Writing remotely

keir

My bandmate and I want to get back into some writing sessions and due to living 20 miles away from each other and other commitments, adding an extra half a day out of the house on top of a weekly rehearsal isn’t really doable. 

So, I’ve suggested trying FaceTime or similar to get some ideas down. We both have macs, interfaces and the ability to record direct. I am a complete novice when it come to recording but can throw a track onto GarageBand etc.

Does anyone do similar? Any tips?

AntonHunter

Not done writing in this way, but jamming online over SonoBus has been really productive. Even recorded an album over it with their built in recording function. Decent latency depending on the connection etc.

spark240

Generally remote collabs are flawed with latency issues, ..the frustration outweighs the benefits for me...I just send files back and forth via Wetransfer....much more productive.

IMC1980

Agree with @spark240; best way would be to get your ideas down in your DAW and send the WAVs over to your friends via WeTransfer or similar. I have done a fair chunk of an album with a couple of guys from this forum and that process has worked well for collaborating. 

TheBigDipper

Latency and busy networks can be a killer for playing in synch with each other. Maybe FaceTime as one person plays and the other listens. You could send a file in advance and the other one could play it at their end and play with it - at least that way everything would be in synch when it arrived back at your end. 

Stratavarious

Our tool of choice is Bandlab.  It has a cracking browser based DAW.    Do it all in the browser, connects plug and play to interfaces and everything stays in cloud.  You can mix, master and export from it.  Easy to add parts remotely to build up tunes.  No moving files/stems around.

We did dozens of tracks in the depths of lockdown with it.  Awesome tool and it is free.

The future! 

There is another app for realtime playing together but latency was an issue for some members.  Can’t remember name.

keir

Thanks for the ideas everyone 

hassleham

Check out "Audiomovers".. I haven't used it properly yet so not sure about the latency but I tested it with a mate who lives far away from me and it seemed pretty good. You get a weeks free trial before having to pay a subscription fee so it's worth a go.

keir

hassleham said:

Check out "Audiomovers".. I haven't used it properly yet so not sure about the latency but I tested it with a mate who lives far away from me and it seemed pretty good. You get a weeks free trial before having to pay a subscription fee so it's worth a go.

Will have a look cheers