recording 'live' - continuous drum loop plus lead

[plincoln]

I have Ableton Live 9 including Live for Max. What I would like to do is to start playing a drum pattern - kick, snare, high hat. Once I have it going, I want to let it keep playing over and over again and it should be playing so I can hear it through the speakers not headphones. As it's playing I would like to play a lead along with it with some other midi instrument and again hear that instrument as well through the speakers while still hearing the drum pattern. And as all this is going on I want to have the entire session recorded - repeating drum pattern and lead. So if I play for 10 minutes I would at the end have a complete recording of everything - the repeating drums and the synth I played over them and could play it back. Finally I would want to be able to edit the entire output. What is the best way to do this? What drum machines could I use? Should I do this with Max for Live - I know it has some step-sequencers. Thanks in advance for any assistance with this.

[oddstep]

at its simplest:
in session view with two midi tracks.
track 1
drag a drum rack from the library.
create a clip on this track to play the drum rack. switch looping on. put notes in the clip

track 2
drag a synth lead from the library
switch record arm on.

press record on the transport. start the drum clip if it hasn't already started. start synthing
this should record the entire composition as an arrangement with a time line of events. check the arrangement view to make sure this is happening. if it isn't check your settings. you might need to record arm track 1.
at the end press the transport stop button.
to get different mixes on your headphones and speakers you'll need a soundcard with at least 2 pairs of stereo outputs. its then a question of routing the audio to the master out or the secondary out using the output audio routing choosers on each track.

[plincoln]

Thanks. I will give this a try.

[plincoln]

Ok. I have managed to get this done so that I see a continuous stream of midi notes as I switch back and forth with different drum patterns and different leads. However when I want to 'open up' the midi output so I can see it in piano roll/editable format there is a little icon that pops up indicating it's locked/not available for editing. How do I get around that?

[oddstep]

Press the back to arrangement button.