Using Ableton as a Guitar Loop Pedal- HELP!

Share your favorite Ableton Live tips, tricks, and techniques.
penfoldplum
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Joined: Tue Jan 03, 2006 6:30 pm

Using Ableton as a Guitar Loop Pedal- HELP!

Post by penfoldplum » Tue Jan 03, 2006 6:43 pm

Any help would be much appreciated...


I used to use 'Live for twisted electronica but I'm gettin back into my guitar and wanna try out layering guitar loops live, just like a BOSS loop pedal would (but without the electrical hum and a shed load more brilliant ways of manipulating the audio!)

If someone could tell me what I need to do in ableton to achieve this and what kind of MIDI controller pedal I need to get, I'll be forever greatful!!

Thank you,


P

Meef Chaloin
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Post by Meef Chaloin » Tue Jan 03, 2006 7:15 pm

try the behringer fcb1010, its perfect for what you want. You'll find it on google & ebay & talked about a lot on this forum (have a search for it).

you could do it with a normal midi controller if you take you're socks off :lol:

penfoldplum
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Joined: Tue Jan 03, 2006 6:30 pm

Post by penfoldplum » Tue Jan 03, 2006 7:29 pm

Thanks for the advice.

Blatantly a newcomer aren't I? :oops:

TheAnimal
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Location: Germany

Post by TheAnimal » Tue Jan 03, 2006 8:02 pm

The Yamaha MFC10 is also very good but a bit more expensive. A couple of weeks ago I wanted to buy a second foot controller. i had planned to buy an FCB1010. But then i found so many complaints about the pedals on the internet that I finally decided to get another MFC10. Many people don't use the pedals but for me they're important.

nicoluminous
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ground control midi foot pedal?

Post by nicoluminous » Thu Jan 05, 2006 3:07 am

Does any one know about the ground control
pedal? I read kid beyond uses it but I can't find it online
nicoluminous

pbajzek
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Post by pbajzek » Fri Jan 06, 2006 5:52 am

I have no complaints about the FCB1010, other than the way the manual is written. It's been invaluable in allowing me to control Live hosting Guitar Rig, Softsynths and a sound-on-sound looping plugin. Ironically, I find Live does not work as well for me as a guitar looper, because I can't overdub and it's very difficult to start "from scratch" without using a click track. But others have great success. It all depends on your approach to looping.

MKS
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Post by MKS » Fri Jan 06, 2006 1:37 pm

For looping with Ableton, try either Mobius for PC (www.zonemobius.com) or sooper-looper for Mac (http://essej.net/sooperlooper/). I know Live handles looping, but both of these freeware plugins offer Echoplex (EDP) like functionality - Record, Overdub, Multiply, Undo, Insert, Substitute, etc. You have to be a bit familiar with the EDP method of working, but they offer HUGE flexibility for looping. I use Live to provide FX and routing and Mobius to handle looping. I can of course route audio back into Live to manipulate the output from Mobius and record the mix (using resampling).

Machinate
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Re: ground control midi foot pedal?

Post by Machinate » Fri Jan 06, 2006 2:41 pm

nicoluminous wrote:Does any one know about the ground control
pedal? I read kid beyond uses it but I can't find it online
http://www.bananas.com/productdetail.as ... ontrol-Pro

just 399$ - seems reasonable for that kind of quality.
mbp 2.66, osx 10.6.8, 8GB ram.

TheAnimal
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Location: Germany

Post by TheAnimal » Fri Jan 06, 2006 3:49 pm

You can download the manual at http://www.voodoolab.com/gcontrolpro.htm

If you're willing to spend a lot of money you might also want to consider a Roland Pk-5. It's a one octave bass pedal with a fantastic feel and it can also be used as a programmable controller.

gregmcnichol
Posts: 154
Joined: Sun Sep 18, 2005 11:56 am

Post by gregmcnichol » Fri Jan 06, 2006 8:58 pm

Best looping vst is Loopy Llama dont have the link on hand right now but easy to find on google
G4 iBook 1.25 gig RAM Tiger , Ableton Live 5, M-Audio Audiophiler Firewire, FCB1010

raoullacerta
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Location: Montreal

Post by raoullacerta » Mon Jan 09, 2006 12:34 am

Do you know if the MFC-10 can send midi simultaneously on different channels (like all 16)? I figure it must. but just want to be sure...I have the MFC-1 (yeah, oldskoool!) and it only transmits one midi channel at a time. and frankly that's too limiting for me.
so with the MFC-10, can you set certain buttons to send program changes on different midi channels?
thanks a heap.
-RL

pbajzek
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Post by pbajzek » Mon Jan 09, 2006 3:13 am

I like Loopy Lama, but it can't go from record mode directly into overdub mode (at least it couldn't in the last version I tried). This is very important to the way I do live guitar looping. So I have been using SooperLooper, which was mentioned earlier. It basically mimics the behavior of the EDP and is, in my opinion, the best solution on a Mac right now. It's great stuff, though the GUI has some flaws as an AU.

gregmcnichol
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Post by gregmcnichol » Mon Jan 09, 2006 5:18 am

pbajzek wrote:I like Loopy Lama, but it can't go from record mode directly into overdub mode (at least it couldn't in the last version I tried). This is very important to the way I do live guitar looping. So I have been using SooperLooper, which was mentioned earlier. It basically mimics the behavior of the EDP and is, in my opinion, the best solution on a Mac right now. It's great stuff, though the GUI has some flaws as an AU.
What do u mean going from record to over dub mode? I have it set up where i hit a button on my floor board record a loop hit it again begin play back hit it again over dub another loop and so on. Scooperlooper seemed resource hungry
G4 iBook 1.25 gig RAM Tiger , Ableton Live 5, M-Audio Audiophiler Firewire, FCB1010

TheAnimal
Posts: 396
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Location: Germany

Post by TheAnimal » Mon Jan 09, 2006 8:01 am

raoullacerta wrote:Do you know if the MFC-10 can send midi simultaneously on different channels (like all 16)? I figure it must. but just want to be sure...I have the MFC-1 (yeah, oldskoool!) and it only transmits one midi channel at a time. and frankly that's too limiting for me.
so with the MFC-10, can you set certain buttons to send program changes on different midi channels?
-RL
Yes, you can. You can also download the manual from www.yamaha.com and check yourself. The manual is always worth a read before buying something new.

feyshay
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Post by feyshay » Mon Jan 09, 2006 6:01 pm

You can overdub (record material on top without erasing the original material) audio tracks? I know you can do this on MIDI. Wow, did I lose some brain cells somewhere?
You have to use a click track to get the right length of loop. I usually start out with a click track or a prerecorded drum track. You then have to make sure you have global quantization set right (I usually use one bar to allow for some inaccuracy in hitting a pedal).
I'll usually set up 10 tracks (some with elec guitar, some with acoustic guitar, some with synthesizer, some with microphone).
With 10 pedals on one bank in FCB 1010, I'll control 5 tracks with one bank.
The top row arms, and the bottom row does launch (toggle record/launch).
I'll then use the expression pedals to control sends and track volume.

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