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Backing tracks that sound good?


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I'm looking for some high quality backing tracks just for jamming along with. A few years ago I found a website that had what really sounded like the originals and you could mute various parts. I have searched Google for hours and cannot find the site. All the stuff I found is cheap knock-offs and sounds terrible.

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Kronos 88, Korg CX-3, Motion Sound KBR-3D

 

 

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I'm looking for some high quality backing tracks just for jamming along with. A few years ago I found a website that had what really sounded like the originals and you could mute various parts. I have searched Google for hours and cannot find the site. All the stuff I found is cheap knock-offs and sounds terrible.

 

http://songgalaxy.com/ has the remove parts stuff.

Barry

 

Home: Steinway L, Montage 8

 

Gigs: Yamaha CP88, Crumar Mojo 61, A&H SQ5 mixer, ME1 IEM, MiPro 909 IEMs

 

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  • 2 years later...
I'm brining back this post from a few years ago. Anybody got recommendations? I'm just looking to have some fun with some classic rock stuff that I can mute certain parts, jam along with, etc. Don't mind paying, not looking for free. Most of what I have found online is fairly bad, especially the vocals.

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Kronos 88, Korg CX-3, Motion Sound KBR-3D

 

 

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do you like a bunch of the Kronos combis ?

 

you can bang them into the SEQ , mute channels/tracks and jam all night

 

learn the SEQ basics and you got it covered

Why fit in, when you were born to stand out ?

My Soundcloud with many originals:

[70's Songwriter]

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I'm a complete noob at this, BUT I just did a full wedding gig with tracks.

 

Backstory - here in NorCal, all the full band wedding gigs have been postponed until, well, you know.

 

But got a call from one of the singers I work with a lot. He's got a few duo / trio gigs. First one was a wedding this last Saturday - masks and social distancing. BTW, social distanced dancing means only 4 people on the dance floor at a time, and they have to wear masks while they dance. Me, guitar player, tracks and male vocals.

 

Anyway, we assembled a list of 36 songs for tracks - and a handful of non-track slow tunes.

 

I ended up getting tracks from song galaxy, hit trax (australia) and Paris Music (UK).

 

What I found:

There are MIDI versions and multi-tracked audio versions. Pros and cons to each approach, and of course quality is all over the map.

 

For tunes that really benefit from backing vocals and lots of little details, I went with multi-tracked audio (a few that come to mind include Uptown Funk and My Prerogative). A few we just nabbed a karaoke track for ease (Yeah, Tennessee Whiskey).

 

I was able to tweak some of the MIDI tracks to sound surprisingly passable - Breezin' and Easy like Sunday Morning - stick a live guitar over one and live piano on the other and bob's your uncle.

 

Others, well, not perfect. But hey, you got drums and bass locked, and if some of the horns sound canned, you do your best with editing and production in Logic, or you mute them.

 

Bottom line, reception went really well. Folks delighted to actually dance and party. Lots of complements about how tight we sounded (LOL - I got the tightest pocket in the business). And I kept to myself with my mask on the entire night.

 

I guess the morale of the story: Audiences still listen with their eyes, and they want to dance. Dancing needs drums and bass. And it makes a big difference to look like you're entertaining, even if there are more players in the silicon than there are on the stage.

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Karaoke Version is an awesome site. I haven't needed to look at it in years, so don't know if they have re-done their early tracks or not, but if not, then it is inconsistent and you really need to audition each song individually to make a buying decision. Like many, they started out MIDI based, using ROMplers and the like. They they switched to high-quality pro musicians, multi-tracking in isolation and allowing any combination of music minus one or however many tracks you choose to mute. There are pricing tiers based on feature exposure.

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Tim, so did you mix the things you did in Logic to stereo and play from a laptops stereo out into PA?

 

Yep, exactly.

 

After purchase and download, I loaded each into Logic, and treated like a recording project. Each track audited, decisions made. Is it so awful that it just needs to be muted? Any obvious corrections required (you'd be surprised how many badly played parts in otherwise decent MIDIs). Then on to patch changes to get decent instrument timbres. Then often removing all the pitch change events. Then EQ. Then FX.

 

Then arranging as it's more important the overall song grooves than a half-baked attempt at duplicating the record. Finally, PSP VintageWarmer 2 to make the track come alive.

 

And then no taking chances on using Logic live. I bounced every track to an MP3 (and don't forget to leave a long silence tail at the end - so when you finish playing the tune live, you don't have to jump on the space bar or have the next tune in the playlist count in).

 

Then I loaded everything in Apple Music (aka iTunes), and that's what I used for playback - MacBook Pro's headphone out to a Radial media DI.

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I'm surprised how good lots of the songs on Karaoke Version sound.

 

If I bought a song on there with multiple parts and I don't want to mess around with Logic, do I just save it on my laptop and play it from "their" website, muting parts as needed? I don't see a separate APP on their site that you can download and then control offline without internet access.

