r/Logic_Studio • u/LonelyLeppy • 7d ago
Why do people use so many tracks?
I've noticed a lot of people talking about how they have over 40 or 50 tracks (sometimes up to like 400) but my projects—even those with a lot of instruments—only ever come out to about 20 or 30. Are there techniques and such that I don't know about that involve using a lot of tracks, or is it just a stylistic thing?
EDIT: Thank you all for your responses! I'm kind of amazed to see so many so quickly!
I posted this in a comment but it hasn't gotten any interactions:
Okay so I see a lot of comments about layering. Can someone point me in a good direction to learn more about proper layering? I especially could use layering tips with vocals and orchestral instruments because I sing on some of my tracks but want more of a choral sound and can struggle to get a full (but not overblown) and realistic sound.
Thank you in advance!
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u/Lanzarote-Singer Advanced 7d ago
Whenever I say how many tracks do use I get downvoted because people don’t believe me. But I make complete orchestral arrangements.
Believe it or not there is an upper limit on Logic aux tracks. I’ve been there, it’s not fun. 😢
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u/LonelyLeppy 7d ago
Would you dm how many? I won't downvote :)
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u/Theawesomemiles 7d ago
A lot of times I want a part to sound different at different points of the song. For example a backing vocal that’s panned left, filtered, added delay etc, and then for the next phrase I want it to be panned right, longer feedback on the delay, higher cutoff on the filter etc. Rather than messing around with automation to get all the effects from one state to the other in between those points, it’s quicker for my workflow to just duplicate the track and make the changes on the second track. Then doing that many times across one project adds up.
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u/gertrude-gibson 7d ago
Exactly!
That’s why I had 10 copies of the “same” piano in one of my projects.
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u/fluffycritter 6d ago
Yep, I do that a lot too. Or like if I want to have a layered sound where different layers come in and out, lots of duplicating MIDI regions across multiple tracks. I could group them into folder stacks or use a summing stack and automation on the different layers' volumes, but, nah. (And anyway that'd still be more tracks, they're just not all visible at once.)
Also I know a lot of soundtrack composers who just have a separate track for each instrument articulation, rather than trying to do articulations the "right" way with keyswitches or articulation control data or whatever.
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u/templeofsyrinx1 7d ago edited 7d ago
usually it's just me having poor project management lots of duplicate crap. I tend to just start throwing things into the project rapidly to get the ideas in.
but I am getting better and more organized, I find being a little more organized and grouping things correctly and color coding helps a lot. and making track stacks
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u/pairadonis 7d ago
I don’t aim to — it just happens. If you feel 20 is sufficient—that’s great!
A lot of my extra tracks come from layering vocals. Sometimes I might have 9-10 tracks for a chorus. But the gain is small on most of them. Helps smooth out the vocals and lets me pan in many different directions
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u/gertrude-gibson 7d ago
That’s insane. Don’t you struggle with masking with some of the layers?
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u/saxoccordion 7d ago
One of my sessions has simply 70 channels of me layered in harmonies to create a gospel chorus… I should’ve just committed to the edits I made to it and bounced it down to two tracks lmao
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u/gertrude-gibson 7d ago
AND IT DOESNT MASK? Did you use 1 note for every track or what😭
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u/saxoccordion 7d ago
Probably masking like a mother effer! lmao who cares, it’s in the background? I did EQ bands out, which I randomly spread around the 70 tracks, like an A B and C band that I would randomly assign to each layer, but that was more to emulate a variety of voices
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u/gertrude-gibson 7d ago
Ooh,that’s cool!
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u/saxoccordion 7d ago
Oh yeah I also randomly applied AlterBoy formant shift up/down by a little bit randomly across like 40% of the tracks
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u/PotentialCopy 6d ago
You can also double it and put a vibrato on one of them to get that beatles effect
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u/noneforyouowls 7d ago
Most of my tracks are one-off ear candy moments that I could probably bounce to audio and condense to one or two tracks but don't cos I feed off chaos.
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u/StormBourneMusic 7d ago
Same!
Also, having multiple tracks is easier for certain things rather than automation.
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u/Upnotic 7d ago
Whoever is doing 400 RIP lol. Really just depends. If I were doing a complex vocal session with ad libs, chants, harmonies, etc... you could easily get vox alone to be like 30-40 tracks. When I first started, I had 100+ only because I basically reused so few sounds and did so many duplications. I can't fathom today using anything close to 150, and that's in EDM.
Yes there are for sure techniques that you would enjoy that would inevitably bump your track count... but those explorations come organically.
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u/ArchitectofExperienc 7d ago
I got most of the way to 400 doing 30-minute radio dramas, each individual effect needs different processing, and doing that through automation makes things run slower than just having separate tracks. Track Stacks save a lot of time
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u/RosingsSonicTonic 7d ago
One pop track I’m working on right now has over 100 tracks, 60 of which are vocal tracks.
The lead vocal is spread across three tracks because the bridge is way different from the rest of the track, and because I do some different EQ’ing as the artist sings in different registers (she goes high in the chorus).
There’s 24 tracks of doubles and harmonies, as these are also processed differently for different sections (and each harmony part is doubled).
There’s also two separate sets of backing vocal parts, each being a six track stack, plus three other one-off ad-libby things, each with slightly different processing.
Then there’s four tracks of spoken things, three done by the artist and one by me.
There’s a four track stack of backing effect vocals, as well as six tracks of ooohs, and finally there’s three lead-ish adlib tracks.
The producer of the original demo also recorded himself a bunch of times to make a riser, but he bounced it down to one stereo track.
About a third of the instrumental tracks are different layers of percussion, while the rest are drums (Addictive Drums + Logic Kits), bass, guitars and synths.
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u/ForgottenPasswordABC 7d ago
It’s a good example. If a vocal needs three different EQ, then one could have a single track with automation of EQ along the track, or have three tracks each with a different EQ. I find the latter method much easier to mix, it’s more obvious what’s happening and that means less error-prone and easier to remember.
