What is Reddit's opinion of BlackHole? From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

Loopback or Blackhole makes Audio Hijack much more functional.

There is another but I forget the name. Might be Ground Control, not sure.

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For audio on MacOS, check out Blackhole. What I do is create a multi output device in my Mac audio setup. It outputs to both Blackhole and my speaker output. So in Ableton/Reaper, I set the audio device to that multi output device.

Then for screen recording, I just use the screenshot application to record the screen. From there you can choose Blackhole as the mic source

You can also record the screen from QuickTime in one of the menus.

SoundFlower is no longer working with the last few MacOS releases, BTW. There is another option that does a similar thing to Loopback called Blackhole which is free.

There is an alternative to Audio-Hijack as well but I can't remember the name for the life of me.

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AU Lab + BlackHole might work. People use it for systemwide room / headphone EQ anyway.

Otherwise, AudioHijack + LoopBack might do the trick, but it's $130

A. I made a comment above about how it was programmed.

B. I only use data to share news from Existential Audio. Privacy Policy is here. https://existential.audio/privacypolicy/.

As for Ground Control. I compared the two in this thread on GitHub. https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/issues/371 In a nutshell the developer was lazy.

Just an FYI, sound flower isn’t receiving updates anymore but the team that made it moved onto a project called blackhole which is similar but allows for more ins and outs.

A paid option is loopback, which I like a lot, but it’s always worth trying the free options first.

You may want to look at Blackhole instead of SoundFlower. Compatibility issues.

This is similar to Rogue Ameoba's Loopback.m. You might want to look at Rgue Ameoba's Audio Hijack to actually solve your problem.

https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/releases

I prefer to do this in hardware which makes it all simpler. The Zoom Podtrak P4 for example is trivially easy to use for this but runs $200.

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Took a bit but I finally figured out how to use Packages. Installer is now up. Thanks for the offer to help. You could check to make sure everything works on your computer. That would be helpful.

Yeah, I totally understand that.

I can tell you that BlackHole is one of the lowest-impact things that you could possibly install on your Mac. There’s an uninstaller here:

https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/wiki/Uninstallation

However, removing it manually is super easy. It’s just a single file that sits in the /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL folder. Delete it and BlackHole is wiped from your system. There are no leftover files or anything like that.

If you're on a Mac you can install this app: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

And record anything that's playing back on your computer into a DAW or app like Audacity, and save it. E.g. tracks from your streaming service of choice. As long as you're not making money from DJing it's morally ok imo.

This may or may not work, but is worth a try.

Download the virtual audio driver Black Hole (https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole). It's used to route audio between apps.

If you work in your project at 96k using the resampled assets, but switch to BlackHole output @ 192k for export, the source files will revert back to 192k.

I would run some null tests to be sure; open a 192k file in reaper and export it without any changes and see if they null.

I think Audacity is your best bet, but if that doesn't work try here. There are a number of applications that can record the playing audio. The Mac one I used to use is no longer available, but Blackhole might be worth a shot when combined with QuickTime Player's audio recording feature.

I still have a Betamax (!) video tape of the 1989 Michigan Rose Bowl victory where I dubbed Bob Ufer's radio broadcast over the video. I should probably get that digitized at some point and post it on the internet.

Alright! So, it seems step 4 is where things are going wrong. In the official BlackHole directions, they have this warning:

>IMPORTANT: Due to issues with macOS the Built-in Output (sometimes called MacBook Pro Speakers or similar) must be enabled and listed as the top device in the Multi-Output. If BlackHole is listed first simply uncheck and recheck the box under Use to change the order.

Also, I see that there’s a new version out (0.3.0) so let me check that on my M1 MacBook Pro (basically the same as yours) to confirm that it works. It’s possible that they introduced some sort of bug.

You have to select BlackHole as the input in QuickTime.

These are the steps to set up BlackHole as the system output device:

https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/wiki/Multi-Output-Device

You have to do the multi-output device stuff if you want to hear the audio from your speakers. Otherwise, the sound will only go to BlackHole.

