Playing Stems on iPhone

I purchased 9 Stems files last night and loaded them onto my iPhone this morning to find that they don't play properly. The songs start correctly, but part way through playing, they stop playing and change to silence while the time keeps ticking on. Before the time of the song reaches the end, the *next* stem file in your playlist starts playing, though it still shows the previous song as playing in the player.

Does anybody know why this is occurring? Are they supposed to play correctly on anything that plays MP3s?

Interested to get other people's experiences.

Todd

 

No. At the moment they only play on Traktor Pro and I'd say it's highly unlikely they'll ever play on Traktor DJ.

 

Not sure that's true. From what I've read, they're supposed to play correctly on anything that can play MP3's/MP4's.

From CreateDigitalMusic.Com (who is pretty tight with NI): You still have a separate stereo mix. Stems are 4+1 – four stereo tracks representing each of the four parts, and one stereo mix. That means two things: one, you still get the mastered, stereo version of the track, independent from mixing the stems together yourself. And two, if you open the Stems file in a different player (like iTunes or a CDJ), you’ll here the music as intended; you just won’t hear those stems.

 

OK, I've confirmed this is not true. Referencing NI's own www.stems-music.com's FAQ page:
Will I be able to play a Stem file in my audio player?

Yes. A Stem file will play as a normal audio track in any player that supports the mp4 format and follows the standard mp4 specs. This means you will hear the full track, but not have control over the individual Stem parts. To listen and play with the individual parts, you’ll need software or hardware that supports the Stem format.

 

Any word on this from NI representatives? Are they actively involved in the STEMS section of this forum?

I would think they'd be monitoring this to ensure a smooth launch of their new platform...

 

One guy with an "@ NI" name liked a post of mine here but he was a Maschine guy (would've expected more of Team Traktor being involved here)

 

Hi Todd, sorry to hear about the problem. Is this still occurring? Or has anyone else experiencing similar? If yes, please could you let us know:

Which operating system is on the iPhone? Which software is being used to play the file? Which Stem file? Which track does it play back? How did you copy the file over to the phone?

 

I have an iPhone 6 - all software is updated on my Mac and iPhone - the stem file plays possibly the first 10 secs of the track and then goes silent, yet still says its playing. Really disappointing!

 

Yes this is still an issue... bought some stems yesterday from Beatport... Synched with iOS9, they play the first .25s of the track then silence...

Files were downloaded from Beatport via Mac OSX and beatport pro app.
These were automatically synched to my iPhone from the beatport application tool "Synch to devices" - Works perfectly with .MP3.

I will try to create a separate playlist in iTunes and synch the *normal* way and update this post with results.

1st impression of stems... erm... could be good, particularly now I got the S8, but needs more artist support and a way of creating stems from MP3 files (IMHO).

 

Its an interesting concept. So how does the other music players interpret the file?

 

Ok, so a little more intersting... I have an old iPOD touch (4th gen) which i have just wiped\re-installed and this plays the stem files just fine.
iTunes plays the stem files just fine..
I still can't play them on the iPhone 6+ through Apple Music app even after the 9.0.2 update. I really don't want to have to reset my phone to test.. can anyone confirm if they are able to play stems on the new Apple Music app on iOS 9.0.2 please?

Thanks in adv..

@witalit - MP4 is a media container that holds meta (and actual) data for the original track that is embedded. The embedded track is played by your favourite music player... or not as in my case

 

Hey guys. I have exact the same problem here. Have many stems - all from beatport - since they launched... From the first to the latest stems you can buy. Mac, iTunes (on Mac), QuickTime, traktor, audacity ... All apps on my Mac (Yosemite) work perfect... And I love the new stem format.
BUT I have the same problem with my iPhone 6 and the iTunes app on that phone. I had the problem on iOS 8 and still on ios9.
Stems work fine in traktoDJ on that phone.

 

... but somehow i´m happy to hear that i´m not the only one with this problem... beside this post i did not found many reports on the net on that problem.
ok, i tested some things...
- i put a stem file on my phone - using a manual copy process and i played it in another player app (files pro)... no problem.
- after that i deleted all my stems files from my phone and copyed just one one to the itunes phone app... and it played correct in the apple itunes-iphone app.
- after that i created an itunes (mac) playlist with 6 stems and synced it back to my phone (usb-cable)...
the first track played without problems... but the same problem as before for the rest of the tracks :-(
- somehow it looks like a sync problem with itunes and the behavior is very inconsistent.

its sad because i use my phone a lot for track-preparation and selection... at the moment the stem tracks get a bit lost behind for my set-selections ... simply because i cant listen to them in full length on my phone to decide if i will put them into my next mix.

hope to hear news on this topic and if this happens to more people out there.
cheers