Music Production and Mixing Tips for Music Producers and Artists | Inside The Mix
If you're searching for answers on topics such as: what is mixing in music, how I can learn to mix music, how to start music production, how can I get better at music production, what is music production, or maybe how to get into the music industry or even just how to release music. Either way, you’re my kind of person and there's something in this podcast for you!
I'm Marc Matthews and I host the Inside The Mix Podcast. It's the ultimate serial podcast for music production and mixing enthusiasts. Say goodbye to generic interviews and tutorials, because I'm taking things to the next level. Join me as I feature listeners in round table music critiques and offer exclusive one-to-one coaching sessions to kickstart your music production and mixing journey. Get ready for cutting-edge music production tutorials and insightful interviews with Grammy Award-winning audio professionals like Dom Morley (Adele) and Mike Exeter (Black Sabbath). If you're passionate about music production and mixing like me, the Inside The Mix is the podcast you can't afford to miss!
Start with this audience-favourite episode: #75: How to Mix Bass Frequencies (PRODUCER KICKSTART: VYLT)
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Music Production and Mixing Tips for Music Producers and Artists | Inside The Mix
#158: Which is the Best AI Stem Splitter | Logic Pro vs. RipX DAW Track Separator Showdown
Have you ever wondered: what is the best song instrument Splitter? Maybe you're seeking answers to the questions: what is the difference between Logic Pro and RipX DAW, how do you separate songs into stems, how do you extract stems from Logic, what is an AI stem splitter or maybe just what is a song stem splitter? Then check out EP 158 of the Inside The Mix podcast.
Can stem separation tools really make or break your music production? Join me, as I put Logic Pro’s stem splitter and Rip-X DAW’s track separator to the ultimate test using my song, "Alive," as our battlefield. I’ll dissect how each tool isolates key elements such as drums, vocals, bass, and other instruments, paying close attention to qualities like snare impact, reverb treatment, and the clarity of cymbals and hi-hats. Discover which software triumphs in delivering cleaner, more precise stems, and which one falls short with issues like Logic Pro's phasy snare.
I'll also zero in on the bass and vocal tracks in this episode to determine the ultimate victor. Hear how Logic Pro’s bass separation, with its mid-range frequency emphasis and somewhat underwater sound, stacks up against Rip-X’s richer, bass-heavy output. When it comes to vocals, see why Logic Pro’s thinner, high-pass filter effect is no match for Rip-X’s vibrant clarity. By the end, Rip-X clinches the win with a 3-1 score, proving its superiority in both bass and vocal stem separation.
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You're listening to the Inside the Mix podcast with your host, Mark Matthews.
Marc Matthews:Hello and welcome to the Inside the Mix podcast. I'm Mark Matthews, your host, musician, producer and mix and mastering engineer. You've come to the right place if you want to know more about your favourite synth music artists, music engineering and production, songwriting and the music industry. I've been writing, producing, mixing and mastering music for over 15 years and I want to share what I've learned with you. Hello, folks, and welcome to the Inside the Mix podcast. If you are a new listener, a big welcome. Make sure you hit follow on your podcast player of choice. And if you're watching this on YouTube, make sure you hit that subscribe button and that notification bell so you get notified of new episodes. And to the returning listeners and or viewers, a big welcome back, as always.
Marc Matthews:So a few episodes ago I did a showdown, I did an AB of Logic Pro's stem splitter versus G Audio's stem splitter, or track separation, however you want to call it, and that was episode 154. So if you don't know the results no spoilers here go and listen to episode 154 or watch it on YouTube. I also I think it was episode 144, did a demo of how to use Logic Pro's stem splitter, and in this episode I'm going to do another showdown. It's going to be another AB and this time it's going to be Logic Pro's stem splitter versus the Rip-X Door track separator or stem splitter, however you want to call it. So let's dive in. In the interest of fairness, I have separated the voice, the vocal, the bass, the drums and percussion and the other sounds and instruments. In rip x you can actually separate the guitar and piano, but you cannot do that in logic pro. So you could say that's already put logic pro on the back foot, as it were. But as I say, in the interest of fairness, I've only separated it into four stems in rip x door. So if you are using rip x, what you need to do is toggle, or rather check, save stems only for DAW, mpc, dj. That way when it's finished the separation process, it will then send, or rather it will send it will. A finder window will appear. Let's say with those separated stems that you can do what you want with them, basically. So just going to throw that out there that you can actually separate guitar and piano with RipX Door, but you can't do that with Logic. So maybe that's already saying 1-0 to RipX Door. So let's move over to Logic now. So we're in Logic Pro and going forward.
