itch.io

I have to admit I had a long time not looking into this, then realized there is a new version, realized the two videos I have not seen before and just spent the hour to watch both trying to test parallel in the app and I am realy impressed :-).

Really not many apps, not inside itch.io and not outside, with such a continous devellopment and improvement.

I can only recommend to take this hour with the two videos and the app to get into this and you have a REAL song generation tool with lots of options and midi out in many ways to finish in your daw with the sounds you like.

Really thanks KodingNights for this, dont even have any requests at the moment (sure to come :-) )

No midi ?

Thanks a lot for this next update, devellopment is really quick and ongoing, much appreciated :-).

Have not tested all but I really love that you can test/export different voices "solo". I just realized this way (and opening the produced songs now directly in a midi editor) how prog length/notes really work together and what the settings mean in concrete for the song.

Great work :-)

Option which instruments should play which section of course would be a great sollution :-).

"Profiles" would be a nice solution :-)

One more request explained by this missing bass part (the only one, so the bass parts is really completely missing):

This missing acoustic bass part in the middle of the song really makes no sense no matter in which style/context, espcecially as there is nothing to take over that part (for example if there would be another bass, a cello whatever) so it would be great if you could add a button on the expert page of the instrument (where dynamic, merge and so on is) to allow silent parts or alternatively simply play threw the whole song ("always playing").

Maybe if you add parts this could be part specific then if possible (so it might make sense to make the bass silence for a bridge part with some pads and long notes staying).

Great :-).

Part export was the thing I was just thinking about cause with the different tracks and melodies fading/leading into a new part its sometimes not that easy to identify where a part really ends and the next starts, so this would be really helpful.

Have not realized that the new version is already up :-).

Thought there would be an automatic info from itch.io but it was not:

- file import is working now as it should, great :-)

- gap at the beginning is fixed

- gaps in the track seem to be fixed

- not using the "pad" function (and maybe some other fixes) makes the exported track much more slim and useable (as I did not use the drums I got 6 tracks now in the exported file, much easier to handle)

Have to look for the other improvements, new look is much better and clearer definitely.

While looking threw the manual again (and waiting on the new version :-) ) I thought about something that might be well worth thinking of for a version 2 maybe.

I realized that you had already "categorized" for yourself some styles in case of tempo. I wonder how much effort it would be to go further with this categorisation and add some typical style based scales/modes, chord progressions and other settings possible in the app already ?

And then offer a "simple" style selection as starting point. That would open the app up even for people who had nearly no music knowledge at all.

And as far as I know there are not many apps out there offering both ways: simply randomn and let yourself surprise what comes up (which is the center of the app now) AND to get started with a dedicated style in mind. It would even open up the app for some style based expansions later on.

Strangely that idea came to my mind while I was thinking about a little christmas song for my daughter as surprise (she is into christmas, I am the grinch :-) ) and then I woundered: what would be typical for a christmas song ? As my musical knowledge is very limited all that questions came to my mind: typical tempo, scale, progression, melody.....?

Great, that will make testing much easier :-)

That would be absolutely great :-).

Of course not evrything could be done at once :-)

Then I am reassured, was not sure about it :-).

O.k., will have to try that out additionally and see whats the difference.

I think I might better sum up my experiences so far to not get missunderstood as nagging round.

And I really wonder that no one else has joined in here so far ?

This is really a great tool (definitely the most capable around here in the "game scene") !!!!

The engine that drives all this is - in my opinion - marvellous and produces musical and really interesting and instantly useable results.

Of course these are "raw" drafts that had to be customized in a daw.

And maybe I should admit that I dont come out of the games scene but from a musical interest in anything generative with a main emphasis on chill, ambient and so on kind of stuff (which might not be the most needed musical styles for games :-) ).

My intention for this question is simply that - from my point of view - this IS really marvellous but could go - if intended of course - MUCH further with maybe (again, only from a user point of view, not from the develloper view which is totally different, especially when it comes to what is easy to change and what is simply NOT possible :-) ) not so much needed to be adjusted to go much further in useability for LOTS of imaginable applications.

And could stand VERY well outside the games scene in the environment of generative music apps in general. I would really love to post this into some music forums but simply have to understand where it is and where it might go.

Thats why I am asking these - maybe - nagging question. Really hope thats fine for you.

Maybe I did not really get what "pad" meants for you in this context. For me "pad" is associated with the soundcategory "pad". So long notes, often part of chords or chords, which build the background and emotion of a song but of course follow the chordprogression ? So what does "pad" if clicked mean and do in mugen ?

