Help me improve my GarageBand skills.
September 6, 2010 12:04 PM   Subscribe

GarageBand Filter: I am recording with GarageBand 3 and I have some questions about how best to seamlessly create/join loops so I don't have to play the whole song through for each track. Looking for tips and tricks.

I'm playing all of the instruments myself, and the song is mainly bass, guitar, and bass. The problem I am having is with the guitar and drums.

The overall quality of the sound is good, so no problems with hum, static, volume, or anything like that.

The problem I have is that if, say, the verse is a repetitive strum/chord pattern that lasts for four measures. I'd prefer to record it once and cut and paste it into the relevant parts of the song, rather than play the whole song on the guitar and then the whole song on the bass, and so on.

The problem I have is getting those tracks to line up properly with what is already there without awkward pauses or the tracks being annoyingly off time.

I know about splitting and joining tracks, but I think until i learn to better match together the loops I am trying to create, those features won't help me. I feel like there have to be some ideas that work that I'm just not trying.

Thanks in advance for any/all input.
posted by 4ster to Computers & Internet (4 answers total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Response by poster: Also, I know about using the slider to stretch out the track, but any advice that involves doing that is welcome as well.
posted by 4ster at 12:08 PM on September 6, 2010


While I hope you don't find this suggestion unhelpful, I would urge you to record a full track for each instrument, multi-tracking everything together. Although I understand the temptation of looping and splicing, you'd probably gain a far more dynamic, organic, and grooving feel to the completed piece with full-through tracks. I'm afraid I have no suggestion for better time-matching; as far as I'm aware, the best one can do is to zoom far in, and meticulously attempt the closest alignment you can get. If you recorded to a constant tempo, and the specific piece you're trying to insert starts on the beat, the time demarcations can aid you.
Best of luck in your creative endeavor!
posted by alexandermatheson at 10:01 PM on September 6, 2010


Are you using the metronome? Make sure that you're playing to GB's metronome.

If you want to get a measure of your repetitive part, record a take of yourself playing it three times in a row. Then you should be able to cut the middle one out (use snap-to-grid wherever possible when editing audio) and it should tesselate nicely with itself when you copy and paste it.

For making a nice transition between different sections, concentrate on ending your phrases correctly, or record the transition separately if it's got anticipatory notes or a build in it, eg:

A - A - A - A_to_B - B - B - B
(Here A is a loop, B is a loop, A_to_B is a twice-as-long loop that you use once.)

I agree with Alex about the groove and trying to do full takes in general, but a mechanical and repetitive sound might be what you're after, or might work for a single instrument amongst a more grooving track. I also like to do the looping thing to quickly arrange songs, or test out different arrangements in GB (or did before I moved to Reaper).
posted by Cantdosleepy at 6:43 AM on September 7, 2010


Get ableton live. It makes what you are trying to do a million times easier.
posted by empath at 5:24 PM on September 7, 2010


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