You’re sitting there with a guitar in your lap and a microphone in front of your face. You hit record. GarageBand, being the "simple" app it is, decides you only need one track. It captures your voice, but the guitar is a ghost. Or worse, it mashes them both into one messy file you can't mix later. It's frustrating. Honestly, knowing how to record two tracks at once GarageBand is the "level up" moment for any home producer. It turns a digital scratchpad into a functional studio.
Most people think you just click two buttons and go. It’s actually a bit more about how your hardware talks to your Mac. If you’re using a USB mic and a built-in input, you’re in for a headache unless you know the Aggregate Device trick. If you have an audio interface, it’s easier, but you still have to toggle a setting that Apple hides by default.
Stop Fighting the Single Track Default
GarageBand is designed to be approachable. Because of that, it assumes you’re a solo act doing one thing at a time. To break this, you have to enable Multitrack Recording. This isn't a button on the main screen; you have to go into the Track menu or right-click the track headers.
If you don't see "Configure Track Header," you’re never going to get this to work. You need to check the box for "Record Enable." Once that little red "R" button appears on your tracks, you’re halfway there. But clicking them both isn't enough. If both tracks are set to "Input 1," you’re just recording the same signal twice. That’s useless. You need discrete paths.
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The Hardware Reality Check
You can't record two things at once if your computer only "sees" one thing. This is where people get stuck. If you have a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 or a Universal Audio Volt, you have two physical inputs. This is the gold standard. GarageBand sees these as "Input 1" and "Input 2." You set your vocal mic to Input 1 on Track A, and your guitar to Input 2 on Track B.
But what if you have two USB microphones? macOS treats them as two separate sound cards. GarageBand can only talk to one "device" at a time. To fix this, you have to go into your Mac’s Audio MIDI Setup (it's in the Utilities folder). You create an "Aggregate Device." Basically, you’re lying to the computer. You’re telling it these two separate mics are actually one big 2-channel interface.
Once that’s set, you go back to GarageBand’s preferences, select the Aggregate Device as your Input, and suddenly, you have two options to pick from. It's a bit of a workaround, but it's the only way to avoid buying more gear.
Routing Your Signal Without the Feedback Loop
Listen. Monitoring is where this gets messy. When you’re trying to figure out how to record two tracks at once GarageBand, you’ll likely hear a weird echo. This is latency. Or worse, you’ll get a screeching feedback loop because your mic is picking up your speakers.
Use headphones. Always.
When you set up your two tracks, make sure "Record Monitoring" is on for both. It’s the icon that looks like a side-ways Wi-Fi signal. If you don't turn this on, you won't hear yourself. If you turn it on and hear a delay, go into GarageBand Preferences > Audio/MIDI and make sure your "Buffer Size" is set to "Small." This puts more strain on your CPU but stops that annoying "talking in a canyon" effect.
A Quick Reality Check on Mono vs. Stereo
Don't record your vocals in stereo. Just don't. A single microphone is a mono source. If you select "Input 1 + 2 (Stereo)" for your vocal track, your voice will only come out of the left speaker. It sounds amateur.
- Track 1 (Vocal): Set to Mono, Input 1.
- Track 2 (Guitar/Keyboard): Set to Mono, Input 2.
If you are recording a keyboard that has two outputs (Left and Right), then you use a Stereo track. Otherwise, keep them separate. This gives you the power to pan the guitar slightly to the left and the vocals dead center during the mix. That’s how you get that "pro" space in a recording.
Why Your Second Track Might Be Silent
Sometimes you do everything right. You’ve got the red buttons blinking. You’ve got the inputs assigned. But one track is just a flat line.
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Check your Phantom Power ($+48V$). If you’re using a condenser microphone (like an Audio-Technica AT2020 or a Rode NT1), it needs electricity to work. Most interfaces have a button for this. If it’s off, the mic is dead. If you’re recording a guitar directly into the interface, make sure the input is set to "Inst" (Instrument) level, not "Line." Instrument level adds a preamp boost that prevents your guitar from sounding thin and noisy.
Deep Dive: The "Producer" Method for Better Separation
If you’re recording a singer-songwriter vibe where the artist is singing and playing at the same time, "bleed" is your enemy. This is when the vocal mic captures the guitar and the guitar mic captures the voice.
You can’t perfectly fix this in GarageBand, but you can minimize it. Use "cardioid" microphones. Point the sensitive part of the vocal mic up toward the mouth and away from the guitar. Point the guitar mic down toward the 12th fret of the acoustic, angled away from the singer’s face. When you record these onto two tracks simultaneously, you’ll have enough separation to add reverb to the vocals without making the guitar sound like it’s in a cathedral.
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Practical Next Steps for a Clean Session
- Open Audio MIDI Setup: If using two USB devices, create that Aggregate Device first.
- Enable Multitrack: Right-click a track header in GarageBand, choose "Configure Track Header," and check "Record Enable."
- Assign Inputs: Click Track 1, go to the "Smart Controls" or "Plugin" area at the bottom, and set Input to 1. Repeat for Track 2, but set it to Input 2.
- Arm the Tracks: Click the blinking red "R" on both tracks. They should both be flashing.
- Gain Staging: Sing and play your loudest part. If the meters hit the red, turn the knob on your interface down. You want to stay in the green/yellow.
- Hit Record: Capture the magic.
Once the take is done, immediately turn off the "Record Enable" buttons. There is nothing worse than accidentally recording over a perfect take because you forgot the tracks were still armed. Now you can treat the vocal with EQ and Compression independently from the instrument. That’s the real secret to why some GarageBand projects sound like "demos" and others sound like "records." It all starts with the split.