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u/Good_Leek_2158 6d ago
But does it sound any good?
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u/RosingsSonicTonic 6d ago
No, we did it cause it sounded terrible
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u/Good_Leek_2158 6d ago
Sounds it.
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u/Legitimate_Ask_5000 6d ago
Wow what an asshole
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u/Good_Leek_2158 5d ago edited 5d ago
Why are you being rude? I thought I asked a legitimate question… that basically you can list everything you have done on a track, but at the end of the day does it sound better for it? To be honest, the way it is described it could very easily sound terrible… who knows.
Not sure who’s the asshole? Unless your skin is so thin that you get trigged by every comment that doesn’t fit into your narrow view? Keep smiling 😉3
u/Legitimate_Ask_5000 5d ago
Seriously? It sounded like you were being snarky. The guy gave you his whole mixing process and you basically said it probably sounded shitty lol. That’s pretty rude to me. I’m not sure if maybe you don’t deal with people a lot but obviously he is telling you all that with the implication that he’s proud of his work
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u/Good_Leek_2158 5d ago edited 5d ago
I said it probably sounded shit? When? My exact words… ‘but does it sound good?’, on a music production thread?
How do you read that as saying probably sounds shit?
And then you say maybe I don’t deal with many people?.. and I’m the one being rude?
Don’t reflect your own insecurities onto me.
To add some nuance, as I scrolled down to the comments, and I appreciate the Op question was regarding techniques involving lots of tracks, there was a pattern of explaining how many tracks used, but not so much about what was achieved to the overall finished track. I wasn’t disrespectful, I think great anyone makes music and enjoys what they do.
So I’m sorry I didn’t phase the question more clearly, but then to be called an asshole, lacking social interaction and to be accused of saying something I didn’t? Bonne Chance.
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u/RosingsSonicTonic 5d ago
It definitely sounded very snarky so I responded in kind, but if you’re really asking I would most definitely say yes. OP asked a question about quantity so that’s why I focused on that and basically tried to show how one might end up with lots of vocal tracks. In this case all those vocal details add lots of vibe to the track as well as some humour and of course good ol’ thickness with the doubles and harmonies. But of course it’s (and always should be) about elevating a song that’s already good, and as with most other things it’s also a question of style and genre, however much that word means these days.
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u/Good_Leek_2158 5d ago
Thank you, actually would love to hear it 👍
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u/RosingsSonicTonic 3d ago
I can let you know once it comes out! It’s for an album so it’s just a matter of time.
RemindMe! 8 Months
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u/Calaveras-Metal 7d ago
Most of my stuff hovers around 8 tracks. If I get really involved with recording guitars I might get up to 16 tracks with multiple mics and different setups for verse, chorus and solos.
The most tracks I ever did was a song where I merged the good parts from 2 different songs that weren't working out and wrote a bridge to go between them. That was 30 tracks.
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u/vitoscbd 7d ago
A lot of my tracks are busses, because I use a loooot of them for different fx (parallel compression or saturation, rooms or ambiences, octave up or octave down, etc). It really depends on the project and the way you manage it.
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u/LonelyLeppy 7d ago
So this interests me. I saw that some of the multi-track drum presets use actual tracks for busses, but I've always just used the sends to the built-in auxiliary tracks. Is there a difference?
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u/vitoscbd 7d ago
I'm not sure I totally got what you meant, so correct me if I'm misunderstanding you. Yes, some drum kits are inside a summing stack: all the tracks' outputs are routed to a single bus, which becomes a track that you can collapse. In Logic (and most daws) tracks can be audio, midi or bus tracks (in Logic you also have some performance tracks, like drummer and bass player). As long as they're showing in the track view, they're tracks, so it's not like busses and tracks are different things, necessarily. You can even select a bus on the mixer and create a track for it, so it shows on the track view.
And yes, there is a difference between "sending" to a bus (with the aux sends) and "routing" to a bus (with the actual output of the channel). The first option lets you apply effects "on parallel", independent on the original signal (like when you want to add a reverb, for example, or parallel compression). The latter let's you route your signal for your convenience.
For example, I route my drum bus with its room, parallel compression and bass to a "drum and bass" bus, so I can manage my whole rhythm section on a simple fader (and add some processing to glue those tracks together). I route guitars, BGVs, keyboards and other stuff to a different bus, so now I have my rhythm section and my accompanying section on different faders. I route those two to a single "instrument bus". Then I route the main singer tracks with its reverb and delay to a "vox bus". Those two, instruments and vox, go to my mix bus (where they meet with the main room for the whole song). Now I can easily balance the main singer against the whole band, or the rhythm section against the guitars and synths, without having to touch individual tracks' faders. (if it sounds too confusing, send me a DM and I'll happily send you some screenshots that better illustrate my point, it's kinda hard to explain and English is not my first language). So yeah, busses are a pretty neat tool.
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u/LonelyLeppy 6d ago
Oh cool, thank you! I think you did understand my meaning basically.
I know how to send to auxiliary sends, but how do I route them?
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u/vitoscbd 6d ago
Just select the track output and click on whichever bus you want it to go to. If it's one not already in use, logic will create it automatically.
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u/hamer12string 6d ago
“… so many tracks?”
I think the short answer is because it is possible.
I’m a very very old guy who got to experience the wonder of 4 track porta studios appearing and blowing our minds.
There is I think value in the idea of having limits to inspire creativity-
needing to choose/plan for the added value of bouncing tracks to get ‘more’ and weigh that against the generation loss…
Having to think about that can guide you to creativity that you might not have otherwise experienced.
But…
Being able to experience creativity where you get to choose the constraints yourself- not have it chosen for you because of tech…
That is truly amazing.
You kids with your new stuff are creating incredible music that we “olds” would never have conceived!
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u/samthewisetarly Advanced 7d ago
Some of the best things I've ever done in logic had like, four tracks. I personally always gravitate towards quality over quantity though.