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Kronos 88, Korg CX-3, Motion Sound KBR-3D

 

 

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Wait a minute, is Crammit the same as Jammit from 10 years ago??? I'm going to download it on my iPhone but don't know what songs are available, etc?

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Kronos 88, Korg CX-3, Motion Sound KBR-3D

 

 

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I'm surprised how good lots of the songs on Karaoke Version sound.

 

If I bought a song on there with multiple parts and I don't want to mess around with Logic, do I just save it on my laptop and play it from "their" website, muting parts as needed? I don't see a separate APP on their site that you can download and then control offline without internet access.

 

I use karaoke-version.com to learn songs often. It's very handy for isolating tricky parts and then when you have the song learned, jamming along to the "band" at home by muting the keyboard part.

 

You don't need a DAW to use it. You pay for the song once, then you can download it as many times as you like in MP3 format - you have complete control over each audio track, including muting, soloing, levels and you can even add a click track if you wish.

 

Of course the quality of the tracks is variable, but I generally find them good enough for my simple purposes.

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Wait a minute, is Crammit the same as Jammit from 10 years ago??? I'm going to download it on my iPhone but don't know what songs are available, etc?

 

Yes it's from the ashes of that program and they've included all the content that was available however I found them to be way heavy, so to speak, on heavy metal/prog and not really suited to my more pop/rock oriented act. Think Dream Theater.

 

I prefer to use DP and create my own backing tracks, it's a little more hassle to haul that system around but I can also use the midi sequencing to trigger outboard hardware. On the rare occasion I've used a downloaded midi file I've almost always found it necessary to go in and strip out all the controller, patch and other odd midi data before I could rework the thing into some usable for me.

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FWIW:

 

I'm a big fan of Karaoke version. They have surprisingly good breakouts of keys/synth parts in a song that I had a hard time in in the recording (but if you don't play them it's noticeable)

 

I use KV to hear and learn a part. As other have said, you buy a track once, and then you have lifetime downloads of it. I will buy the track, then go back and change what's muted: download and save that, then go back and mute another part. Works well for me.

 

I have also done what you say you want up top. I mute the keys parts, and then play with along with the entire track.

David

Gig Rig:Casio Privia PX-5S | Yamaha MODX+ 6 | MacBook Pro 14" M1| Mainstage

 

 

 

 

 

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Regarding Crammit, I'm wondering if Canoehead or Greg can share the details of how you gain access to the songs and how all that works. I found that Crammit had a Facebook page which I tried to join a few nights ago but have not heard back from them. Please keep me posted.

 

Not to sound too dense, but when playing along with Karaoke Version songs, do you need to download the songs and then make sure you are connected to their website while playing them back?

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Kronos 88, Korg CX-3, Motion Sound KBR-3D

 

 

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Hey MrVegus. To use Crammit, purchase it from whatever app store you use. Once you"ve installed the app, all of the songs are available to download at no extra cost. If I remember correctly, almost all of the original Jammit files are available.

 

Cheers,

Canoe

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Rather than use iTunes which completely lacks soul and feeling, I would use play along"s that feature Ron Carter on bass. Perhaps one of the greatest bass players ever. Payin" Dues is a great album. Too bad Jamie couldn"t hire Ray Brown to do a bunch of sessions.

 Find 660 of my jazz piano arrangements of standards for educational purposes and tutorials at www.Patreon.com/HarryLikas Harry was the Technical Editor of Mark Levine's "The Jazz Theory Book" and helped develop "The Jazz Piano Book."

 

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Not to sound too dense, but when playing along with Karaoke Version songs, do you need to download the songs and then make sure you are connected to their website while playing them back?

 

No. You download an MP3 which you can play on a train, in the rain, in a box or with a fox.

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I have used Karaoke Version several times. You can download each track separately into Pro Tools and mix as you like. This takes some time but allows you to customize the tracks to your needs.

For example , no vocals, no keys, drums only etc. Most of the recordings are pretty good and you can lower or raise the key by a few steps.

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I have used Karaoke Version several times. You can download each track separately into Pro Tools...

 

For example , no vocals, no keys, drums only etc.

 

You can do this but there"s absolutely no need to. You can mix the tracks on the website to your taste BEFORE you download them.

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As a keyboard player I hate most tracks that you can buy You feel stupid playing a long with tracks that have everything covered. I put my own together so that at least you can play and create. Once in a while I'll put in a horn or string part that's necessary but generally I concentrate on drums and thick bass. I have everything from Jill Scott, Jeff Lorber, Al Green, Alex Bugnon, George Duke, Michael McDonald.......etc. Its hard enough mentally to play with tracks let alone when there's no space. I started this way back when when it was still new. Now it's everywhere . I guess as musicians we can blame ourselves for this. I'll send a sample to someone if you want. I also don't limit the sequences to the top. It sounds better to get a thicker sound by letting your PA create the volume
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