DAW Workflow - Please Help with Audio and/or Midi

[Banquet]

Hi everyone,

I bought the Rytm mkII recently and love it to bits. I do most of my music using Cubase Pro and have a couple other bits of hardware that integrate ok. I’m struggling with Rytm though.

So, the way I’d like to use it is to program the drums including the trigs and probability stuff on the Rytm and then record the tracks individually either by midi or audio to Cubase. Then if I want to cut/past/ edit I can do it from Cubase. Perhaps add some extra snares, edit out some hats, etc, I can either do it via midi later, or by editing the audio.

However, although I had no problem controlling a Mother 32 via the Rytm so I can sequence it from one of the pads (midi out seems to be fine there) I’m not having any luck getting any of the midi into Cubase. I’ve enabled each track to send midi and tried using USB and a midi cable, but all I seem to get is the same one note on all the midi tracks. I must be doing something wrong, but I don’t know what!

I’ve also tried using Overbridge to catch the audio but on opening it as a VST and enabling the outputs, I get a bunch of tracks, but they don’t record anything. Someone told me I needed to create audio tracks and route the outputs to the audio, but they don’t show up in the list of available routings!

So I’m kind of ready to give up and just record the 2 track audio and that will have to do, and any changes I’ll have to go back to the Rytm, but I wondered if anyone here might have managed to get it working and be able to point me in the right direction? I’ve looked at the manual, but can’t see anything that helps.

Any assistance very gratefully received!
Thanks

[og_tea_boi]

I was messing around with Cubase last night.

For some insane reason you still need to do the following:

Connections menu…
Choose outputs
Create a stereo bus routed to nowhere.
Set the mixer outputs (the ‘fake’ OB ones) to the new busses, 1 buss needs to be made per out,
Go to arranger add an audio track for each ‘fake’ OB output.
Then wire a buss into each of those
Then click the speaker icon
Then go back to the mixer and hide the mess cubase has made by hiding the VST outs (the ob ones)

I can’t believe they still use this, it’s been the same since Cubase 4.

If youd don’t get it, I’ll find you a video, it is defo the way it’s done and it works fine. I couldn’t get Cubase to act as Midi slave, and I had enough by that point.

[Banquet]

Thanks very much for your help with this. You’ve given me hope I may be able to get this working!

I have created a new buss (trying this 1 channel at a time) and routed it nowhere. However I can’t seem to select that to route the face OB channels to it. You do mean the channels that appear when you select ‘activate outputs’ on the VST?

EDIT: Actually, I can assign it from mixer window - I managed to do 1 channel and it seems to work. I have to pop out but will try the other 11 when I get back.

It’s crazy, I’m going to need 12 busses and 12 audio tracks, in addition to the 12 outputs! That’s 36 channels! I wonder if there’s a way in Cubase to import them all in one hit because I don’t want to do this for every song that uses Rytm.

But, not to moan, this might work! Thank you

[tnussb]

@Banquet

because I don’t want to do this for every song that uses Rytm.

Then just store an empty project with only the routing set up and use this as template to clone when starting a new project.

[Banquet]

YES! So happy to report that worked - thanks so much Mark. I’ve spent hours try to get it to work and now it does!

[Banquet]

tnussb thanks, that’s good advice - I’ll set up a template for it

[Banquet]

I just wanted to come back and add a couple things to this in case anyone is in the same situation and finds this useful…

After a couple days fiddling around, I found the individual outs from the AR2 incredibly quiet and underwhelming compared to the master 2trk feed.

The reason for this is mostly the compression output gain which is I think treated like a master effect and doesn’t come through on the individual outs. Also, the overdrive is master effect and the reverb and delay are send/return and don’t come through either. So using the great guide posted by og_tea_boia above, I created another group and routed all the individual outs to that. I then assigned an insert compressor and overdrive from Cubase (in my case Vulf Compressor and Soundtoys Decapitator) and I assigned sends on the individual audio tracks coming in from AR2 to Valhalla Vintage Verb and Soundtoys Echoboy, which gives me the same effect setup as in the AR2. This allows me to pump up the volume of the individual outs and get a great sound!

I’m really happy with this setup and the workflow, which will be to organise and design my sounds from Overbridge and then create the beats on the AR2 and then record the individual tracks to Cubase and come back and use effects there to bring back/expand the sound I had from the AR2 master track.

Happy days!