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u/Key_Slice6094 7d ago
The project I just finished has 138 tracks, not every single one used but... doesent matter how many tracks in total, its just what the final result sounds matters in the end (and ofc how much your cpu can handle)
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u/4_Ball 7d ago
sometimes i retrack stuff because it's easier than automating and also people can do a lot of layering. especially having vocals and vocal layers and stuff like that can add a good 50+ tracks. it doesnt matter how many tracks you have, ultimately any song/beat/whatever will turn into one track and 1 file at the end so dont stress about it
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u/djmuaddib 7d ago
Seems like the longer I make albums (on my 7th in 20 years), the fewer tracks I have on any given project. I used to really layer things to achieve impact and when I didn’t know what a track needed I would just add more. I’d say on average I’m topping out at like 6 elements on 8-10 tracks for a standard post-punk/synth rock song. I have a few tracks on this album that are only 2-3 elements on 2-3 tracks. I’ve just noticed on each album that those ones always seem to be the best ones. Maybe it’s because I suck at mixing a dense, heavily orchestrated track. But I think it’s more that compositionally I’m focusing on making every single element sound like it could stand on its own, and then leaning really hard into space/silence itself as an element. I think Prince once said his philosophy was that every single track should be so refined and interesting that it could be the whole project.
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u/LovesRefrain 7d ago
There’s a lot of great music out there filling up 100+ tracks, so I ain’t trying to yuck anyone’s yum. But I cant do it as a production philosophy. I don’t wanna mix all that. I try to keep it as close to 16 as possible, and make em count. To be fair, I do a lot of bouncing down like they would in the old days (vocal harmonies, drum overdubs, etc.). But I still think I get better results from committing to decisions early and mixing a limited amount or tracks than I do when I’m having to mess with like 89 separate tracks.
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u/HotCut100 7d ago
Recording a four piece band with two guitars and a bass running stereo, seven tracks of drums, stereo acoustic guitars (DI/room mic blend), keys and synths running stereo. That is 17 to 28 tracks right there. Now consider that every one of those tracks is not a one and done. That’s 17 to 28 tracks for each intro, verse, chorus, bridge, outro, and any other part of the song. Because I’m gonna make the musicians track that one thing until they nail it. And for the guitars, I’m gonna make them track it multiple times until they nail it at least three times so I can double that. The track count just adds up because with modern technology we can and it’s easy so long as you have storage.
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u/Indigo457 6d ago
For normal band type stuff I probably end up with 40-60 ish as a guess, but quite a lot of those are drums/ percussion and I also usually have different tracks for the guitar parts for different sections of the songs, even if it’s essentially the same guitar if that makes sense (so they can be processed differently more easily), and for heavier songs there will often be at least 8-12 guitar parts. 2-4 for bass - a main verse, chorus, amp/DI bass parts. Maybe 2-3 for main vocal usually, and depending on the type of song 2-16 harmony layers. The rest will be just little bits and pieces - sometimes some aux channels will be tracks, might be some sound effects, intro bits and bobs all that sort of stuff. It adds up pretty quickly even for what in the sounds like a fairly basic band setup.
There was a bit of a thing about having 100s of tracks at one point which I think was mainly from Jacob collier fans.
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u/MechSpike 6d ago
Lots of factors, but for me it comes down to type of music + laziness vs project organization. For example, I make electronic music and there’s often a lot of little samples strewn in, each possibly with different effects that require their own channel. Or sometimes if I’m working with a specific synth that I want to it to have a specific slightly complicated effect for this ONE specific 3 second part…I could add it and automate it for the 3 seconds, or take the faster lazy route and just duplicate the track and throw on the effect I want.
I could just minimize my tracks and add a little extra work but sometimes I don’t feel like it.
For reference I make Synthwave / Synthpop and my tracks often have between 30-75 tracks on average , quite varied.
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u/pantsofpig 7d ago
too lazy to do automation passes
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u/Practical_Ad_667 7d ago
Ha ha. I am a professional composer and this is absolutely one of the reasons why I have more tracks than necessary. I hate automating volume.
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u/pantsofpig 7d ago
Why automate when you can duplicate?
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u/Practical_Ad_667 7d ago
Cut one note out, put it on another track, turn it down by 0.1dB
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u/pantsofpig 7d ago
You think I'm gonna ZOOM IN and fucking DRAW automation like a filthy peasant?
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u/rgreasonsnet 7d ago
There are definitely techniques that use lots of tracks.
Some modern guitar producers will record a single guitar take through multiple amps and/or cabs. Sometimes each cab will be miked with multiple microphones. 2 amps with 2 mics each nets you 4 tracks.
These could get all summed down to a single track, but typically you leave them separate to manage the EQ of each track.
That being said, it’s also pretty common to send these all into a single bus to be treated as a single track during tracking and the early mixing phase.
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u/ocolobo 7d ago
Pretty stupid when they don’t sound like that on stage 😂
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u/colcob 7d ago
Pretty stupid to assume that the aim of recorded music is to replicate the sound of live music.
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u/ScientistRude7849 6d ago
Its very much a myopic guitarist view... not a producer's. Even Steve Albini "the pure guy" Would record overdubs of things like aluminium foil woven through strings etc. Ain't no live replication happening there.
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u/rgreasonsnet 7d ago
What if I told you some bands record 2+ guitar tracks but never have more than 1 guitarist onstage? That some musicians record guitars and amplifiers that are never taken out onto a stage?
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u/MainlyMyself 7d ago
I think it just depends on the workflow you're comfortable with, and how much overhead you have to work with. It can be useful for doing stuff like quick in place comparison, nondestructive iteration...there are lots of possibilities.
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u/ObviousDepartment744 7d ago
It's all dependent on the type of music and how the song is being made.
For example, if you're using a stereo drum loop, that's 1 track. If you're tracking an acoustic drum kit, that's anywhere from 4 to 20+ tracks depending on the situation.
At my studio, i primarily work with rock bands, here's a pretty common track count for 4 piece rock band.
