMPC & iMPC Pro - It's just a sampler with Pads and MPC graphics on it. I pulled out all the drum samples and deleted the apps.

    The worst part is that many Retronyms apps aren't bad by themselves, in spite of their idiosyncracies. I love Phase84, programmed with love by Louis Gorenfeld. I really like the emulated synths. And I have been working with Jen on the SF Mobile Music Meetup. Super nice.

    But because of Tapbletop, these apps don't support Audiobus. Music software is hard, and I think Retronyms does a great job overall. But Tabletop is a weird play.

    I keep it on my system, so I can run multiple instances of a few of their apps.

  • I wonder if I keep coming back to Tabletop because it has something, or just because it swallowed a whole heap of money (in app terms)?

  • @Fruitbat1919 said:
    I wonder if I keep coming back to Tabletop because it has something, or just because it swallowed a whole heap of money (in app terms)?

    I keep coming back to the Retronyms apps because of the sounds.

  • Yeah Phase 84 is great and I've only ever had one hiccup with it not working. I've had some strange happenings with iProphet in Tabletop though.

  • edited August 2015

    @monzo said:

    ust k

  • GuitarCapo+ — it’s all so contrary and feels incorrect. As if I should be using the back of the iPad instead. There’s no way of making it be like my actual guitar. It’s uncomfortable and disturbing.

    Hokusai — makes me very angry.

    iMaschine — not as useful as I imagined it would be (i.e. I imagined it might be at least a tiny bit useful).

    LH Grain Pad — utter pointlessness.

    Phase Rings — ditto

    Pocket Studio — a downright affront, ugly and buggy.

    SoundPrism pro and electro — uncomfortable because all the controls are hidden in usage and requires contortion of the fingers to manipulate, and the sound is unpredictable on the grid, as if the panels are all arranged the wrong way round.

    SynthStation (Akai) — why doesn’t this work?

    studio.M — I bought it quite early on, and it turned out to be one of those tiny apps that fit in the middle of the screen, so I paid to upgrade it to the next version up, and it’s still too small to see in the middle of the screen, so that’s a waste of time and money.

    Tape by Focusrite — nice, but the bitrate and file format should be better. As it stands, what’s the point?

    Tabletop — something about it repulses me, got rid of it quickly.

    Thumb jam — immediately hated this and never touched it, but starting to try it out a bit more these days, still seems distant and unconnected though.

    WR6000 — got this, then found it had to cost more money to be useful, which was not made apparent at the time of launch.

  • iMachine could be so great if they would just expand it. Are they scared it might devalue their hardware?

    Exact same thoughts on Tape and both Sound Prisms.

    I kinda like WR6000, but do I use it much....hmm maybe not.

    Thumbjam.....just love it!

  • Thumbjam is one of my favourite apps, love it.

  • edited August 2015

    Tabletop

    IMPC

    Waldorf Attack (until sync problems are fixed and it has IAA)

    TNR-1 (never understood it!!)

    DM1 (until sync problems are fixed)

    Nave (too complicated)

    Edit: and Elastic Drums too - at least until they write a proper manual that's not just for the iphone version

    Edit 2: Actually there now is a manual for the latest version of Elastic Drums - although the screenshots are all for the iPhone version.... Better than nothing though, better RTFM I guess then!

    http://mominstruments.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/ElasticDrums_Manual.pdf

  • I really like Crystal but I have to keep flipping my iPad in order to get it back to the right orientation. Dont know why this happens. I also hate losing my presets all the time, so i just gave up.

  • Elastic Drums, sun vox, Cubasis( I know! I'm an Auria boy)

  • @Musikman4Christ said:
    I really like Crystal but I have to keep flipping my iPad in order to get it back to the right orientation. Dont know why this happens. I also hate losing my presets all the time, so i just gave up.

    Same here. May seem a small thing, but the orientation issue got on my nerves really quickly and the fact it used to spike in processor use from time to time.