I have a pretty convoluted setup to accomplish something similar. My top priority was having LedFX run on the same computer as the audio source to get the best possible LED output. I found if I tried streaming the music or running LedFX on another device, too much noise was introduced and it really watered down the LED effects.

So I have LedFx running on my Macbook. I'll play music through Spotify, with Spotify set to play the music only through the Macbook. I use Blackhole and a multi-device audio group to redirect Spotify's audio to both LedFX and the laptop's speakers (or if I don't want audio playing from my laptop, I'll just select Blackhole as the sole output, so the audio is still being directed to LedFX). Lastly I use Airfoil to broadcast the music to all of the Google Home Mini and Nest Hub Max speakers.

It works, but it's not as easy to start/stop as I'd like. I have a short bash script for starting LedFX, but maybe I'll look into Mac scripting to see if I can automate the full setup/teardown procedures. Airfoil can also be finicky. Unfortunately it doesn't sync across all devices as seamlessly as when you cast audio to multiple google speakers. I'll have to manually adjust the timing of each speaker, and it seems like it doesn't always stay in sync with the others. But once it's setup, it works just like I wanted with very rich colors in the LED effects and no lag between the audio effects and the audio.

I second Soundsource or Loopback as the gold standards.

There used to be a similar free tool called Soundflower that looks to have not been updated for a while however there is a replacement for that called Blackhole (https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole) however I cannot vouch for it but you can't beat the price to give it a go!

Ah, do you have any recommendations on getting started? Basically I want to create a virtual audio device in an OS agnostic manner as much as possible, so it could work on both macOS and Windows. I'm aware this probably isn't possible and I'd have to learn 2 different APIs. But I'm not sure how to get started, Google search doesn't reveal a lot, and the authors of many these tools don't release their source code.

There is Blackhole whose author has open sourced it: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole. But it's only for macOS.

Also I'm not a sound engineer and have no background in audio, so perhaps this is why it's difficult to search for the right terms/API?

The official documentation has the output first and BlackHole second, with drift correction checked on BlackHole:

https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/wiki/Multi-Output-Device

Both ways seem to work on my Mac, but that page seems to be really clear that the order matters.

Ok... black hole? https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

It supports Apple silicon, but if you're at all progressive I would not trust it unless there was a Sunny wagon. And I’m fucking no I’m using it as a third one or better to go Karkh or satori? I play a lot of vaccines as a child.

I’m not sure what you mean? It’s software that you own, not one of those subscription things that seem to be popular these days.

If you want, there’s a way to set this up with a lot more effort, but for free. Basically:

1) Get BlackHole as the loopback driver.

2) In Audio MIDI Setup, set up an aggregate audio device that includes (in the following order) the loopback device and your left and right monitors.

3) In GarageBand, set up two audio channels. The first one inputs from the loopback driver, pans 100% left, and converts to mono. The second one does the same thing for the right channel. Then, set up the two audio tracks to output to channels 3-4 (left monitor) and channels 5-6 (right monitor) and enable input monitoring on both channels.

4) Set the system audio output to the Blackhole driver.

Here is an equivalent setup using Loopback (in its simplest form, which works just like Blackhole) and Logic Pro (I don’t have GarageBand installed but it should provide the same functionality).

This is not an ideal solution since you’d have to have GarageBand open all of the time. I’d rather pay the $99 for Loopback (and I did) since it’s specifically designed for doing audio routing stuff like what you’re trying to accomplish.

I discovered that this problem was related to a known issue with the iOS Simulator in Xcode. The solution is to install https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole and direct the audio output of the simulator to the blackhole virtual audio device. Apple doesn't acknowledge that there's an issue, and wanted me to return my mac for service before I discovered this fix through a colleague who was having the same problem.

Get BlackHole and set up a multi-output device (in Audio MIDI Setup) that combines with it with your regular output (like your headphones or speakers). Set the system audio output to the multi-output device. Then, in QuickTime, choose BlackHole as the microphone input.