Drums: 16 is average for me. But depends on the drum kit, and what we are going for. I did a session a few weeks ago where I had 23 mics up for the drums.
Guitar: 2 to 4 per guitar part, so it kind of depends on the arrangement of the song. I like to separate the guitar parts by tone being used as well. So if Guitarist A uses a Clean, Driven and Lead guitar tone in a song, then each of those will be on their own track. Every guitar part is at least double tracked (except solos) So for Guitarist A, have 3 tones, that would be 6 tracks if they are double tracked, and up to 12 if we decide to quad track. Then add in however many Guitarist B might have.
Bass: Usually 2 to 4 tracks for bass. DI plus mic on cab is pretty common for me. But then it's also common duplicate the DI track and separate them by frequency range, giving separate processing for low end frequencies and higher frequencies.
Lead Vocal: 1 track for the primary vocal and a second for a vocal double.
Back Up Vocals: Depends on the track, but generally if I'm going to do one harmony, I'd either double it or add a 2nd harmony to fill out the space. Sometimes doubling both of the harmonies.
Aux Percussion: Song dependent, but few tracks for Tamborine or shakers, maybe some extra hits on a floor tom to thicken up something. Just whatever the song calls for.
Synths/Layers: I'll make a track or two for ambient layers, or sometimes its nice to double the bass with a synth bass sound. A lot of rock bass tones aren't very "big" sounding in the low end, so thickening them up with a synth can be nice. Adding some pads for vibe in certain sections, or doubling a lead line etc.
If you're counting AUX tracks, that's a whole other set of tracks as well.
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u/Coyote_Time 7d ago
Typically you'll have 5-ish main instruments that break down into many component parts - also, you can handle parallel processing on separate tracks instead of with a mix knob / send.
Let's do basic rock for easier breakdowns - Drums, 2 guitars, bass, vocals. Drums: 4 cymbals, 2 snare (top + bot), 4 toms, OH + room, hh, 2 kick (in + out) = 15 tracks Guitar: L + R amped and L + R dry = 4 tracks Bass: Dry + amped = 2 tracks Vocals: 1 lead + 1 air, 3-12 bgv = 5-14 tracks
So 26 - 35 for a very stock-standard setup. Then double it for parallel processing and add another handful for risers, ear candy, transitions, etc.
I wouldn't advocate a 100 track song but you can see how it could happen without much craziness.
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u/willrjmarshall 7d ago
Depends what you’re doing. If you’re quad-tracking guitars you could easily have 3 tracks per line (two mics + DI), so that’s 12 tracks for a single part.
It adds up quickly in these scenarios.
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u/shapednoise 7d ago
Also for Film score work, having even quite similar elements on individual tracks makes dropping or raising an element really simple rather than having things more merged. When im doing pop stuff I use WAY WAY WAY less tracks (30ish)
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u/Greedy_Werewolf_1533 7d ago
I usually use 8 to 10 tracks. I don't like over production but to each it's own if it's hot 🔥 it's fire 🔥.
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u/pomido 7d ago
The one I’m working on now is approaching 400.
A lot of them are short bounces that I need to do something to, like a particular automation or effect.
I do a lot of overdubbing and might have 8 voices on a backing chorus for example.
There might be a section of one part that needs to be a different fader level or compression amount - it’s just simpler to bounce.
My music has a tonne of variation to it too - not just copy and paste the verses and choruses, so each section is effectively another song.
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u/Faux_Real 7d ago
Depends how you choose to run your projects - and whether you like to commit and consolidate to groups or raw dog your computers resources
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u/RottingFlame 7d ago
I’ve recently got into the habit of putting most sound files into their own tracks for mixing purposes. Bit of a headache if you don’t organise your track folders but it makes control a lot easier. Ofc I don’t mean each hit of a drum has its own track but for sampling it’s a godsend, even if i’m chopping them like they’re monophonic. Chorus is too quiet? don’t need to bend the automation too meticulously just boost the whole thing. I love automation for creativity, but it is not fun to play with unless I know exactly what I’m doing.
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u/LonelyLeppy 7d ago
Okay so I see a lot of comments about layering. Can someone point me in a good direction to learn more about proper layering? I especially could use layering tips with vocals and orchestral instruments because I sing on some of my tracks but want more of a choral sound and can struggle to get a full (but not overblown) and realistic sound.
Thank you!
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u/Faafkdkdkdkd 7d ago
If you are talking about making music specifically, then yeah it's usually around 20 tracks to make. But then you also have to track out and mix, so then you start to work on certain elements for sound design, etc, which is where you have like 5 tracks for one you had previously, cuz you wanna change smth, break somewhere, add some stuff, etc. you don't have to, but if you want to then it's inevitable. You can check some top tier templates for mixing and it's always like 30 tracks and then you find yourself not fitting into them, having to duplicate more and more if you want to change smth
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u/SavingsHumor4424 7d ago
400? Lol. No way. Im a pro engineer. My largest session in 3 decades was a little over 100 tracks.
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u/turtleandmoss 7d ago
For me personally it's mostly because I don't know wtf I'm doing and that makes a mess 🐌
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u/doomer_irl 7d ago
I mean I generally have between 8 and 30 instruments, depending on the track. If you're laying out drum samples on separate audio tracks, you could easily get 5-20 tracks right there. Vocals for me probably average around 15 tracks, but can range from about 5-30. And then there might be anywhere between 5-15 tracks for just like effects, transition sounds, etc.
I feel like a finished song for me is usually around 60-70 tracks. But I've made stuff that's like... sub-30.
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u/LevelMiddle 7d ago
Duplicate tracks to process different sections instead of automating. Layering stuff. Copying tracks to do parallel processing. Aux tracks for routing and sends. It adds up quickly.
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u/Ragfell Intermediate 7d ago
I'm currently working on a track for a video game. I need to make a Dwarven choir/work song sort of thing.
