Anyone using Live as a regular multitrack recorder?

milfbait · Post by **milfbait** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 6:45 pm

It seems nearly everyone is using Live mainly for loop based music and live gigs. The only loops I use are usually just drum loops and I record just about everything else realtime in audio. Live's interface is so clean for standard multitracking, it enables you to work so quickly. Is anyone using it for recording guitar, vocals, etc?

I tried to make myself like Tracktion, as everyone raves about how it's intuitive and easy to use. Those new Mackie plugs, the pricetag, and the 64-bit audio do sound nice, but I had to go with Live. The way everything works is how I think it should be, whereas Tracktion is kind of whacky imo.

kennerb · Post by **kennerb** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 7:03 pm

I use it as a multitacker all of the time. The only problems I have ever had were with latency but that's not Live's issue. I have my fcb-1010 set up so that I hit one button and it selects the next scene. I arm all the tracks that I want to record at once. This is really great for Live jamming over projects that I have already started. Sometimes the not so perfect first take recordings are the ones I like to use. It leaves a less refined more human quality to the overall sound which is what I like to go for sometimes.

tencentcat · Post by **tencentcat** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 7:11 pm

Thinking of using Live as a basic DAW, I haven't been able to find certain standard features like a count-in/pre-roll before recording, crossfades, trimming, etc.

Does Live do these type things already and I just haven't found them, or is it wishfull thinking?

gfea · Post by **gfea** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 7:16 pm

Yes!! When I was first getting into computer-based multitrack recording, I had a friend who used Sonar, so I tried Sonar. I knew it was complex, but still wasn't prepared for the steep learning curve. I then tried a demo of Cubase SX, which was better than Sonar, in my opinion, but it took me so long to figure out how to do simple tasks that I began to lose interest. One day I was poking around the stuff that came with my M-Audio Delta 66 soundcard, and remembered the Ableton Live disk that came with it. I tried it and knew I'd found my application!

Why should I pay 600-800USD? It has the same sound quality as any other program, and the same basic capabilities, but it so much faster to operate.

I have been using Live and Reason for 3 years and have been very happy. I've even messed around with Cubase a little more recently, and I still am so much more impressed with Live.

The fact that it is an amazing loop and performance tool is just icing on the cake.

The main thing I like about using Live for multitracking is the fact that everything is drag-and-drop. Effects, clips, and even tracks themselves come alive with one mouse click. Awesome!

treysmith · Post by **treysmith** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 7:38 pm

I use it as a live multitrack very often... actually been using it more than nuendo lately.. doh!

Sales Dude McBoob · Post by **Sales Dude McBoob** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 8:07 pm

I track vocals and guitar and whatnot with Live. It rocks.

You can make all the acoustic folk you want. You can mic a drum kit and band. You will be tempted to try a little Grain Delay Borg on banjo.

telekom · Post by **telekom** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 10:26 pm

Yes indeedy.
I use it for recording my own stuff, simple multitrack stuff. Plus I used it a lot earlier this year for a community theatre project involving lots of vocal recordings, often in pretty challenged acoustic spaces. Live was a dream to work with. I was able to do some tweaking to get some vocals on key, and even to do some really way out stuff to get more wierd sounding vocal effects. Rewired up with Reason it was basically everything I've ever wanted and much much more since I was twelve. I'm now 37 so you can imagine how happy I was to get busy with some really good technology. Although the two tape decks and a plastic microphone were a good place to start aged 12....

I'm happy...

braj · Post by **braj** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 11:42 pm

I'm not into dance music and Live is my sequencer. It's the easiest and most flexible DAW IMO and I've tried them all. V5 improves things for non-loop based musical styles.

milfbait · Post by **milfbait** » Wed Jul 20, 2005 6:16 am

braj wrote: It's the easiest and most flexible DAW IMO and I've tried them all. V5 improves things for non-loop based musical styles.

+1!

Plugin Delay Compensation!!!! It's gonna be nice.

FORMAT · Post by **FORMAT** » Wed Jul 20, 2005 8:38 am

I use it to multitrack, or rather as my No.1 sequencer. I build tunes in Live. From scratch to finish. Not just remixes - new compositions. I only go back to Logic if I need synth or sampling capability, which is happening less and less with Operator and Impulse.

R.

spiderprod · Post by **spiderprod** » Wed Jul 20, 2005 2:47 pm

i use live as a multitracker ,the session view is quite good for that ,i record different takes on different scenes ,you have all your takes on the screen ,then i mixdown in the arrangement view .
i use the motu 828 mk2 ,i manage an overall 6 ms latency ,to be honest you have to have mutant ears to hear it .i don't sync to a clic so it doesn't really make any difference anyway .

raapie · Post by **raapie** » Wed Jul 20, 2005 4:01 pm

yes, use it as multitrack. prefer it over Nuendo 2.2 any day!

milfbait · Post by **milfbait** » Wed Jul 20, 2005 5:05 pm

spiderprod wrote:i use live as a multitracker ,the session view is quite good for that ,i record different takes on different scenes ,you have all your takes on the screen ,then i mixdown in the arrangement view .

Wow, didn't even know you could do that. Sounds like a very cool way to record mulitple takes.

eMmZee · Post by **eMmZee** » Mon Sep 26, 2005 12:03 am

Hi All,
I'm very new to Live (5, got it last week).

While I had some success doing some rhythm doodles using audio samples I'm having a pretty hard time to get my head around how to run it as a simple multitrack recorder.
I noticed that it's possible to record tracks in the arrangement view.
But then no clips show up.
I also can't find a possibility how to move a clip in the arrangement view with the computer keyboard in the smallest possible increments to adjust the starting point (not the clip start in the session view! I don't want to truncate the preceding note in the sample!)
I got many many newbie questions I don't want bother you with.
Can someone PLS point me to a additional tutorial which shows the smoothest way to use Live 5 as such a multitracker? I just passed the lesson coming with Live.

Thanks a lot, Michael.

eMmZee · Post by **eMmZee** » Mon Sep 26, 2005 12:09 am

braj wrote:I'm not into dance music and Live is my sequencer. It's the easiest and most flexible DAW IMO and I've tried them all. V5 improves things for non-loop based musical styles.

ok, me too. But obviously I'm experiencing a quantum leap (from Steinberg Sequencer on Atari / Fortex R-8 straight to Live 5).
Any good pointers available? I think I understand the manual but I'm afraid I'm missing something.
A friend uses Logic but he doesn't get the logics behind Live.
But I'm sure I did right to go with the Ableton software since I'm used to work on an very intuitive basis.
But first, simple multitracking ...

Thanks a lot, Michael.