Marc Matthews:I'm going to refer to RipX Door as or RipX DAW as RipX, because it's easier for me and I am using the same song from episodes 154 and 144. And it's the song called Alive from my EP. It was released in December 2023. I wanted continuity. So if you listen to all three episodes as a playlist, let's say it's the same song, so you can compare apples to apples, as it were. I'm not using different material. So I'm going to play you a section of the original mix and we're going to use the same section when we're comparing throughout this episode. So this is the original mix of Alive, this particular section. Let's give it a play.
Marc Matthews:Great stuff. So in there we have vocals, we have drums, we have bass, there's some guitar and synths and some other little bits of ear candy going on. So the first stem we're going to audition and compare is the drums stem. So let's play the original Alive drums on their own. So this is the original drum stem, not the separated, any of the separated stems.
Marc Matthews:Okay, so what I'm listening for here in this separation is I want to hear that thwack of the snare, the attack of the snare. I'm interested to see whether the separation tools capture the reverb or attenuate the reverb of that snare, because it's quite prominent, and also how the cymbals are treated. So you've got that crash. I don't want it to sound brittle. I don't want that to sound brittle. I want the kick drum to retain its power and impact as well. So that's what I'm listening out for. So let's do the Logic Pro one first. So I'm gonna un-solo that. So this is the Logic Pro split drum stem. Okay, I think the kick sounds pretty good. The snare it sounds a bit phasy. Now I appreciate, with the artificial intelligence, with the AI that it's using to separate it out, you're going to have that, but at times it's kind of going like that and it sounds a bit like a really bad MP3. But it has retained the impact of the snare for me. The reverb it's attenuated, it's not captured that reverb. And the hats and the cymbals, the crashes sound okay but again they sound a touch brittle to me. So I'm just going to play it one more time before they move on to rip x.
Marc Matthews:Yeah, the kick drum sounds kind of like when you get a kick drum and you fill it full of a duvet. We used to do this back when we were in a band. I was in a band and we were rehearsing. It was quite crude in this rehearsal environment. We'd stick a duvet in the kick drum to dampen it and that's what it kind of sounds like to me. So it sounds okay. It sounds okay. But let's have a listen to Rip-X and see what this one sounds like in comparison. So this is the Rip-X drums Interesting. So the kick drum again sounds like it's been dampened.
Marc Matthews:I'm finding that the hi-hats and the cymbals there's nice stereo separation on them so it's captured that well. But it kind of does. It's got that sort of thing going on again. It's got a nice attack, it's got a nice presence of the snare, but I feel like it's lost some of the body of the snare. So I'm gonna listen to it one more time. Yeah, I think the snare sounds quite good.
Marc Matthews:There are a few other little artifacts in there again that I'm hearing that I didn't hear in Logic Pro. Occasionally it almost sounds like a dog bark and it kind of goes like that. I cannot pinpoint it, but listen back again and you know what I mean. Yeah, it sounds quite similar to a dog barking in a way. It's like a like that. My microphone is going to hate me for doing that, I think in this instance and this was the same in the G Audio episode. But I think Logic Pro wins the round for me here and my memory, because it was a few episodes ago now, but I'm fairly certain Logic Pro won the battle with G-Audio with the drums as well. So I would say that is one one one, because Logic Pro cannot separate piano and guitar. So let's say it's one one at the moment. So Logic Pro wins the drum round for me.