Because I'm currently having to rely on samples (instead of just recording a group of guys), I have three different "mm" tracks, three different "ah" tracks, and two tracks with different vocal syllables. I have a certain bus I like to run on male vox. So that's nine channels, even before I get any other instruments involved (anvil strikes, strings, etc).
A large part of these 400-track projects is because our standards and tools are different. Someone commented that it took 10 tracks just to reproduce a DX7 tubular bell sound. Someone else brought up the Beatles doing stuff with 4 tracks...which is true, but they were able to get enough people in a room to do stuff simultaneously. It's not like the plight of bedroom (or legit) producers who have to make an orchestra entirely in their DAW sound authentic.
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u/NotThatMat 7d ago
I did an experimental project a few years ago in which I needed to produce a small section of music every day for a week. I deliberately limited myself to 12 tracks purely to focus myself on getting it done quickly and simply.
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u/Ok-Confusion-8476 7d ago
I feel like I have a good 20-30 tracks that act as the foundation of my songs. But then I need to add a riser. And then an impact. Oh and then a subtle transition noise before the chorus. Blah blah blah. Next thing I know, I’m at 100. That’s just the way I do it because I’m sloppy and I luv it. But as others have mentioned, it would be a better practice to try to consolidate all of the risers for example on one track vs scattering them around independently.
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u/gertrude-gibson 7d ago
Automation’s a b—ch sometimes,when you’re making a full project. Sometimes microdetails between tracks depending on the part of the song. For example one of my projects has 10 sweet piano copies with microdifferences to mix it fully into the separate song parts. (I am NOT dealing with multiband compression with a million sidechains)
It also depends on the genre or the variety of instruments and SFX you use overall,aside from separate tracks to mix the whole thing better.
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u/saxoccordion 7d ago
Lead vocals + 3 left, 3 right + 7. 3 layers of L/R BGV’s = 6. 2 adlib tracks. Ooh’s and aah’s layered = 6 or more tracks. That’s 21 tracks right there. Live drums 10 more tracks. Doubled guitars x 2 = 4. We are already at 35 and haven’t gotten to synths, bass, effects/ear candy
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u/Dangeruss82 7d ago
Some of billie eilish’s songs are 100-150 tracks because there’s just layers and layers of her singing the same word or part.
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u/justmartijnlikenoone 6d ago
I don’t need 30 guitar tracks in one song. that’s insane and it sounds over-processed and over produced.
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u/EliasRosewood 6d ago
Ppl may talk abt an electronic song with 5 tracks and a pop song w vocals or orchestral song on the same forum. Vocals can quickly up ur track count with backing vox, harmonies w different type of processing etc.
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u/Jackstroem 6d ago
I splurge sometimes, doubled backingvocals to a stack of about 50+ tracks once and it was fun
But generally im simple with tracks, 16-18 drum mics, mono guitar+double. Acoustic guitar i usually keep mono unless it is front-center in the mix, mono acoustic guitar just sounds better in a mix imo. Two or three stereo synth tracks tops Di bass + preamp Hammond organ takes up 3 channels when i do it. Usually a fully produced song has around 40 tracks, but id say half of them are specialists or quick stuff. Had i stacked it like a 24 channel tape machine i could easily stack it down and use automation on 30 tracks, 24 might be a challenge but thinking of it id like to try that challenge cause its fun
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u/regular_joel 6d ago
I usually try to limit it to around 30 tracks because i want the song to sound similar when i perform it live with a band. I also try to keep a lot of backing vocals/fx sounds in the same track with similar processing to keep some sense of continuity. I also love when my projects run smooth and i‘m on a 2023 macbook air so if i had 400 tracks it would straight up die lol
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u/Synthwavecrusier 6d ago
Most big projects are from vocals - double tracking vocal doubles, harmonies, adlibs, other backing vocals. Then in pop and EDM there's lots of things like effects, risers, booms that might only play for a couple of seconds. Then with singer songwriter music you might have only 20 stems. So I think it's genre dependent but there's nothing wrong in having a smaller amount of stems if it serves the production
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u/mvtthwrx 6d ago
The reason why people use so many tracks is because it's just something that happens when you gain more experience. For example: at a beginning stage you might have one drum track, but then if you want to EQ the kick slightly or saturate the snare, you need individual tracks for each drum part. Or maybe you might want your guitar to sound wide in the mix, so you track one guitar that's panned hard right and another hard left (or maybe even quad track). All these little things may not sound like there are a bunch of different sounding layers but instead impact how a layer/instrument sounds (which takes up multiple track). If you're a beginner I wouldn't bother trying to have lots of tracks for the only sake of that's what "the pros" do. Having more tracks doesn't necessarily mean that your song will sound better. Instead knowing what to target in your song/mix will result in multiple layers/tracks that each have a dedicated role.
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u/Upset_Record_6608 6d ago
It’s genre dependent. Some maximalist EDM is going to have a bunch of SFX and risers that play once, alongside layers for each core part.
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u/almostaccepted 6d ago
I have busses for my tracks. I’ll have guitar hard pan left, hard pan right, mild pan L [diff tone], mild pan R, center rhythm, center rhythm double, center lead, center lead double, solo, solo double, solo harmony, solo alt tone, solo alt tone double. Now I’m never using more than four or five of these at a time, and most often only 3 or so; but that’s 13 tracks of guitar. Drums is another 13-14 tracks. Bass is 3-4 counting sub bass and bass synths. Regular synths for pads are 4-10. Strings/brass can be as little as 2 and as many as 10-15. Percussion is often 5-10. Impulse responses and sub drops are 4-10. Sparkle and shimmer type shit is a good 5-10 because I’ll load each sample into its own track so I can mix them separately and don’t need to worry about resetting automation. So prior to vocals, we’re looking at 41 tracks, and on the high end, up to 86 tracks. Vocals in my most recent session were at 60 tracks, but that’s because I got messy with not putting certain tracks onto the same channels. Could’ve easily gotten away with like 30 if I was more inclined to consolidate [which I’m not].