Yes, I agree, sorry, I should have explained :-).

The chord track is only to be able to use some other generative tools, sequencers, arps and so on on it to make them easiely play in tune with the song from mugen. Or to "recognize" the chordprogression on that track.

Of course it would be bothering to let it play all the time :-)

So the pad tracks play always the SAME ONE note no matter what chordprogression is on ?

A little strange for me. And in the actual track thats shown on the picture there is NO pad track (or there are no notes on it, so I deleted) although I have activated it.

But the problem with only one note is on the slap bass, fx, all string ensemble tracks and so on......I can add a picture in detail but I can assure you its always the one note not changing on all these tracks.

No, at least I did not recognize thats why I ask for a simple chord track that represents the chord progression.

The only tracks with chords on it are the "epiano" and "harmonica", but they dont run threw.

Some more problems, I have attached the tracks in my daw and then the settings in case there might be something wrong which I doubt (I think there are some important bugs). Problems:

- I have chosen "pad" but the pad tracks are empty (I have deleted before making the screen so not to be seen but they are empty)

- whats more severe and can be seen in the screen: a lot of tracks dont follow the chord progression but simply stay on ONE note threw all the song, that does not make any sense at all

Some more thoughts on a first test with one of the generated midi tracks after renaming:

- there is an absolute unlogical out of beat pause at the beginning which I have to cut (in this case 1 and a half beat ???) on all tracks. Does not make any sense, if it meant to be an intro when there is no track playing. My song tempo is exactly 60 like in the song generated so that could not cause the problem.

- empty midi tracks should not be expported that just confuses, maybe there is a way to avoid/filter this before the export/save (if there are no notes, dont export or something like that)

- the main problem for me: there are complete empty parts on all tracks just in the the song at different positions (around 8 bars long, so I would assume whole songparts). I would think this is a bug cause if all the parts I have chosen in the song structure (verse-chorus-bridge-solo in this case) gets generated there could not be these completely empty parts at different positions of the song.

Summary: I think there needs to be a logical "filter" before the export OR more control/visualisation of the generated track before the export to avoid such problems. In the moment it is simply not really a "song" that gets exported but parts with pauses more or less logical arranged. Or if its a bug just needs to be fixed and then see what happens if its fixed. And maybe simplification would help at some point (a simple chord track with the chord progression going on on ONE track, not separated).

What I like is the general idea of the song generated, the AI behind it seem to be capable, in general the generated results are really musical and useful.

It should be "simply" bringing the channel info to the tracks. I tried a bit today and renamed the "untitled" track names in the midi editor after the names of the channel info. Started with the first ones, saved and now it works as you can see in the picture:

It works in my other daw too, so it is really that your app has to output the channel info instead of whatever in the track name to make it work.

Of course this could be kind of workaround, but as the strength of the app is to put out lots of different tracks to compare IN the daw could not be a solution. But it helps for some more testing.

The first good news: velocity randomization works :-)

I am afraid the track naming still does not work for me and none of my daw reads the channel info:

I even tried the *.mid.xml but none of my daw could read xml it seems. If at least the track/channel Number was in the track name I could get the info from the text file but its still all only the file name, no number, no instrument, nothing:

Wow, that was quick and so many requests added, update lists seems nearly unbelievable for such a short time, expert settings looks great in the screen, do you ever sleep :-).

Will try this out as soon as possible (to late fo tonight) and report back.

Then it must be both daw that could not read the name properly.

I have just made some quick test in my usual test daw environment mulab and its definitely not on that side. I imported files from cgmusic (dont know if you know, one of the best out there, from a game develloper to who sadly does not find time to devellop further), all with track name (melody, drum.....).

Then I add a screen from a midi editor software I sometimes use for your track, "untitled", this works really good on different midi files, can im-/export different formats.....:

EDIT: Just found out something interesting maybe that could help to solve the problem, it seems that the midi editor HAS the info, but not on the track but on the CHANNEL:

No, in Mixcraft its only the track name "Spiteful Hate in G LYDIAN (60bpm) [7659596129254323459] [jazzy]" (so its the same on evry imported track, nothing else, no number). In Mulab it only says "sequence 1", "sequence 2" and so on.

In Mulab it only shows "sequence" and Number so no instrument either while in Mixcraft pro it shows only name of the song.

:-))))))

Mixcraft 9 Pro. I could try in Mulab 8 if that might help.

Great :-). Seems really under heavy develloping :-).

