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.

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

Song Of The Month Club - November 2021

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

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Comments

  • My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

  • @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    83 months consecutive is one hell of an achievement! Very impressive indeed especially as all the ones I've heard (I must admit I've not listened to all 83!) are 'proper songs' rather than something maybe easier to churn out...

    The song has a nice 80s shoe gazy vibe, as does much of your output with a good traditional song structure. It would sound more shoe gazy if the vocals were buried in the mix 80s style but that wouldn't necessarily be a good thing!

    There are aspects of it that remind me of the more mellow Jesus+Mary Chain (which is a good thing).

    In terms of constructive criticism I always find it quite hard as I'm very aware of my own shortcomings, but purely biased towards my own preferences I'd like slightly more of a contrast between verse and chorus maybe by bringing up the level of the synths in the background (or sending more of it to the reverb your vox are going through) and also maybe double tracking the vox?

    The only thing I'd want to actually change is the bass note being played under "sure" in the "Wanted to be sure" section. It doesn't quite sit right for me.

    It's certainly got your signature Indie sound (which is a good thing =)

  • @klownshed thanks for the listen! And indeed the constructive feedback, which in your case is always thoughtful and worthwhile. 👍

  • edited November 2021

    Here's my entry this month:

    The song itself is a new track but I used some old vocals (not by me -- I can't sing a note) for a song I did with my band about 15 years ago. I tried to make an electro track to start with, using 808 drums from my old EPS16+ which I re-sampled into Logic. Turns out I can't do electro as I can't resist the urge to throw the kitchen sink at the mix. :lol:

    EDIT:

    Updated mix (with bonus free added silence at the end):

  • This is a music track that I improvised on an older iPad running iOS 10.3.3. I used the TC-Data app as a MIDI front-end for the Alchemy Mobile and Thor synth apps. And I used the AUM app to connect everything and record the music.

    After bringing the AUM recording over to my PC, I added Fabfilter's Timeless 3 plugin to the mix in Vegas Pro.

    It's titled Curved.

  • @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    Was this solely recorded, mastered on an Ipad? The sound quality is awesome!

  • @Sandstorm said:

    @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    Was this solely recorded, mastered on an Ipad? The sound quality is awesome!

    Thanks! Yes this is 100% recorded, mixed, and mastered on the iPad. Guitars and vocals were tracked with a Scarlett Solo (3rd gen) straight into GarageBand for the guitar and Auria for the vocals.

  • @klownshed said:
    Here's my entry this month:

    I'm not 100% happy with the mix yet as it is as I'm only able to mix on headphones at the moment . Any mix tips/feedback gratefully accepted :-)

    The song itself is a new track but I used some old vocals (not by me -- I can't sing a note) for a song I did with my band about 15 years ago. I tried to make an electro track to start with, using 808 drums from my old EPS16+ which I re-sampled into Logic. Turns out I can't do electro as I can't resist the urge to throw the kitchen sink at the mix. :lol:

    I love the vibe and the sound design, some really gritty stuff in there, full of leering menace.

    I have to say I'm not that mad on the effect-ridden vocals at the start (and that come back at the end), but I do like the sung and whispered ones that come later. The other issue is that the single line that gets repeated does feel a bit monotonous by the end, but I guess you are limited by what you had recorded all those years ago.

    The music and arrangement are terrific though, as is the edgy vibe.

  • edited November 2021

    @richardyot said:

    @klownshed said:
    Here's my entry this month:

    I'm not 100% happy with the mix yet as it is as I'm only able to mix on headphones at the moment . Any mix tips/feedback gratefully accepted :-)

    The song itself is a new track but I used some old vocals (not by me -- I can't sing a note) for a song I did with my band about 15 years ago. I tried to make an electro track to start with, using 808 drums from my old lo in EPS16+ which I re-sampled into Logic. Turns out I can't do electro as I can't resist the urge to throw the kitchen sink at the mix. :lol:

    I love the vibe and the sound design, some really gritty stuff in there, full of leering menace.