It’s not quite “one and done” but it’s about as close as you can get.

I don’t believe mac supports recording system audio. There are work arounds with like BlackholeBlackHole that let you make an output (airpods) into an input to record. An easier way mifht be just to create a zoom meeting, share screen, and record.

So, this is similar to Audio Hijack the way Blackhole is similar to Loopback? Big Sur compatible? M1?

You can try eqMac - Free Audio Equalizer for macOS or GitHub - ExistentialAudio/BlackHole: BlackHole is a modern macOS virtual audio driver that allows applications to pass audio to other applications with zero additional latency.

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You can record sound on Macs using BlackHole (free). Basically, set up a multi-output device that includes BlackHole and your speakers (in the Audio MIDI Setup utility included with your Mac) and then use that multi-output device as your system audio output. Then, in QuickTime or OBS, you can use the BlackHole device as the microphone.

Not tested yet, because after all i connect audio via dock jack instad of hdmi.

This is really annoying when you move from windows to mac and realize there are no such things like system master volume etc..

I’d recommend BlackHole if you’re on an M1 Mac. SoundFlower isn’t compatible yet.

Steps:

In Zoom, set the speaker to the BlackHole/SoundFlower device.
In OBS, set up the Zoom window capture source and then add two audio input capture sources for the BlackHole/SoundFlower device and your microphone.
In OBS, enable audio monitoring for the BlackHole/SoundFlower source so that you can hear the Zoom call live.

That’s it!

Rogue Amoeba is a great company and anyone interested in supporting a vibrant macOS software ecosystem should consider supporting them in one way or another.

That said… if you have very basic needs and cannot swing the purchase price for Audio Hijack et al. there is Blackhole, the spiritual successor to SoundFlower: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

You mean system audio in addition to microphone audio?

I’ve not used it yet but there’s this https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole which you can feed into the Audio MIDI controller

https://macmost.com/how-to-record-your-mac-screen-with-computer-audio.html

GUYS. I found a way to get an output device listed in OBS!

This works flawlessly: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/wiki/Multi-Output-Device#4-select-output-devices

Install. Restart every app. It'll show up in OBS.

Note: in MIDI setup, you'll need to turn up volume manually for MacBook's speakers, multi-output doesn't support switching up volume!

You can also use BlackHole audio driver and it will record as well!

Link: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/wiki/Multi-Output-Device#4-select-output-devices

you can have a look at Dante Via you'll need to pay, but Dante is a reliable network.

(assuming you're using a DAW) you might need to route your audio to a virtual audio driver to be able to set it as an input on your DAW. you can have a look at Blackhole .

you'll then need to create an aggregate device in Audio MIDI setup consisting of Blackhole & your AI, then set the aggregate device as the input on your DAW.

then ensure your tracks in your DAW are selected to the correct input as how you set it up in the Audio MIDI setup.

hope this helps

Black Hole is a simple loopback virtual audio device. You need to create a multi-out device and monitor what you are recording. How to set it up is documented in their wiki.

There are some limitations like no longer having volume control.

You can use Blackhole as a virtual audio driver on Mac. https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

Install that and set your output device to ‘Blackhole 16ch’ in system preferences (not Rekordbox).

In Rekordbox, click the icon that says ‘output audio from built-in speaker and output device’. You now have audio running through your gear and the Blackhole virtual audio device (nothing should actually be coming out of your computer speakers though).

In the audio mixer in OBS, set the input device to Blackhole 16ch and check that your levels look good when playing something in Rekordbox.

Before you stream, be sure to turn on DND and mute the other sound sources on your computer (i.e. if you have an open Twitch window in the background our something). Since you’re routing ALL your system audio to Blackhole instead of your speakers it can be pretty jarring to your viewers if you get a Messages alert in the middle of your set and Rekordbox is routing it’s audio only through your controller so you’ll never hear it. (Yep, I’ve made this mistake and only caught it watching the VoD to see why everyone was almost immediately bailing).