Marc Matthews:So let's move on to bass. So here is the bass stem. This is the original bass stem. So in there you've got not only sort of not acoustic bass but recorded bass. So in there you've got not only sort of not acoustic bass but recorded bass, di bass, and you've got synthesizers as well providing some bass in this bass stem. So it's interesting to see how the platforms pick out those synthesizer elements, whether or not those synth elements may fall into the other category due to their frequency, the frequencies of those particular synths. So I'd be interested to know how Rip-X picks those out or whether or not it goes straight for bass. There's also the slide between notes as well. So it'd be interesting to see how Rip-X picks up the slide between notes or whether that would fall into the other category as well.
Marc Matthews:So let's start with Logic Pro. So this is the Logic Pro split stem. Yeah, so you can just about hear the slide between notes. You can hear it's almost like a metronome in the background. So it's captured some of the mid-range frequencies of the kit. You've got that going on in the background and it kind of sounds to me like it's underwater a bit. It does sound a bit like it's underwater to me. So I'm not overly keen on the space separation for Logic Pro. So let's give Rip-X a go and see how that sounds. Disclaimer here I haven't listened to any of these Rip-X DAW stems yet. I've listened to the Logic ones before, in a previous episode, but I haven't listened to any of the Rip-X ones. So this is all in real time, as it were, when I'm providing feedback on these. So this is the Rip-X one, so this is all in real time as it were when I'm providing feedback on this.
Marc Matthews:So this is the Rip-X version. I would say that sounds fuller to me or rounder. It's got more bass presence, more bass element to it. To me it sounds more like a bass guitar. It sounds more like a bass stem to me than the Logic Pro one did. You've still got that sort of metronome sort of sound. It's like someone's wearing headphones and they're recording and it's bleed, but obviously in a full mix. Now you're not going to hear that anyway, so it doesn't really matter. It's captured the slide between notes.
Marc Matthews:I'm just going to play the logic one again and the rip x. Yeah, I would say the RIP-X bass separation is more testament to actual bass, say like 300 hertz and below, whereas the Logic Pro one you've sort of got more of the mid-range frequencies in there. You could almost imagine like RIP-X is providing 250, 300 hertz and below and Logic Pro would provide the upper frequencies, maybe of the synths. So I think in terms of actually separating bass and if it were a bass guitar I would roll with RIP-X in this instance I think Logic is moving more towards mid-range-y frequencies and we're losing some of those lower frequencies that RIP-X is able to reproduce in the stem separation. So I think rip X wins this round for me. So rip X is going to win the bass separation. So that is 2-1 to rip X. So let's move on to vocals. So let's play the original vocal stem.
Marc Matthews:So let's give it a play so what I'm listening out for here is the stereo width of the vocal and the backing vocals. The time-based processing has it attenuated it? Has it captured it? And also it's an interesting vocal performance, this one, because when it was recorded there's a lot of mouth noises, but that was wanted in this particular performance. So has the vocal separation captured those sort of mouth noises? Because the vocalist was very close to the microphone and let's give it a go. So let's try Logic Pro Logic. What have you done with this vocal? Let's give it a listen.
Marc Matthews:And high by its side. Our souls align and the warmth of a smile into bliss resign.
Marc Matthews:And I've got fogged metronome in the background. It sounds thinner. So it almost sounds like there is a low-cut high-pass filter on it around I don't know around 1k or something like that. It sounds quite thin to me. It's retained some of that reverb, some of the time-based processing, and it's got the width there as well, but it does sound very thin, very, very thin for me. So it's okay. It's okay, uh, but what it has done interestingly now this might be something you want it has not captured those mouth noises, so maybe that's a good thing in this instance, if you're doing a remix and you didn't want that. So, and also it depends on how you want the vocal. Do you want the vocal processing to be removed and stripped back so it's just a clean vocal, or do you want that time-based processing to remain?
Marc Matthews:If it is the former, then maybe Logic Pro wouldn't be the way to go, so let's give Rip-X a go and high by the side of our souls that lie in the warmth of our smile and the bliss we saw in the fog rise in the shine of the sun now.
Marc Matthews:To me that is much better. I think that vocal. This is probably the most obvious one out of the three so far. I think that vocal sounds much better. It sounds fuller, it's more vibrant, it's more present. Yes, you've got that metronome click in the background, but I think you're going to have that throughout all of these anyway, so I'm not too bothered about that, but that sounds much better. It has retained the time-based processing, so no, it hasn't attenuated that. But I'm just going to play the Logic one again.
