Backing Track

[Griffon67]

Ok this is new to me and I tried searching but not sure how to find what I'm looking for so forgive me if its already been discussed.

I play guitar in a 4-piece outfit but we're experimenting with the idea of using a midi sequencer to play some backing tracks. We don't have a full-time keyboardist so we're trying to fill that gap with hardware.

Does anyone know how this should/could be done? What type of gear is required? I can produce midi files at home on my keyboard/computer but I don't want to haul all that along to a gig.

All help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Graeme

[Griffon67]

No worries...I've just read a few articles on backing tracks and the majority seem to be pre-canned WAV files mixed with a click track for the drummer to sync to.

Thanks anyway,

[momo]

My old band (a girl led rock-pop out outfit) used backing tracks. We had loads of discussion about them before we decided to go with it. We decided that filling out some keys or cool sample noises were fine, but that all vocals (except one vocal delay loop) and other instruments would be live. We just put the tracks on a Minidisc with the music panned to one side and a click panned to the other. We then sent one side to the house and the drummer used the other through headphones. We had to be careful, because there was no room for error in the songs. If someone misses a beat, you are fukt. We had ours set for a kill switch if we needed it. It can kind of kill the spontinaity, so we only used it on about half of the set.

Just a word to the wise, if you have never played, as a band, to a click, take a whle to practice it. It can be hard, but you start to see all of the places you rush or drag.