Let me know if you have any questions!

Dunno how tech-savvy you are but Quicktime lets you record videos of your screen but without your computer's internal sound. To do it with sound you need to reroute the internal outputs basically.
People used to use a software called SoundFlower which you can get from GitHub but it's obsolete on the newer Mac OS. Someone recently came up with a replacement called BlackHole ( https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole ) which if you are technically / audio-engineering inclined is pretty straightforward to figure out - youtube videos, forums etc. If you install this and set it up properly, you can record the footage through Quicktime in pretty high quality, with the sound, as long as you have access to the footage (online or a file etc).

I do know that – outside of using a separate video camera – recording the screen at full scale, especially on a 4K monitor, yields top quality. You can also do this and record internal audio at the same time, using Blackhole, which I have used to copy videos that can't be downloaded (or are hard to download).

I am interested in OBS because it I can record more 4K screens that have, which are only two. In terms of your for-everyone question, I have asked that here and, with audio in particular, here.

Look at Blackhole. It's similar to Loopback but free.

Also, look at the Applications / Utilities / Audio Midi Setup and see if you can set up an Aggregate device that would be useful.

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Audio Hijack records audio from programs on YOUR computer. So the remote side, unless you are having them record as well, will get compressed and mangled by the internet. I usually find this acceptable but I have no standards, I've been told recently.

And if looking at Audio Hijack, also look at Loopback or Blackhole. They sort of work together.

The Samson Q2U, Audio-Technica ATR2100x or AT2005 are decent dinamic USB and XLR mics that are often shipped out to guests. Note the ATR mic line has a limited Lifetime warranty where the AT line has I believe 1 year and the Q2U has two years.

ALWAYS MAKE SURE THEY UNPLUG THE USB CABLE!!!

The jack damages easily.

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Why not stream the audio from your Macbook? Just run OBS on it, set an audio channel, add a filter, set the filter to VST/AU.

I'm on PC and I use Reastream to route my DAW audio into OBS. Put it on the master, set it to local broadcast, and ezpz gg.

I believe this works in the same way, just for MacOS - Blackhole.

I can't give an exact breakdown on how to work it, but I'm sure the process is similar or easier. Just set as a VST/AU filter on an audio channel within OBS.

If you don't have to use the Mac, considering renting Studio One from Splice, or being a real hero and buying FL Studio and joining the dark side with me.

From the GitHub page:

Delete BlackHole.driver by running rm -fr /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/HAL/BlackHole.driver
NOTE: The directory is in /Library
not user/Library
Restart CoreAudio with terminal command sudo launchctl kickstart -kp system/com.apple.audio.coreaudiod

Or, apparently, there’s an uninstaller.

(This is presuming you’re talking about BlackHole from existential audio)

See Blackhole

Loopback

https://www.rogueamoeba.com/audiohijack/.

and Audio Hijack

Sound Flower is not compatible with recent versions of OS X.

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So, I did some research on this as well. Apparently there was a 3rd party program that would let you route audio from one app to to another (to OBS) but it now either doesn't work or isn't supported. There is also some paid app that works pretty well, but it is expensive. The one app that I have installed but really haven't messed with too much yet is call Blackhole and is here and is free (as in beer) as far as I can tell. Best of luck, I hope that it works out for you.

Agreed with /u/dontovar on both fronts of audio not being passed through and the consent requirement for recording conversations. There are apps (e.g. Capto) and extensions for Chrome/Brave/etc. that will let you screen record with audio pass through. If you just wanted to continue using QuickTime, you need a pass through audio driver, e.g., BlackHole.

You have to digitally connect the two within your computer. On Mac there are apps that do this. https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole . On PC i have no idea. You can also use a free DAW to monitor the recording input from the Stomp on usb interface’s speakers.

Correct, the browser can’t do it. The platform support for doing it together with screen sharing varies: works just for the shared tab on macOS / Linux, works for all system audio on Windows IIRC.