Marc Matthews:And then the RIP-X version.
Marc Matthews:There's just more clarity there, I'm finding it easier to decipher what the vocalist is saying. It just sounds better. Once again, this one is more obvious than the other two, I think, for me in this instance. So I would say, folks, that is 3-1, if my maths is correct I hope it is. I got an A in GCSE, mind you, that was over 20 years ago. Not even A's anymore. I think that would constitute a nine anyway. That's the uh, the UK curriculum or educational system. So, yes, 3-1, I think, in this instance to RipX. So I think RipX has won it, albeit it would be 2-1 if you discounted the fact that Logic cannot separate piano and guitar. So 3--1. So I think Ripex has one, but we're going to do other anyway.
Marc Matthews:So let's move on to other. I really like doing the other comparison because there's a lot of factors. There's a lot of instruments at play here. We've got some guitars and synths and other bits and pieces as well going on. So I'm interested to see how the stem separators, the track separators, pick this out. So let's play the original mix, the other stem, as it were, from the original mix. The other stem is really interesting because there are various instruments in the same frequency pocket. So how has the stem separator separated these instruments from the other drums, bass and vocals.
Marc Matthews:So let's have a listen to Logic Pro. For me it sounds a bit narrow, it sounds muted and you've lost sort of like you've got that going on. That's a really flat version of it, but you've lost that of like you've got that going on. That's a really flat version of it. But you've lost that sort of brightness as well. To that it sounds quite muted, like there's a bandpass filter on it for me and we've rolled off a lot of the higher frequency content. So not great.
Marc Matthews:Let's give Rip X a go. Hmm, interesting, I think with this one here you can hear that it has captured more of the other instruments. There's more of the drums coming through and almost a bit of the bass coming through as well. So I don't think it's separated it as well as Logic Pro, but Logic Pro does sound very muted. The Ripex version doesn't sound as muted, but I do think it has lost some of that brightness, that lusciousness of the synths again. So I'm just going to play the Logic Pro one again, because this is quite a tricky one to pick out. Again on the Ripex Ooh, it's a tricky one. I think you can hear more of the guitar in Logic Pro, but you've got more of the other instrument stems in the Ripex version. I think the Ripex version does sound more lusciousness, it's got more presence, it's brighter. So it's a tricky one.
Marc Matthews:I think if we're going straight down the line in terms of separation, I think Logic Pro has done a better job of separating the other stem, whereas Ripex has still got some artifacts from the other stems in it. However, ripex, I think, just sounds a tiny bit better. So I think in terms of actual separation, logic Pro probably wins this one, which we'll put it at 3-2. Now that might be a contentious decision because I'm going straight for the idea of how well is it separated, not in terms of which one sounds better. Maybe I should go with which one sounds better. If I wanted to go with which one sounds better, it would be RipX. If I wanted to go with which one has actually separated it better in terms of removing the other artifacts, then it would be Logic Pro. So I'm probably going to go and say you could say it's a draw.
Marc Matthews:I'm waffling now, but I think I'm going to go 3-2 to RipX with this one here.
Marc Matthews:So RipX is the overall winner for the stem splitter showdown. So I really have just scratched the surface with RipX D-A-W RipX door. There's a lot more you can do in it in terms of AI and it's not just a stem separator tool, and I'm going to have a follow-up video, a follow-up episode, where I go through some of the cool features in RipX itself. So look out for that episode. But if you want to listen back to previous AB comparison episodes of stem splitters the GE Audio one, for example, episode 154 and if you just want to know how to use the Logic Pro stem splitter, check out episode 144. So I hope you found this episode useful. Folks, if you do have a stem splitter tool that you would like to see or listen to me compare with Logic Pro or maybe against Rip-X or against G-Audio, leave a comment if you're watching this on YouTube or just DM me at InsideTheMixPodcast on Instagram, and I look forward to doing more of these comparisons. They are great fun after all. Happy stem splitting.