    I have to say I'm not that mad on the effect-ridden vocals at the start (and that come back at the end), but I do like the sung and whispered ones that come later. The other issue is that the single line that gets repeated does feel a bit monotonous by the end, but I guess you are limited by what you had recorded all those years ago.

    The music and arrangement are terrific though, as is the edgy vibe.

    Thanks for listening and for your kind words :-)

    I agree that the “I can feel..” line is a bit too repetitive. I tried changing it quite a few times but couldn’t find a way to improve it without losing the remix electro vibe I was going for. I think I moght ‘fix’ that by shortening the mix and making a non-extended version :-)

    The vocals I found were for a song i never finished mixing at the time. I mixed it as an instrumental and we loved playing It live but I couldn’t get the vocals right in the mix and always intended re-recording the vocals. It just never happened. Anyway I think I’ve recovered enough of the original track that I can try and mix it again as it was always supposed to be.

    Maybe that will be my entry next month :-)

  • edited November 2021

    Hi Audiobus Folks,

    This time I try to remember on good old technovibes. Hope you like it.

    @DavidEnglish really relaxing vizzle…I had added just.a little bit more dust and dirt

  • @DavidEnglish said:
    This is a music track that I improvised on an older iPad running iOS 10.3.3. I used the TC-Data app as a MIDI front-end for the Alchemy Mobile and Thor synth apps. And I used the AUM app to connect everything and record the music.

    After bringing the AUM recording over to my PC, I added Fabfilter's Timeless 3 plugin to the mix in Vegas Pro.

    It's titled Curved.

    Very mellow, nice sounds all the way through. However I'd like to hear some kind of motif or melody coming in and out to thread it's way through as it doesn't really take me on a journey. Please bear in mind that I don't have ambient-tuned ears though! :-)

  • Well that vocal woke me up :-)

    If I was the producer I think I'd want the drums to have a shed load of room ambience, I'd want it to sound like I was standing right in front of the drum kit with lots of ringing from the cymbals with the vocals right there in the middle to celebrate the cacophony!

  • @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    Congrats on 83 songs! Wow 👍👍

    I like a lot the fat bass tone and the chord progression. And the clean guitar parts. The vocals in some places feel a bit forced in place.

    Not that I would do better. Take my comments with a grain of salt. 😃👍

  • @ecou said:

    @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    Congrats on 83 songs! Wow 👍👍

    I like a lot the fat bass tone and the chord progression. And the clean guitar parts. The vocals in some places feel a bit forced in place.

    Not that I would do better. Take my comments with a grain of salt. 😃👍

    Thanks for the listen and the feedback 😀

  • edited November 2021

    ..

  • edited November 2021

    Hello!

    This is Shivers, Ed Sheeran instrumental version recorded in Garageband, hope you like it!

    https://youtu.be/TzNsX1uMSSI

  • I don’t want to sound whingey, but how do people expect their song to be listened to and crtitiqued when they’ve not listened to any of the tracks already posted?

    There’s almost no dialogue here which is a real shame. Richard puts a lot of effort keeping this club going writing new material every month — and clearly listens to everybody’s songs and puts a lot of thought into his comments.

    I’d encourage everybody that has posted songs to actually get involved and discuss the other tracks — like an, er, club! If somebody’s mix sounds bad on your speakers, tell them. They might not know as it probably sounds fine on theirs. If the song drags on too much, like this post, let them know. A bit of pruning might result in a much better song. And if you can’t find too much to like in a track you can still offer honest opinions on things like sound design and structure.

    If you don’t want to listen to anybody else’s music, why post in a thread where that’s the whole point of the exercise?

    Hardly anybody is replying to the comments on their songs either.

    Waiting until the last day of the month and commenting on all the tracks in one go seems to be the de-facto now but completely removes any ongoing discussions.

    Come on people — join in!

    I hope I’m not speaking out of turn @richardyot

  • @klownshed said:
    I hope I’m not speaking out of turn @richardyot

    Not at all :) I share some of your frustrations. I particularly dislike it when people post without taking the time to listen and comment on other people's work - and that's despite having a very clear set of rules laid out in the first post.