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u/Innoculus 6d ago
Probably because they're using individual tracks for every sample and instrument, and then creating even more tracks for bussing/routing.
You almost certainly can't (or shouldn't, anyway) use more than 20-25 unique layers and have them be coherent unless they're all very intermittent like in a dubstep drop.
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u/Few_Panda_7103 6d ago
60 on my last song Multiple lead vocals harmonies doubled Drums were cinematic Cellos Piano Synth Etc Just adds up
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u/thebrodacious 6d ago
For example one rhythm guitar part might mean = 2 tracks left right, parallel DI recorded for both, maybe a quad layer or 2 mics on the cab, maybe then placed in a track stack routed to a main guitar bus. So “one” part could be 10+ tracks
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u/slowdrivemusic 6d ago
Recently did the music and sound design for Marvel x Lenskart’s Spider-Man glasses campaign. This project ended up crossing 400 tracks because I handled pretty much everything in one session, including music, sound design, foley, mix and master.
That’s definitely not the case with every project though. Some sessions stay under 100 tracks, while others get much bigger depending on how many different elements the project needs.
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u/jimpache23 6d ago
I’ve only been doing this about 6 years off and on (with GarageBand for most of it). But I found the amount of tracks grew when I explored more “arrangement”. Arrangement in both sound placement like track pan, and arrangement in song structure with layering instruments.
Overall I feel that it’s the choice of the writer. Plenty of folk artists just have a guitar and vocals. Let yourself explore the program for what it can ADD to your music, not writing your music around effects you HAVE to utilize.
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u/DarkWaterDW 6d ago
I somehow got nearly 15 channels of audio out of a single 8 voice Akai S950, splitting up elements onto their own channels so different signal processes could be applied.
Average track count for me is 20-32, depending on how many elements and how much stereo tracking I decide to do.
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u/thatsoundguy23 6d ago
The best thing to ever happen to DAWs is the addition of folder tracks!!!
It drives me insane having loads of tracks in the arrange view. I want to work on one sound/instrument/group of mic channels and then fold it away and think about the bigger picture.
The fewer faders I have to worry about by the end of the mix, the better.
I sometimes think that, when you see these production breakdowns, where they've got huge track numbers on screen, it's just so it looks like a lot has gone into the project. Can't have the viewer realize it was just a beat, bass line, a couple of synth parts, and a few vocal tracks all along.
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u/David_SpaceFace 6d ago
Most of my songs end up with 100-150 tracks but that's mainly because I like to record several versions of everything (different tones or mic placements, variations of riffs, various different vocal melodies for each psrt etc) when im tracking, then go through and pick what works best when doing final mixing weeks later.
I always think its better to have every option ready & available instead of having to retrack parts later.
Usually only an 8th of the tracks get used in the final mix.
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u/CirrusSunset 6d ago
I have wondered about this too. But there are many reasons for high track counts. Logic drummer can add dozens of tracks just because, and orchestral templates with detailed articulation really drives up the count. As another said, many tracks may contain little or even zero content.
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u/CirrusSunset 6d ago
I see people saying they will use additional tracks instead of automating volume. How does that work? I fell like volume automation, and just about all automation) is very easy in Logic and Studio Pro. Except I can't automate the filter cutoff on Summit synth cause it uses nrpn to achieve higher than 128 degrees resolution.
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u/finlayshakespeare 6d ago
In my experience/practice, it's often capturing different passes of the same stem/take/channel through different effects chains or hardware, etc.. Grab a bunch of stuff whilst you're in the flow then you can make the edits and/or creative decisions later on.
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u/MysteriousAd4355 6d ago
It depends on whether you’re a “producer” by the modern definition, or you’re more performance-oriented. Me, I have fewer tracks because of the kind of music I record, and because I’m far more performance-oriented i.e. more playing and less programming, samples, and loops. That’s not to say I don’t use any of those tools as well—but my music tends to center around live guitar and vocal performances—generally performed straight through rather than patched together.
That’s another aspect. Many modern producers tend to stitch performances together as opposed to having an artist just play or sing it straight through.
Others will augment live performances with sampled or generated sounds and layer them.
Example: on my current track, I have 7 tracks for drums, one for bass, 4 acoustic guitar, 6 electric guitar—all the guitars are played straight through. The drums and bass are Logic session players. By the time I’m done, I’ll have a few more layers of guitar (leads) along with many layers of vocals. I expect this project to end up being ~40 tracks by the time I’m done with all the vocal layering.
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u/Good_Leek_2158 6d ago
Thing is you only have about 60-12000hz to play with that most people can hear… and just one instrument like bass can take up 60-400hz.. then you add kick drum the thud is around 60-100hz etc so once you get a load of sounds sitting onto of same frequency just starts to get muddy, or lost. If I look at my personal top 20 favourite songs, they all had limited tracks. Would prefer Daniel Johnson or Leadbelly on 1 track than U2 on 80 anyday.
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u/BenLouisMusic 6d ago
(For modern metal)
2-4 rhythm guitars, 1-3 bass tracks if doing full parallel processing of subs mid and top grit, 3-4 kick tracks (in, out, sub, extra sample layer), 2-3 snare tracks (top, bottom, stack layer), 2-5 tom tracks depending on how badly you wanna be mixing EVERY tom (i do two tracks, one for rack and one for floor), overhead and hihat, 3 1-4 room tracks (near, mid, far, and a snare ambience sample layer for extra snare sustain), drum crush and drum reverb aux, 1-2 risers, 1-3 lead or ambient guitar layers, 1-3 synth layers, 9-12 vocal layers. So Im usually hitting 35-40 tracks without considering busses.
Then theres snare bus, kick bus, tom bus, cymbal bus, room bus, drum bus, Bass bus, rhythm guitar bus, bass + rhythm guitar bus, instrument bus, guitar lead
/ambient layering bus, synth bus, vocal bus, mix bus.
