DJing & Improvising 2 Ableton Songs

[oddstep]

you've got an apc, you've got tracks in Live. the whole point of the bridge is to allow the rane hardware to work with live.
Create a new live set. you can drag live sets from the browser into the the new live set. if you want you can leave it there. just make sure the scenes don't overlap - so its easier to see what's going on.
What I do is have about 4 - 6 tracks. bass. mid range 1, mid range 2, pads. percussion, mebbe other stuff. each track has all the instruments from all the songs that serve that purpose.. i make racks of these instruments and use chain selector to switch between them. the chain selector automation is put into the clip - so that when a clip is triggered, the right synth is playing.
I then have some other tracks for freestyle playing, audio in, looping and whatever.
Another way to do it is to freeze all of your tracks down to audio - either as stems or as entire tracks and then chop the audio up into loops. maybe create folders with the loops in so you find them easily.

whatever way you choose.. its way better to have it in one liveset.. so you're not loading up new songs all the time. basically, you've got about 5 -10 hours of preparation before you can play your tracks out as a continuous mix. its worth doing though and the apc will make it really easy/intuitive to work with once you've put the liveset together.

[Syncretia]

But, I don't have any Rone hardware. The bridge website says I need to have Rone hardware

I've been looking at Tom cosms stuff. His website is fantastic and actually allows you to download his sets. Basically what he does is bounce all his tracks to audio and then mix them live. I guess that is the way that live is supposed to be used. It makes sense. I guess I just hadn't been looking that way because I write songs more like the traditional way: intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus. What I've been struggling with is getting used to the Dj'ing way which is to have a bunch of loops which you mix in and out live.

[Dj Ace]

Bridge certainly LOOKED like the answer. Check out the first video on this page:

http://serato.com/thebridge/lesson

The guy is usaing an APC40, so I went out and bought an APC40. But, after reading the fine print on the Serato website, it seems that the software will only work if you have Rane hardware. They could have made that more clear.

So, now I'm back to square one.

You need to consolidate all of your music into a single live set

Holy #$@#!

Well you could pick up and SL2 for for 500.00 and is a REALLY good sound card to use for ableton by itself and with the bridge using serato scratchlive... It is the ish!

[willdahbe]

What I've been struggling with is getting used to the Dj'ing way which is to have a bunch of loops which you mix in and out live.

I don't think what you're trying to do is considered to be "Dj'ing", It would be more along the lines of a live set. And the APC40 is perfect for this. Just my two bits.

Also the bridge will do nothing for you in terms of mixing together two songs that you've made in Ableton. What Serato/Bridge does allow you to do is dj two tracks together in the traditional sense (inside Serato). Ableton is nested in there for firing off clips, loops, whatever in time with your decks in Serato. It does some other dj recording stuff too, but nothing of what I think you're trying to accomplish.

[Syncretia]

Well you could pick up and SL2 for for 500.00

I got all excited when you said this. I've had so much trouble with soundcards. I'd do anything to get one that works. I had an FTP Pro but the drivers licked balls. I then swapped it for a FocusRite 6 USB but this thing has an annoying hiss that I can't stand!!!! I would totally spend $500+ for a working soundcard for it turns out the SL3 doesn't have phantom powered Xlr in so I can't use it. Damn!

[102455]

Well you could pick up and SL2 for for 500.00

the SL3 doesn't have phantom powered Xlr in so I can't use it. Damn!

Well no - it's not for DJs, not musicians!

All the Rane kit that works with Serato Scratch Live\The Bridge\Ableton Live is DJ based.