Writing and recording a song in Logic

BillS

Over the past few weeks I have been getting to know Logic Pro for iPad by writing, recording and mixing a couple of new songs. I’ve just finished a new one, Weight of Expectation, which is linked below.

It’s been a lot of fun! I just thought I’d share some of my thoughts on Logic as well as the song itself, and I’d be interested to hear others’ experiences. I am a traditional linear songwriter, so much as I have tried to love Drambo, my completed iPad songs have previously come via Cubasis, and going forwards it’ll likely be Logic.

First, some frustrations:

• Chord strips occasionally stopped working, even using in-house synths and only rebooting seemed to sort the problem.
• I could not record using the in-house arpeggiator, even with ‘record MIDI to track here’ enabled.
• Cannot record using the KB-1 keyboard
• Changing the key signature through the song does not update the chord strips at that point.
• The Swam Alto Sax overloads LP, even when basic overdubs are attempted.
• Keyboard shortcuts are great, but cease working immediately that a third party UI is open - even the spacebar is defunct.
• The lack of a ‘save as’ option is a huge omission, as is the ability to switch off auto-save.

That all said, the overall experience was great - I particularly enjoyed:

• Using LP in conjunction with a qwerty keyboard and mouse - yes, it would be great to have more k/b shortcuts, but spacebar, Ctrl+C/V, cursor keys, B for plugins, E for Editor, Y for browser, X for mixer, I for inspector etc all become second nature very quickly. It would be great to be able to edit these - I mean, why not B for Browser?! Multi-select by holding shift, backspace for delete - all these things and more make the work flow really fast when I am sitting at a desk actually working on something, rather than noodling on the sofa.
• Automation is really a joy to work with - I found that hitting V for fader and recording ‘live’ volume automation very easy. In my world, moving from a good ‘static’ mix with no automation, to an ever evolving mix by making many small automation changes to tracks really brings a song alive, and LP makes this easy.
• The quality of the included plugins is very, very good indeed. I’ll be first to admit I’ve spent a lot on iOS plugins that will no longer get used because the options in Logic are way better.
• I absolutely love Drummer - at long last this ‘solves’ the biggest issue I’ve had with iOS music making, namely acoustic drums. And in LP, I was able to convert Drummer regions to MIDI if I wanted to edit the patterns manually, so ended up getting a drum track that I was happy with.

As for the song itself, it would never have been created without noodling in AUM first. The initial 4-bar melody which is central to the song was inspired by using one keyboard to play two instruments at the same time, which is so quick and easy in AUM. I combined GeoShred’s ‘Shred Lead’ preset with Pure Synth’s ‘solo violin’ - I found the combination of an ‘electronic’ and a ‘real instrument’ complemented each other perfectly and with lots of live automation, I tried to make the sounds interweave with each other, rather than remaining static.

The (very few) lyrics outline the frustrations of a friend who has not had children, but has faced a lifetime of questioning as to why this is the case (either explicitly or left unspoken). The heavier/faster middle section is there to represent her anger, before she regains her peace in the final section. Although the middle section is a contrast from the first part, I used a variation of that same AUM inspired 4 bar melody in all three sections to try to give musical continuity.

Thank you if you have read this far…hope I don’t sound self-indulgent, but I love reading how others go about writing and recording, and in doing so I have picked up so many ideas from this forum. Cheers

Paulieworld

Hi Bill,

I must confess, I skipped the part about frustrations and went straight to the music, which is outstanding! To me, it had a bit of early Genesis feel. I love that! Whatever you’re doing, it’s working great. I also like the linear approach and use Cubasis exclusively. AUM is ideal for ambient music, but it doesn’t seem to work for me when I want to create something with structured parts. I really enjoyed this and hope to hear more from you!

AlterEgo_UK

I too skipped straight to the music but read the post whilst listening. Until fairly recently my DAW of choice was Cubasis until I replaced my PC with an M2 Mac Mini with Logic Pro on it! I was pleased to see it come to iPad but I do find it fiddly on my small (2018 11in iPad Pro) screen. It is missing a few nice features that are on the Mac version but it is early days and for mobile use I now prefer it over Cubasis.
I liked your track too - quite proggy and I like the change of tempo in the middle.

BillS

@Paulieworld Early Genesis? I’ll take that - saw Steve Hackett performing his ‘Foxtrot at 50’ show here in Scotland last year - it still mystifies me how anyone can write something as great as Supper’s Ready. @AlterEgo_UK thanks - proggy is my thing, but I’ve never been able to compose in anything but 4/4 or 3/4…I’ll keep trying.

scadet

Wow, so impressive! Really enjoyed the listen.

richardyot

I particularly liked the instrumentation in the intro, very nice.

BillS

@scadet @richardyot thanks for your positive comments 👍

GeoTony

Really enjoyable track. Great change of mood at about 2 minutes and then again at 3 with that folky Celtic feel. Top job 🙏