Next one:

- velocity (setting randomn amount from/to would be sufficient, maybe categorized by instrument category background/lead/rhythmn, in the playback I already realized that the pad is much to loud)

Changed the title cause I think more questions/requests to follow :-)

Hope this one wont be to difficult:

- please add the instrument name to the tracks in the midi file. I just imported my first file in my daw and now I have 20 tracks each only with the file name and can start to puzzle wich instrument might be hidden in each track.....

DM ? PM ? Simply could find no adress in here or how it works in io. Usually you click on the author (you) and there is an option. As you will update inside io no problem for me but might be good to know in general :-). Sorry if its a dumb question....

Great, works now :-).

And nice that even kind of "style/feel" description is added.

But two requests both dealing with the chord progressions. The first is the important one:

- there should be and option to add you own progression. Of course it would be the easiest if you have a "manual" option in the list and could just type in the numbers you want. But I could live with any other option as long as its possible. Background: my test scale is still lydian. So I was looking for some progressions that fits and realized that they are simply not in the list. Of course the other way would be to expand the list but that would make it clumsy and you could never put evry possible wish into it.

- the second is more dedicated to userfriendlyness not "functional" directly but as the most used spelling for relative chord progression are roman numerals (so "I" instead of 1) and you even mentioned it in your manual it would be much easier instead of needing to transcribe.

Still to early for comparision but under the hood there are lots of options, first results are very promising and I see lots of develloping potential while still keeping it simple in use. The manual helps a lot and is absolutley sufficient this way.

Thanks, will try on the weekend and report back.

I have to come back to the scale/mode thing. Are you sure this works at all ? I have tried all kind of different settings, progressions and went threw ALL the modes, no matter which I choose, even MINOR, all songs generated (at least the naming, maybe its only a naming problem, I dont know) where labelled "G major":

Thanks a lot for the manual, that helps a lot :-).

If the updated version within here keeps track with the steam version I am fine with that.

To be honest I have no idea how to sent a pm inside here (forum, itch.io in general), I have looked evrywhere but did not find anything. But as I dont use it much apart from downloading the few music apps I have and commenting on them from time to time (I am no gamer at all :-) ) I am sure I must have overseen something.

Think I will find some time on the weekend for a in detail tryout with the help of the manual, will then be back with my impressions.

Just seen the hint about the steam version and wonder will the devellopment in here be stopped, or will there be different versions ? So do I have to have an account and install steam to use the "final" commercial version ? And where to sent the proof of the purchase, on your website I could not even find any contact info or email adress. But the good thing is that you seem to have high plans for this with ongoing devellopment :-).

"I feel that part of the reason for using a program like this is to get inspiration, and a big part of that is going 'outside the box' so to speak. So the flexibility regarding mixing of scales, modes, progressions and structure is an intended feature, not a limitation."

Yes, I thought that this was your intention and I appreciate in general. Its just more comfortable if you take different parts from different software if this is clear and simply stays "in tune". For example, one other software I use can import and recognize chords and then you can generate additional parts but for this its needed that you know the root and scale.

Other programs ? Lots of :-). I am really kind of addicted by any kind of generative stuff in this way. Mostly I use it inside DAW, so Captain Plugins, Orb Producer and lately InstaComposer (just to mention a few). I have Wotja too, which is the by far most develloped for any Ambient stuff but really complex and hard to get into. I prefer some simple stuff (for the user and the handling) like your tool in general cause it should be fun to use.

At the moment I cant really judge your program in comparision, for this I think I will have to follow your advise, generate a bunch of songs while playing around with the settings and then see what I can make out of it in a DAW.

Will sure be back with some comments when this is done :-)

Usually in comparable generative programs if you set root note/scale the programs I know only generate songs that are completly follow that scale as MAIN rule for evrything after (melody, chord progression.....). So the resulting song will ALWAYS be in G lydian no matter which other settings you choose.

I have to say I am really not good in music theory (thats why I use these kind of tools :-) ) but it seems that in your tool setting the root note/scale is only ONE component for song generation and you have to exactly know which chords you have to use to get a song in G lydian finally and not in G major.

I really would prefer to work it in the way the other tools do so if I set it to G lydian the resulting songs will be in G lydian, maybe that could be done on the road of further devellopment ? At least as an option to choose.

I am afraid I have the next problem/question. I choose G lydian (which is one of my most used scales/mood), no change to minor/major, but the songs produced landed ALL in G major ? I could understand in a way D major (same notes) even if its not what I want, but from G lydian to G major ?????