While this functionality could potentially be added to the Electron app, I think using an external virtual audio device is the way to go since you’ll have a lot more flexibility. On macOS you can use BlackHole for instance: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

Blackhole is free if you're on a mac: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

works like a charm for me, solved all the issues of routing audio from browser into logic/ableton, and routing from logic into a screen record software.

Really decent program worth a look, esp as it's free, and I can vouch that it works without hiccup.

It depends on what you’re streaming. If you’re using an HDMI capture card, you don’t need Soundflower. If you’re trying to capture desktop audio, then you would. Although, I think Soundflower development has stopped, so you might want to look into BlackHole. I believe it’s Catalina compatible as well. If you’re willing to spend some money, Audio Hijack adds incredible extendability to something like Soundflower or BlackHole.

There is no 'audio in' on the DDJ-400 (you can't even get access the audio inputs with a DDJ-1000), so without an external capture device or a virtual audio driver, you're not going to be able to use the good audio in OBS. I'm currently using a DDJ-1000 on Catalina (also have a DDJ-400 to test with), so it doesn't matter that you're not using the latest OS.

You can use a virtual audio driver like Blackhole to capture your system audio; once you install it, set BlackHole 16ch as your output device in system preferences and set your DJ software to use 'Built-in Output' - you can now add 'BlackHole 16ch' to your audio input devices on OBS. Alternately, there are a LOT of class-compliant USB audio interfaces for $20-30 on Amazon that will give you the an extra physical audio input you could run an RCA->3.5mm TRS to (assuming your old mac doesn't already have a headphone jack that operates as a line in... I want to say my 2012 MacBook Pro had one of those if I remember correctly)

SoundFlower isn't compatible with 10.15 Catalina in some fashion. Look at Blackhole.

It's he free alternative that popped up rather than paying for Loopback.

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Correct, the 'easiest' way is with two laptops, one for RB and the other to run your DAW.

I think it might be possible with a single laptop but you'd need something like Blackhole to route your audio where it needs to be.

For anyone looking to do audio routing like this on Mac, it isn't cheap, but Rogue Amoeba's Loopback is the best tool for the job by far and is used by many professional Podcast hosts.

I haven't looked into this for a while, but luckily some free options have popped up again. Blackhole seems to be the best bet, but I haven't tested it and appears less user-friendly, but is free. Years ago Soundflower was the tool for the job, but that project has been abandoned for a while.

Are you using Mac OS 10.15 Catalina? Technically, SoundFlower isn't supported. Blackhole is a replacement.

If you are using loopback, I don't see why you would use SoundFlower or Blackhole at all, to be honest. Wouldn't that just be an additional Loopback device?

Mic audio is always quiet with professional gear as the gain is boosted for more consumer gear. Not sure why this would be an issue here.

I might see if I can replicate the issue with my Scarlett and. ... FaceTime?

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First, before you buy Loopback, look at Blackhole.

Note, I do own Loopback and it's companion Audio Hijack. They are very very good and /u/RogueAmoeba has been known to pass through.

You are at the hopeful and happy stage of the road. The tears come later.

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In Facetime's "Video" menu, choose "Soundflower (2ch)" as the microphone input.

In Logic, it's probably best to route all your channels to a bus. From there you can send the bus to :

the Soundflower outputs of your aggregate device (to Facetime)
the UAD L/R outputs of your aggregate device (so you can hear it)

As a footnote, take a look at the blackhole loopback driver. Soundflower is pretty old, and I've been much more successful with this on later versions of OSX

There's a free software called BlackHole that can get you similar functionality, without the mixing and busing features. As someone who works with audio professionally, I can assure you that Loopback is indeed worth the $99. But for what you're doing, BlackHole might suffice.

Do yourself a favor and use Blackhole: https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole

Ishowu was a fucking nightmare trying to figure out my cue channel with my DDJ-1000 and streaming on twitch with OBS. I switched to blackhole and it works like a charm

There used to be a really good Facetime recorder from Ecamm but Mojave and up changed the security model and it broke.

