Is Real-Time Stem DeMixing Possible?

In an age where anything with the term AI in it is on point, we saw this new  plug-in from Acon Digital - called Remix and were sceptical.

Acon have a range of audio processing software in both standalone and plug-in format that is focussed on cleaning and restoring and fixing.

Remix has the schtick:

Remix is the first plug-in capable of separating instrument groups in a mix – so called stems – in real-time with an acceptable latency. Remix uses cutting edge technology based on artificial intelligence to separate complete mixes into five stems – Vocals, Piano, Bass, Drums and Other. These stems can be remixed so that you can easily increase the level of the vocals, reduce the level of the drums or even create a karaoke version.

And actually it does what it says, you have five channels, Vocals, Piano, Bass, Drums and Other, with mute. solo, level and sensitivity for each.

We tried it on a live input and indeed it does work as described, we used Ableton Live in input monitor mode, routing a few popular hits into it. Might be something for DJ sets, running it as an input processor, or karaoke for real-time processing of stems to additional processing - all kinds of fun.
Not the cleanest or stem-perfect - you do get some of that churning where common frequencies are affected between elements and other artifacts,   but this stuff is hard without pre-processing.

You can try out the demo for free and buy Remix V1.x for AAX, VST, VST3, AU from their website at an eminently resonable £39.90

https://acondigital.com/store

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• Parametric EQ Plug-In 12-Nov-14