    The SOTMC definitely had a much greater sense of camaraderie in the early days, there was quite a lot of discussion in the threads from 2015-2017, but sadly all of those early participants dropped off one-by-one and I'm the last one left :)

    My motivation for running the SOTMC is purely selfish though, I do it because it motivates me to create a new song every month. So I'm happy to keep the club going as it is a useful thing for me to have in my life.

    I am grateful to the current small number of regulars though, because most of them have been contributing for years now, and I enjoy listening to their work.

    I believe in leading by example, so let's all do our best to make this thing worthwhile. Contribute, listen, comment, start a conversation. Ultimately I have to say that I have learned an enormous amount about songwriting by maintaining this club, both from the work I've done as a result, and from listening to the contributions of others.

  • Hi @klownshed , @richardyot

    I can only play / record early in the morning before going to work, I posted the video promising myself to hear the other songs in the lunch break.
    Sorry I won't do it again :)

  • @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    @richardyot said:
    My entry for the month. Not my best, but it's one more month completed - that's 83 consecutive months since January 2015.

    Hi Richardyot,

    From a musical point of view I like it, you have your own style and everything is very well packaged.
    If I have to find a point to improve and work on maybe the voice, especially in some points it seems to me that you are not perfectly in tune.
    Overall, however, it is all very pleasant especially for the personality of the piece

  • @klownshed said:
    Here's my entry this month:

    The song itself is a new track but I used some old vocals (not by me -- I can't sing a note) for a song I did with my band about 15 years ago. I tried to make an electro track to start with, using 808 drums from my old EPS16+ which I re-sampled into Logic. Turns out I can't do electro as I can't resist the urge to throw the kitchen sink at the mix. :lol:

    EDIT:

    Updated mix (with bonus free added silence at the end):

    Hi Klownshed,

    not being the kind of music I usually listen to so take my considerations with a grain of salt, I really like the melodic part of the chorus, maybe at that point I would have loaded the drums more with other rhythmic elements to give them even more explosiveness

  • @Overdosed_Ape said:
    Hi Audiobus Folks,

    This time I try to remember on good old technovibes. Hope you like it.

    @DavidEnglish really relaxing vizzle…I had added just.a little bit more dust and dirt

    Hi Overdosed_Ape,

    your song is a type of music very far from what I listen to, it is difficult for me to give a constructive comment, I do not have the basis to be able to evaluate, sorry

  • @DavidEnglish said:
    This is a music track that I improvised on an older iPad running iOS 10.3.3. I used the TC-Data app as a MIDI front-end for the Alchemy Mobile and Thor synth apps. And I used the AUM app to connect everything and record the music.

    After bringing the AUM recording over to my PC, I added Fabfilter's Timeless 3 plugin to the mix in Vegas Pro.

    It's titled Curved.

    Hi DavidEnglish,

    Your song is out of my genres too, but wow, very relaxing !! you took me on a trip during my lunch break! Thank you!

  • @pexfra said:
    Hi @klownshed , @richardyot

    I can only play / record early in the morning before going to work, I posted the video promising myself to hear the other songs in the lunch break.
    Sorry I won't do it again :)

    i feel your pain :-) I often have 2 mins to check the forum or mess about on the phone but finding time to be able to listen to songs properly isn’t easy.

    My comment above was me just trying to encourage some dialogue rather than have everybody wait until the last day to comment on all the songs in one go, which doesn’t really encourage back and forth discussions.

    I’m certainly not telling anybody what they should or shouldn’t do, but i felt that this thread was missing out on its raison d’etre which is a shame and not what Richard deserves.

  • @klownshed said:

    Well that vocal woke me up :-)

    If I was the producer I think I'd want the drums to have a shed load of room ambience, I'd want it to sound like I was standing right in front of the drum kit with lots of ringing from the cymbals with the vocals right there in the middle to celebrate the cacophony!