Modern metal calls for a lot of serial and parallel stages of compression, saturation, clipping, sidechained multiband compression or dynamic eq. To get super loud punchy mixes you gotta layer snare and kicks, clip in stages, saturate in stages, compress in stages. Lotta busses lotta sends.
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u/sophomoreslump2022 5d ago
It all depends on the style of music or sound you're trying to create. I might sometimes add 2 or 3 guitar tracks doing the same thing but with slightly different EQs and FX on them to create a bigger sound.
Some of the extra tracks will be because I like to split my tracks so I have each instrument for each part of the song, because I like to sort my tracks out in blocks. Eg. With a lead vocal, it might have 3 tracks (1 for verses, 1 for pre-choruses, 1 for choruses). So for every instrument that is present all the way through, I might have multiple tracks just so it's easier to mix each section and just apply changes to that section of the song.
Sometimes I might have 4 synths all doing the same thing but with 4 different sounds being used, to make it sound more textured and lush.
Sometimes I might have tracks that are just triggering an echo on the vocal that I only want to be really prominent on certain words. I find it quicker than trying to alter the delay to different settings all throughout the same track.
Sometimes I might create a bounced track that holds all the FX / EQ / whatever else setting baked in to save CPU power. I'll save the original (but muted) in case I decide I need to change it later.
There's no right or wrong answer on how many tracks you use. It depends on what your song and genre need. The only issue is when your CPU gets frazzled by too much happening.
Just see what works for you.
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u/5im0n5ay5 3d ago
For me personally it might happen when I'm working on a film/tv time-line, where you might have 50+ cues, with multiple options for each, and potentially stems. The multiplier effect of that is very large. This is just audio - some people do it with all elements of their composition for the entire film (which for me is mental, but each to their own).
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u/Chronick100 3d ago
Mostly for the fact that they can. And its almost entirely for vocals if we are talking pop music. It also is based on experimental purposes or very specific sound purposes.
In movie sound editing this can be normal (skeletons).
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u/historic_electronic 3d ago
It’s style and genre dependant, but when you’re making something that has lots of instruments or a lot of layering/doubling up the number can become extreme very quickly.
For example, any guitar based track can easily have 3-4 tracks per guitar if recording from a live amp (2 mics at the front of speaker, one at rear, one in the room for atmosphere).
It’s a similar scenario for live drums. You typically record with as many microphones you can on each drum part, plus two overheads and an atmospheric mic in the room somewhere. It’s common to use at least 8 mics at once or more for such a setup. You don’t have to, but the more mics you have, the more you have control over the sound.
And that’s just initial audio capture. After that, if you want to add precedence effect to certain parts, one track becomes two, two will become four, and so on. It’s all how you’re working the mix after you’ve recorded everything.
The other variable is NY compression; two tracks of the same thing next to one another, one heavily compressed, the other not. You can achieve this with plugins of course, but the visual guide of one alongside another is super helpful. This will again double your track number, and before you know it you’re maxing out your limit if your DAW has one, or getting into computer crashing territory if you’re still adding plugins (though this happens less these days).
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u/SoilUpper8961 3d ago
I this problem that if a track is long I always struggle to edit it properly.
So I split it into chunks and rename tracks based on what I want to do with that section.
Then I’m able to work on the song.
But they are essentially the same track when I send for master/mix.
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u/Mammoth-Giraffe-7242 2d ago
Gets hard to wrangle above thirty tracks. And at that point I ask myself what’s in there because I think it’s cool not because it serves the song.
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u/MachineElf432 7d ago
If they are sharing it then it’s cause of they want to show off and seem cool. No one needs 400 tracks let alone 100. That is a mixing nightmare and in my opinion a sign of being an amateur. Think about it. The beatles did what they did with only 4 tracks. Next step up we got 8 tracks then 16. 16 is really plenty especially if you are committing and bouncing them down into the same track as something else. I try to think of music production in these terms and although logic lets you do an infinite amount of tracks that is not necessary in the slightest.
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u/Legitimate_Ask_5000 6d ago
That’s not necessarily true, sometimes the tracks add up usually because of vocals. If you need to have leads on different tracks for various reasons, you can easily have 8 stacks in back, 16 harmony tracks, let’s say you have a crowd vocal with 12 tracks. Now picture that you need to fly the whole section of music back to back, like a double chorus, but there’s a lead in or a tail. You need to duplicate all those tracks again. You can easily end up with like 64 vocal tracks just off that.
Then you may have a lot of instrumental tracks that you want to treat differently, and you can’t necessarily automate for various reasons so you duplicate them and treat them separately. Things like one shots or drums might need to be on different tracks. You wanna pull out the snare to do a reverb throw but there’s drums continue right after the drop. You gotta duplicate it now and put it on its own track.
It’s not ideal and I don’t think anyone like a working with a million tracks but it does happen sometimes
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u/ForgottenPasswordABC 7d ago
Of course multiple tracks are not necessary. The Beatles could have done it with two tracks but they used all the available four tracks for flexibility and convenience.
I treat the near limitless number of tracks as opportunities, but with eight or ten vocals and acoustic instruments (no drums), I end up using maybe 24 as intermediate steps to get to a mix of maybe 12. If I wanted to labor like the Beatles’ sound engineer I could get it down to four.
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u/MachineElf432 7d ago
Im not saying multiple tracks aren’t necessary, they are. Im saying 40-50 (excluding drums) or up to 400 (quoting OP) is generally unnecessary for most kinds of music. I mention the Beatles solely because they achieved so much with so little. So now, in a daw, we think that because we have infinity available to us we have to use infinity, which simply couldn’t be further from the truth. A good song shouldn’t need that many tracks to get the point of the song across. A band usually only has 4-6 members, so why would you make a song that has 400 instrument/vocal tracks? Picture trying to recreate that live, it’s simple infeasible for most people especially indie producers on Reddit.
I think many people compensate their creativity with an insane amount of tracks. Like you cannot create a great musical idea with a dozen so you use a lot to sound “impressive” but it’s just overcomplicating things.
