Band Demo

[guitarist321]

I'm doing a band demo CD with about 10 instrumental backing track song clips that my bandmates are adding vocals to, which is an 8 minute Main backing track in one stereo mp3 file. Now there are about 15 vocal tracks stacked underneath the main track along the timeline and the song is 3/4 done. Should I just keep adding tracks and finish the last 3 songs and let the tracks pile up and do one big mixdown or should I be doing sub-mixes of the vocal tracks?
If i wanted to do a sub mix of only certain tracks. How do I do this?
How do I select only certain tracks I wish to mixdown?
thx!

[kozikowski]

I'd produce each song one at a time. If you try to stuff too much into the computer, you could run the risk of recording latency wandering, stuttering, or other damage and that would be a nightmare to fix.

I would try selecting a whole track by clicking just above the MUTE button and then shift-select the other tracks you want to mix down. File > Export Selected should mix down to one stereo file.

Stay away from doing production in MP3. MP3 music files have some interesting timing problems in addition to damaging the sound.

Koz

[guitarist321]

Koz,
That makes sense about doing a sub mix.
So, all I have to do is highlight the tracks I want to mixdown?
excellent.

When should I convert them into wav files, and how do I do that?

thx,
Lou

[kozikowski]

While you're mixing, you can use the SOLO and MUTE buttons to the left to turn on and off individual tracks.

There was something magic about this. I need to look it up. You can't multiple select tracks of different length and the MUTE buttons are magic.

Koz

[kozikowski]

When you multiple select (shift key) pick the longest track first. The other track lengths will follow you.

Open your mix in Audacity later and see if you produced clipping or overload. All the export system does is add up the sounds. If they add up to over 100%, the sound will be clipped.

View > Show Clipping.

Watch for red bars in the sound.

If you do have damage, you need to reduce the volume of your original works before the mix.

Koz

[kozikowski]

Export will follow the MUTE buttons as well. Mute the tracks you don't want and File > Export.

Koz