    Hi Kitusai,

    I agree with @klownshed, compared to the other instruments and the voice, the drums remain not stand out.
    In any case, the piece is very personal congratulations!

  • @klownshed said:

    @pexfra said:
    Hi @klownshed , @richardyot

    I can only play / record early in the morning before going to work, I posted the video promising myself to hear the other songs in the lunch break.
    Sorry I won't do it again :)

    i feel your pain :-) I often have 2 mins to check the forum or mess about on the phone but finding time to be able to listen to songs properly isn’t easy.

    My comment above was me just trying to encourage some dialogue rather than have everybody wait until the last day to comment on all the songs in one go, which doesn’t really encourage back and forth discussions.

    I’m certainly not telling anybody what they should or shouldn’t do, but i felt that this thread was missing out on its raison d’etre which is a shame and not what Richard deserves.

    thanks klownshed, I understand your comment and you are right.

    having small children and a breaking wife i can only let off steam when others are asleep :)

  • @pexfra said:

    @klownshed said:

    @pexfra said:
    Hi @klownshed , @richardyot

    I can only play / record early in the morning before going to work, I posted the video promising myself to hear the other songs in the lunch break.
    Sorry I won't do it again :)

    i feel your pain :-) I often have 2 mins to check the forum or mess about on the phone but finding time to be able to listen to songs properly isn’t easy.

    My comment above was me just trying to encourage some dialogue rather than have everybody wait until the last day to comment on all the songs in one go, which doesn’t really encourage back and forth discussions.

    I’m certainly not telling anybody what they should or shouldn’t do, but i felt that this thread was missing out on its raison d’etre which is a shame and not what Richard deserves.

    thanks klownshed, I understand your comment and you are right.

    having small children and a breaking wife i can only let off steam when others are asleep :)

    I'm with you. 3 kids, 4, 6 and 9, busy wife (a full time nurse), busy life, not enough room!

    I've been a lot more productive of late though, mainly because of the iPhone. it lets me make music when I do actually have 30 mins to spend with my thoughts. The first few years were tough, musically speaking. I was in a band, had a home bedroom studio then all of a sudden I had a wife and a baby, no band, no home studio and almost no music for a good 5 or 6 years!

    But I wouldn't swap a minute :-)

  • edited November 2021

    @pexfra said:

    @klownshed said:
    Here's my entry this month:

    The song itself is a new track but I used some old vocals (not by me -- I can't sing a note) for a song I did with my band about 15 years ago. I tried to make an electro track to start with, using 808 drums from my old EPS16+ which I re-sampled into Logic. Turns out I can't do electro as I can't resist the urge to throw the kitchen sink at the mix. :lol:

    EDIT:

    Updated mix (with bonus free added silence at the end):

    Hi Klownshed,

    not being the kind of music I usually listen to so take my considerations with a grain of salt, I really like the melodic part of the chorus, maybe at that point I would have loaded the drums more with other rhythmic elements to give them even more explosiveness

    Thanks for listening. It's hard to comment on music outside of your comfort zone, I have the same issues :-)

    I know what you mean with regards to the chorus, and in the original version it did have that. It was an old song I did with my old band and for whatever reason I never finished a full mix with vocals. It's actually very rare for me to not have almost completely different drums in the chorus!

    The back story to this tune was that I recently found some old backups and there was an unfinished project with some vocals in it which I ended up using on a failed attempt at an electro track.

    I will try and find all the other vocals on the backup and actually mix the old song!

    For context, here’s an instrumental version of the original song-- it's a bit different...

  • @pexfra said:
    Hello!

    This is Shivers, Ed Sheeran instrumental version recorded in Garageband, hope you like it!

    https://youtu.be/TzNsX1uMSSI

    Great guitar tone and playing.

    From a mix perspective, I think that the guitar is a bit too dominant. I like the strings but they're drowned out by the guitar. I'd also probably swap out the synth pad with celli/violas etc and maybe pan them so they have their own space within the mix and don't fight for the guitar's frequencies.

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