Look at Blackhole or Loopback and Audio Hijack.

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Use BlackHole to create a virtual audio device (you'll probably want to create a multi-output device if you want to monitor the audio also) and then set your Mac's audio output to the virtual device. In OBS, set your "Mic/Auxiliary Audio 2" output in Audio settings to the device, or an Audio Input Capture to your scene using the BlackHole virtual device.

Have you tried BlackHole? it’s a few clicks of a button and it’s free! I ran into the same problem that you did and this has been the best solution i’ve found! Happy DJing 🙃

No experience with iShowU, but make sure you either have your Mac's sounds output set to the multi-output device you created, or go into Zoom's settings and set the "Speaker" setting to the multi-output device.

If IShowU still doesn't work, you can accomplish the same thing with BlackHole (https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole)

Pretty much the same process: create a multi-output device with your built-in output and the BlackHole 16ch device, and set the Speaker setting in Zoom to that (or set your Mac's system output setting to that to capture all off your Mac's audio) and then configure OBS to use the BlackHole 16ch device as one of your Mic/Aux inputs.

(An alternative to setting up OBS to use the device in Audio settings is to create an audio input capture source in your scene and set it to the BlackHole device.)

If you're on a Mac, take a look at BlackHole https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole since Soundflower is no longer being developed/supported (afaik)

This is the setup I use

Ableton/DAW - In: Interface (e.g. Focusrite) - Out: Multioutput (Blackhole and Interface)

Video Calling (Zoom, Skype, etc.) - In: Blackhole Channel - Out: Interface

Hope this helps.

This works fantastic as well in Catalina. I tried it with Zoom but it should work with anything.

https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole#record-system-audio

I use a virtual audio driver (specifically BlackHole, free) and created an aggregate audio device in Audio MIDI Setup.app combining the "BlackHole 16ch" and "DDJ-400 Audio Out" channels. That way I'm still routing my audio out directly to my monitors as well as being able to feed that directly as an audio source in OBS with no additional cabling or hardware. This should work with any streaming platform that allows you to select your audio input, but I like OBS since I can do things like split-screen with the Rekordbox waveforms, overlay my insta or the currently playing track via KUVO.

(Caveat: I'm on a Mac, specifically a 2018 13" MBP w/ TouchBar - my CPU usage hovers between 40-65% during this. If you're using Windows something similar might exist, but it may take some additional Googling on your end to figure out the nuts and bolts.)

Also, totally unrelated to audio, but I just figured out in the past week how to use my DSLR (a Canon T3i) instead of a dedicated webcam to stream which makes the video look so much better. Similar driver trick to the virtual audio driver above except using Camera Live as my video driver and selecting Syphon as the source in OBS.

PS - I've been thinking of ways to get a bunch of DJs doing back to back live streams in some kind of group chat platform for entertainment and camaraderie during the quarantine. I'm stuck in my house in Denver, Colorado and due to the public health order all bars and restaurants will be closed and gatherings over 10 people banned for at least the next 30 days, so all my upcoming gigs this month are canceled and I'm sitting on so many good new tracks.

Traditionally soundflower was used, but that's old and probably doesn't work on newer macOS versions (I haven't tried in a long time).

You can either pay for Loopback, or try Blackhole (https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole/releases)

Loopback is very well done, and lets you hijack audio from apps without having to mess with app or system config. It costs money though, so maybe not for everyone. I haven't really used BlackHole that much.

I'm also on a Mac. I use IAC to route MIDI back and forth between Ableton and Rack. I use Blackhole to route audio back and forth. I use Ableton's CV Tools to send modulation and clocks back and forth.

SoundFlower doesn't work on Catalina and it doesn't look like the devs are going to get it working.

Loopback works fine.

Blackhole is a free option that I have never played with that replaces SoundFlower.