Ableton Forum

Those of you who use Live...live:

How exactly do you use it? There are lots of videos and tutorials and tips and tricks, but they're usually pretty specific, like "how to do X". I'd like to get some tips on general use in a live show.

I took one of my older songs and adapted it for Live, by splitting the MIDI tracks into loops, but even dumbing down some of the changes, I still ended up with quite a few loops and scenes. I couldn't imagine coordinating 8 or 10 times that many loops and scenes for a 60+ minute set. Not to mention the number of instruments that would be required. It wasn't until I started thinking about how to use Live live that I realized that Reason synths can't do patch changes (I use Reason for some sounds but not sequencing). By the way, I'm referring to a continuous-mix set where Live is controlling everything, not part of a larger band.

I guess an easier way would be to treat it like a DJ setup and use audio loops, but that's not what I want to do. I want to do as much "performance" as one can with sequenced music.

So how do YOU use Live live?

Here's a general non-technical demo of what we do:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1siG6_Pd-Mg

I trigger things as scenes and trigger samples and play synth lines and pads and shit on top. Like most this is combined with live effect tweaking througout.


If you haven't seen this, this shows an efficient way to take your songs to the stage.

http://www.cosm.co.nz/index.php?option= ... &Itemid=94

Thanks for the videos. Those were both decent videos, but they were both centered on one song. I'm curious about a whole set. I've got the one-song method down.

Pitch Black, do you play discrete songs or do you play them continuously? If continuously, how do you go from song to song?

A bit of both... All our songs are loaded into a "mega-set" (sure it can be a lot of work to set up... ours are 110 tracks wide x 250 scenes deep... but do it once, and then you can play with it and build on it).

We use a lot of Dub delays in our stuff, and often use the regenerating delay tail to bridge between songs. I have my keyboard MIDI controller set up with one preset per song, and when I change presets, it selects a Rack Chain in Live with the appropriate delay setting for the incoming song.

So, the outgoing song ends in a pool of regenerating Dub delays, I hit the preset button and the delays continue to regenerate but jump to the new tempo, then I drop the new song in, in time with the delays.

We do consider ourselves a band though, not a DJ, so we have no problem stopping between songs, hopefully getting a clap, then moving on. It's live, and it's audience interaction.

Pitch Black wrote:A bit of both... All our songs are loaded into a "mega-set" (sure it can be a lot of work to set up... ours are 110 tracks wide x 250 scenes deep... but do it once, and then you can play with it and build on it).

We use a lot of Dub delays in our stuff, and often use the regenerating delay tail to bridge between songs. I have my keyboard MIDI controller set up with one preset per song, and when I change presets, it selects a Rack Chain in Live with the appropriate delay setting for the incoming song.

So, the outgoing song ends in a pool of regenerating Dub delays, I hit the preset button and the delays continue to regenerate but jump to the new tempo, then I drop the new song in, in time with the delays.

We do consider ourselves a band though, not a DJ, so we have no problem stopping between songs, hopefully getting a clap, then moving on. It's live, and it's audience interaction.

On average, how many scenes or loops per track do you have per song?

It would be easy if I could just set up one file per song, but my plan (or hope) is to play in rave-like parties and/or clubs where continuity of the music is pretty important, especially with trance.

Pitch Black,

I thoroughly enjoyed your video! For the first time, I now understand the difference between a DJ and a live performance of this genre...whatever one calls it.

I'm new to this stuff, although I've played music live for years. Thanks for the insight.

thank you pitch black for sharing the vid _

Great live set, hopefully you are two for all those buttons around

Pitch Black wrote:A bit of both... All our songs are loaded into a "mega-set" (sure it can be a lot of work to set up... ours are 110 tracks wide x 250 scenes deep... but do it once, and then you can play with it and build on it).

We use a lot of Dub delays in our stuff, and often use the regenerating delay tail to bridge between songs. I have my keyboard MIDI controller set up with one preset per song, and when I change presets, it selects a Rack Chain in Live with the appropriate delay setting for the incoming song.

So, the outgoing song ends in a pool of regenerating Dub delays, I hit the preset button and the delays continue to regenerate but jump to the new tempo, then I drop the new song in, in time with the delays.

We do consider ourselves a band though, not a DJ, so we have no problem stopping between songs, hopefully getting a clap, then moving on. It's live, and it's audience interaction.

So you frequently change the master tempo?

master swing wrote:

Pitch Black wrote:A bit of both... All our songs are loaded into a "mega-set" (sure it can be a lot of work to set up... ours are 110 tracks wide x 250 scenes deep... but do it once, and then you can play with it and build on it).

We use a lot of Dub delays in our stuff, and often use the regenerating delay tail to bridge between songs. I have my keyboard MIDI controller set up with one preset per song, and when I change presets, it selects a Rack Chain in Live with the appropriate delay setting for the incoming song.

So, the outgoing song ends in a pool of regenerating Dub delays, I hit the preset button and the delays continue to regenerate but jump to the new tempo, then I drop the new song in, in time with the delays.

We do consider ourselves a band though, not a DJ, so we have no problem stopping between songs, hopefully getting a clap, then moving on. It's live, and it's audience interaction.

So you frequently change the master tempo?

Yes. We do a lot of different styles. But some "songs" are in fact 3 or 4 of our tunes mashed up together over a new beat/tempo. Stuff that was once ambient and chilled from 10 years ago put in a different context.

cool, thx for sharing that.