Stems on a version

What it is

A stem is audio that plays on top of a track version: a part you bounced out of your DAW, a reference loop, or a vocal you sang straight over the track in the browser. Each stem sits at its own position on the version's timeline, and the whole thing plays back as one layered mix.

Stems are not deliverables. They only ever play alongside the version they belong to, and they are never part of a download or a distribution bundle.

Using it

Add stems. Open the version's Stems tab. With no stems yet, the tab shows one empty lane shaped like the lanes to come: a mic button where a stem keeps its transport, Upload stems beside it, and a placeholder waveform. Recording and uploading therefore happen in the row the stem will live in. Add stem → Upload files brings in existing bounces: pick as many as you like, or drop a whole stem folder onto the mixer. Each one lands at the start of the track, ready to be dragged into place. While a file is uploading its lane has an ✗: press it and the upload stops, with nothing saved.

Record over the version. Record over the track opens a recording lane right in the mixer and starts rolling: one click, the song plays and the mic is live. The lane sits on the same timeline as everything else, its transport button on the left like every other lane, so you can see where in the song you are. Stop, and the take stays a draft: play it back against the track, drag it along the timeline, rename it, and only then Save take. Discard throws it away instantly, because nothing has been uploaded yet. Wear headphones, or the track bleeds back into the microphone.

A take starts where the playhead is, so click the point in the track lane you want to sing over before you press record.

Place it. A stem's "…" menu starts it at the playhead or back at the beginning, and the selection bar moves everything picked to the playhead at once. Drag a stem's block along its lane to move it, or focus it and use the arrow keys (hold shift for five-second jumps). One playhead runs across every lane, so you can see what lines up with what. Click anywhere in a lane. On the empty part or on the stem itself, to move the playhead there.

From a comment. Any voice memo or audio file left on a version's comment has an Add as stem button. It lands at that comment's own timestamp, so a note left at 1:20 plays back at 1:20. The comment keeps its audio.

From your samples. Add stem → From your samples searches the libraries your desktop app has synced and drops the one you pick at the playhead. The sample stays in the library; the stem is its own copy.

Hear it while it uploads. An uploaded stem plays from the moment you pick it, off the file on your own machine, and keeps playing without a gap when the saved version takes over.

Mix it. The top lane is the song itself, with the same mute, solo and level controls as every stem, so you can drop the instrumental and listen to your vocal alone, or solo one part against the track. Mute sits directly on the fader it silences; solo sits with the name. Each stem also has a left/right control, marked L…R. Hover a fader to see its exact value. Click a stem's name to rename it, and the "…" menu to download it, share it or delete it. Deleting removes the audio for everyone; downloading works on an unsaved take too.

Work on several at once. Hover a lane and its source icon turns into a checkbox. Select as many stems as you like and a bar floats up from the bottom of the screen to move, download, share or delete the lot. It floats rather than sitting in the card, so picking a stem never pushes the lanes around. Download all sits next to Add stem once a version has more than one stem. Sharing hands the audio files to the system share sheet where the browser supports it, and copies a link to the version where it doesn't.

On your phone. The version's Stems tab in the mobile app plays every stem against the song and records a new one over it: press play, hit Record an idea where you want it to sit, and the take uploads as a stem at that exact point. Move a stem with the arrows either side of its row, a second at a time, or drop it at the playhead with the pin. Mute and delete are there too; level and pan stay on the web.