Push, Maschine, and Drum Racks

[TekMonki]

Just wanted to put this out there for anyone interested as I've spent several weeks (when I've had time) figuring out how to get this to work right. It was also addressed here, but figured I'd start a clean thread for it to cut down on all the cross-linking . . .

The simple impetus for me was "hey, I love Maschine's expansions and sounds, but the methodology of getting clips from Maschine to Live . . meh. Additionally, it'd be awesome if I could step sequence Maschine right in Push - so much workflow!".

So, what I came up with is a tiny bit of spin on what St. Joe posted about ages ago regarding integrating Maschine into Live. So far this works for me now and I'm stoked. In Live you have a self-contained Group with all 8 Maschine Groups in which you can load up whatever and do it without Push, or if you have Push, integrate some of it's functionality into sequencing Maschine. Ultimately Maschine is not much more than a soundbank with this method, but that totally works for me - and I'm stoked. Hopefully it's helpful for you too - and maybe just a jump off to do your own setup with it.

For what it's worth, I've set this as my default template in Live as well. Definitely still in progress, but . . .

Anyway, the steps:


In Live:

• Create 8 Midi Tracks, name them Maschine A, Maschine B, Maschine C, etc;, The letter is to reference the Maschine group.
• Select all 8 tracks and group them. Name the group "Maschine".
• Put Maschine on "Maschine A" and right click and "Group to Drum Rack". Name the drum rack "Maschine Rack"
• Set Maschine receive in drum rack to All.
• Add Ext Inst to B, C, D, Etc.
• Set each Ext Inst as "MIDI To: Maschine A and then the associated Maschine output - for example doing this under Maschine B, the 2nd piece should read "2 - Maschine". Do the same for C (would be "midi to: Maschine A and 3 - Maschine), and D, and how many other Maschine groups you plan on using.

In Maschine:

• Click on each group starting with B, click the Group button in Maschine and then the Out button. Set the Main out to the associated channel. E.g. B wold be 2, C would be 3, D would be 4, etc.
• Next, while on the same group, right-click the first sound and go to "sound midi settings".
• Click Enable and change the MIDI channel to the correct number Live needs. ex: Group B is Maschine B in Live, it's also track 2, so change the MIDI channel to "2".
• If you want to add another drum kit to a Group other than A, let's use B as an example, right-click the Group in Maschine, click Sound MIDI Batch Setup, select Sounds to MIDI Notes and change the MIDI Channel. In this case, since it's B, and accounting for the above, you'd want to set the MIDI Channel to 2. If for some reason you just want to play the first pad of the Maschine kit/group as a scale, don't add a drum rack. If you want all of the pads to be addressed in Live though, (and note this is said with using Push in mind), right click your Ext Inst in B and "Group to Drum Rack". Set up the same as you did with A in regards to the receive in the Drum Rack (all), etc. BOOM! New kit step-sequencable in PUSH.

[lyovino]

TekMonki, a Big thank you!

I'm not all that adapt with Lives routings. For the past 6 months I have been trying to route SP2 (Superior Drummer2) so that I have full control in Live and haven't been successful. I just applied your breakdown and it actually works with SD2. I can now apply Lives fx to any of the individual tracks or utilizing the main sends. I can also use SP2s loops or play into the first channel strip and control all the drums from their individual fader without having to open the SD2 interface. I don't have my Push as of yet, which is the final test..

SD2 has "zero" for midi map control from your DAW, cannot be done. This was the only issue I had with this method but I just inserted an empty clip into any of the drum ch. slots that I wanted to overdub Volume, fx what ever. Works like a charm!

[TekMonki]

Never used SD, but glad this transfers to other plug-ins!

Next up is figuring out how to get individual Maschine drum hits broken out into Ableton so I can use FX there (e.g. snare or clap or something gets a long verb that can be automated). I know you can do that in Maschine worst case, but I'd like to keep things as straightforward as possible vs flipping around through interfaces going "where the fuck did I put that delay??". I'm sure the routing will ultimately ending up having to do with the 16 outs Maschine offers and sending them to their own channel in Live, but hasn't worked so far the way I would guess and also suspect it's something that can't be templated - though then I haven't dug in.

Push is helping churn out inspirational ideas so much faster already though (I'm in LOVE with it), and would obviously rather be making music, so . . . will dig in when life, work, and music making isn't happening.

Sounds like you're sorted though, glad to hear it, cheers!

[lyovino]

Never used SD, but glad this transfers to other plug-ins!

Next up is figuring out how to get individual Maschine drum hits broken out into Ableton so I can use FX there (e.g. snare or clap or something gets a long verb that can be automated). I know you can do that in Maschine worst case, but I'd like to keep things as straightforward as possible vs flipping around through interfaces going "where the fuck did I put that delay??".

I'm not recording individual hits per ch. but In Live I made 6 midi tracks and grouped them. Each tracks External Inst. is set to 1-2, 3-4 etc. In SPD2 I set the outs accordingly to match the Extn. Inst. In Live, on each of the tracks you can place your FX per ch. strip or as I said above use the main sends. Not familiar with Maschine, but shouldn't you be able to do pretty much do the same? Granted, all of the midi notes are being recorded/edited from the one main track, but that's fine with me as long as I have complete control from their individual ch. strips.. (Automation etc.) It is now included in my default set.

[jsliwinski]

Tekmonki, thanks so much for this! I'm having a little problem though. After everything I only get a chromatic keyboard on push that's only affecting a single pad in Maschine. I can't get it to map each individual sound on push's pads. I'm assuming that's the main goal.

[TekMonki]

I don't have Live in front of me and don't know all of the intricacies by heart just yet, so for the moment I'd say double-check the all the Maschine steps, particularly in regards to "sound midi settings" and such. I definitely remember running into the same issue though, but it's resolved now.

Lemme know, can take a look at my setup later if still no dice.

[TekMonki]

Occurred to me that it sounds like you're having the one problem that got me stuck for a week or so before. I could get the first drumkit working fine on Group A, but anything after that . . . sounds of first pad on Maschine was the only that would play. Argh!

Anyway, check out the last bullet point under the Maschine stuff and see if that helps out.

[jsliwinski]

Thanks I'll give it a couple more tries this weekend. I couldn't even get group A to play without it being in chromatic key mode and stuck on the first pad in maschine.

[lyovino]

I'm using TekMonki's setup above on Superior Drummer which works really well. The only thing that is not working on Push are the backlit Yellow drum pads. (Lower left) The blues are fine when striking a pad and playing back.. The yellows are very dull lit. Any thoughts?..