So,
I find myself in a strange situation. My APC40 of about 2 years finally got a little alzheimers and lost some of it's functionality that I wasn't comfortable playing out with, i.e. broken faders, send knobs getting screwy, so on. I got really drunk and bought another one on eBay and found it at my front step a few days later. I've since put the original up on a wall shelf as I ask myself what exactly to do with it. That APC is very dear to me- we've played a lot of shows together, recorded an album together, spent 2 years of my life on this box as my instrument, a true, tangible instrument, more than any MIDI controller I've ever known.
Having a strange time adjusting to this clean, crisp, new replacement. The buttons sure do feel different, virgin pads still awkward to the mash. But it's nice having that out-of-the-box function again, and not some hard mapped like crazy default set to reassign everything to something else, yknow how it goes; makes any other MIDI mapping a nightmare, 'specially with multiple controllers. Thing is though, I've always salivated at the idea of moremoremore over the years, like "What if I upgraded to, like, 4 Launchpads for a 256 grid?!", or "Man, I wish the UC-33 was still floundering around Craigslist, THAT's what's missing", so on + so on.
And yet here we are,
and I have absolutely no idea what I'd utilize with two APCs. Most of my sets/projects are set in 8 track mode, in context of the APC being my central controller. It's almost like I've just musically shifted to the 8x5 (along side a 8x8 Launchpad), kind of like how Pete Rock or DJ Shadow, or Dilla related to the 4X4 of the MPC. There's this big road block with how I could employ the second APC for something.
With shows, I'm not really heavy on VSTs that need to be modulated, almost all of it gets freezed so I don't have to sweat pops and clicks on my 2GB machine. I'm weary of hard mapping the second because I already have a lot of that going on with other controllers. I guess what I'm getting at is how y'all like to use yr APC for something other than yr standard clip launch levels sends, etc. This isn't exclusive to playing out either, I'm more interested in the studio sense, really. I've spent a few years trying to trim down the gig load and got it down to a science by now, I suppose.