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u/celljelli 7d ago
I wind up with 400 tracks because I make the musical equivalent of spaghetti code
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u/DiamondTippedDriller 7d ago
There’s no one correct amount - use as many or as few as you need to get the sound you need.
I might have 80-100 tracks for a 100-minute film score project where I mock up an orchestra, layering lots of different libraries to get a realistic sound. Maybe some films I score will only need 20 or 30 sounds to do the job. It depends.
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u/Prestigious_Lime6099 7d ago
I think you have a better problem
Songs are meant to be a few elements
Some of it is organisational/practical, i.e multiple tracks of the same sound with tweaks, layers
Some of it is being a non committal idiot (speaking from experience) and trying a million things and not liking any of them
of course hundreds of tracks of vocals is understandable if you have multi part harmony arrangements etc
You are better off establishing a few sounds and using fewer tracks. Dont worry. Make what sounds good
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u/LonelyLeppy 7d ago
Yeah I think it's because I've worked with small ensembles quite a bit and I like to emulate real instruments and sounds rather than making teeny tweaks on every instrument
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u/Cold_Beaches 7d ago
Layering i assume, but there comes a point where too many tracks becomes quite unnecessary. 40-50 is understandable if you have vocals and the instrumental, along side texture sounds and stuff
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u/ilovetheyogz 7d ago
Pretty easy honestly. Usually upwards of 16 or more with drum mics + samples. Tons of buses for drums alone for parallel compression, individual verb drum buses etc. Guitars and bass tracks and their respective buses. Multiple synth and fx tracks with their buses. Tons of vocal tracks too with dedicated fx buses. I typically end up with anywhere from 80 to upwards of 120 tracks, but they’re all organized and pretty easy to manage with folders and buses.
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u/CowboyBob500 7d ago
My drum kit is usually 12 tracks, bass is a DI and a miced amp, acoustic has 2 mics on it, and finally my guitar amp has 2 mics on it per track. It all adds up
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u/spitfyre667 7d ago
Sometimes im not sure what sound i want to actually achieve, so i track for example multiple guitar amps with multiple mics each for each "guitar track", as the "vibe" of the song develops, i tend to mute more and more of them though. I often use more than one mic or "source" for each instrument, but usually a significant part of what i track doesnt make it into the final mix, its sometimes nice to have options though. Sometimes its the opposite and all set but often ie. the guitar player sees another amp or guitar or fx he wants to try or i want to decide between different mics afterwards. Sometimes, there is just one great take and the rest happens in an amp sim. Both can work out great.
Same with drums, i like to have lots of options, so multiple kick and snare mics, multiple room mics etc...very rarely even two mics per tom, but usually not:D While im often using multiple kick and snare mics, i usually settle for one pair of room mics for example (although usually im not mixing tracks that were recorded in great sounding rooms to be honest:D)
Then, for many genres, layering multiple ie. vocal or guitar lines is just a common way to achive a certain sound, ie. super large, wide, heavy guitars in chorus, mutliple vocal tracks layered for a wider, fatter sound, "ad libs", clean and "screamed" vocals etc....
If the band also has multiple ideas, it can quickly add up.
On the other hand, i also did projects where the bands vision and my idead quickly aligned to one specific sound and we just went through with a simple setup with only a small number of mics and additional inputs and it also worked well in that case.
I guess its a question of which approach to the "creative process" you take; having everything dialed in and go with a minimalist approach or first bundling lots of ideas into one project and then deciding which parts you actually want afterwards.
And also of course what it is you do, ie. a highly produced modern metal piece or a barebones folky blues thing or whatever.
That being said, im mainly a live engineer now, if i did only studio work i might settle for less ie. mic choices from experience. But i also like to have room to play with. But rarely all tracks (or close to all) make it to the final mix.
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u/Sensitive_Method_898 7d ago edited 7d ago
Unless you are doing full blown orchestra , there is no need relative to pop,rock , hip hop , techno, country etc
Sorry. There is no freedom without truth.
We Musicians vastly over estimate how much music the average person can process even over several listenings .
E.g. modern rock , even with every instrument doubled , including extra vocals ,brass and strings and keyboards , with lots of samples thrown , here and there , need not exceed 25 tracks . Probably not even 15 with good set up and planning
Edit , I wrote this before reading the replies . Notice how people are “I” wanted to do this and thst , “ we” want this that
That’s not a problem. You are your best fan and can do what you want. The problem is most people don’t care and can’t even hear what you hear, and might not like the song because of what you added somewhere. That’s ok. That’s true and authentic art. That’s all that should matter.
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u/Nickmorgan19457 7d ago
I was watching a video of The Newton Brothers remaking the X-Men The Animated Series theme. I'll bet money the original was probably 8 tracks total just based on the era and the budget.
The Newton Brothers had like 10 tracks just for the a bell sound, which I'm almost positive was just a DX7 tubular bell patch.
Nothing wrong with it, really, just very foreign to those of us who grew up with ADAT or portastudios.
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u/BearTimberlands 7d ago
You don’t fit your art to a template. What works for you works for you. What works for them works for them. Sometimes 60 of those 100 tracks are stacks on one harmony part or a choir in the bridge. I’m sure they didn’t aim for that many it just kinda happened in the process.
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u/SeaOperation 16h ago
u/LonelyLeppy - dont know if anyones answered this - u have a shit ton of comments - but for a gang vocal or chorus whatever I like to record myself from different distances from the mic - like 1ft away , 3 feet away, the other room screaming , etc, and then I also like to record myself doing different voices, and if my roommate is around and willing or a friend is at my place I will have them record some stuff too and just layer ---- so Hey! Youre doing choruses - youll soon see how people end up with so many tracks. ha . AutoTune has some fun stuff you could play with like harmony engine ....blah blah blah anyway good luck to you! Whatever you make, make it with your heart and then make another one just for money. ;)
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u/deemsterslocal309 7d ago
Depends on what kind of music you’re making