  • Really two categories here (and neither of them really mean that the app is "bad" in any objective sense). First, there are the apps that get replaced by other apps that are more efficient or have smaller memory footprint. That's what happened to me with Auria. I loved Auria, and I would totally use it, but I discovered MTS afterwards and Auria just became a wasted purchase. Too bad because I really like the implementation of apps as "plug-ins" and the Overloud THM stuff for guitar recording within the app.

    The second category are the high concept apps that promise something unique but just don't deliver any practical use for you. Different Drummer is a classic example of this, but I've had others like Stroke Machine and the various beatbox apps (Oscilab, Beathawk, etc.). All of these offer some alternative approach to creating groove patterns but they were either too avant garde, too large, or had too high of a learning curve to ever become a practical part of my workflow. That being said, I could absolutely see any of those being someone's "favorite app".

  • @StormJH1 said:
    Too bad because I really like the implementation of apps as "plug-ins" and the Overloud THM stuff for guitar recording within the app.

    >
    I use a lot of Amp / Effects Sims on my keyboard sounds. I have most iPad apps, but not the Overloud THM plug in yet. I find it quite difficult to get an idea of what each apps different sound has to offer on You Tube.

    If you have other Amp Sim apps, how would you describe what THM has to offer compared to other apps. Is it the sound or ease of use as a plug- in, or something else?

  • I used to have eight folder windows filled with music apps until I started weeding them out by non-usage - now I don't even fill two folders! It's a boon that we can get any one back at any time!

  • I'll say my DAW dislikes are controversial. I never liked the user interfaces of Beatmaker 2 and Multitrack Studio. I like Cubasis and Auria the best because they're similar to programs I've used in the past.

  • I go back and forth CONSTANTLY. Just a week or two ago I deleted everything except Auria, but that didn't last long at all. Right now I'm back to doing everything in GarageBand. In does basically everything I need and the projects are compatible with Logic on my Mac. It's not as flexible as other apps, but it's all you really need to write and record demos.

  • edited August 2015

    oddly enough - this is becoming more and more the case for Audiobus! all the apps I use have background audio and built in Fx so I don't need to chain them to an FX app- and when I want to process external audio I use apps that have soo many FX that I don't need a chain-

  • Safari.

  • edited August 2015

    Glad to have company on Elastic Drums. The workflow never clicked with me despite the attention and care that went into the design. Actually, all drums except Patterning and Drum Perfect are now gone, thanks to the release of the former.

    Others:

    Grain Science
    Microtera
    Photophore
    All Apesofts/Amazing Noises except for Apefilter
    Soundprism
    All gtr interfaces except Tonestack
    Nano Studio

    Many more. As I stop myself I'm relieved at how relatively cheap iOS apps are.

    Had to come back to add Synthmaster. I love a good traipse through presets, but it's ugly and by this point I know my way around several other synths much better.

  • @StormJH1 said:
    Really two categories here (and neither of them really mean that the app is "bad" in any objective sense). First, there are the apps that get replaced by other apps that are more efficient or have smaller memory footprint. That's what happened to me with Auria. I loved Auria, and I would totally use it, but I discovered MTS afterwards and Auria just became a wasted purchase. Too bad because I really like the implementation of apps as "plug-ins" and the Overloud THM stuff for guitar recording within the app.

    The second category are the high concept apps that promise something unique but just don't deliver any practical use for you. Different Drummer is a classic example of this, but I've had others like Stroke Machine and the various beatbox apps (Oscilab, Beathawk, etc.). All of these offer some alternative approach to creating groove patterns but they were either too avant garde, too large, or had too high of a learning curve to ever become a practical part of my workflow. That being said, I could absolutely see any of those being someone's "favorite app".

    MTS ? Whats that ?

  • Take care about Dropbox cache. You can watch its size at "Settings/Usage" . The only way I've found to clean it is through iFunbox.

  • @u0421793 said:
    GuitarCapo+ — it’s all so contrary and feels incorrect. As if I should be using the back of the iPad instead. There’s no way of making it be like my actual guitar. It’s uncomfortable and disturbing.

    Just noticed this - haven't seen this post before. All feedback for us devs is great - both good and bad. Have you tried the rotate-button?

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