RANT! - Performing live and moving from one tune to the next

danshaw · Post by **danshaw** » Fri May 23, 2008 10:11 pm

Ive been reading a lot on these forums about how best to use Live in a live scenario and the difficulty of getting from one track to the next whilst maintaining some flexibility for mashing up your tracks and arrangements.

I have an idea about how I would do it but wanted to get some thoughts about any potential problems or shortcomings...........

I would bounce groups of tracks down to audio files (full length of song);

1 full audio track with the drums
1 for bass
1 for synth lines etc etc

Id then arrange these in Session view creating a scene per song

That way you can set up plugins on specific tracks, e.g. beat repeat/glitch effects on track 1 which will be available on all your tunes. Highpass filter on Bassline for example

Moving between scenes can trigger tempo changes which is an advantage

You can easily drop out the bassline or any other sound on the fly

Stop buttons can be removed so that some sounds can spill over into the next tune to blur the change a bit, perhaps with some reverb/echo as a build and introduction to the next tune, or even keep the drums running if the new tune is drum-less

Plus the layout onscreen is intuitive and can match a midi mixer/controller as its layed out in front of you, i.e. channel 1 drums, channel 2 bass etc

This could also be expanded if you chop the tunes into sections, e.g the scene list might be:

tune 1 intro
tune 1 verse
tune 1 chorus
tune 1 outro
tune 2 intro
tune 2 verse
etc

This would give more flexibility if you wanted to prolong a verse and mash it up a bit then switch to the next step whenever you like

To me this seems the perfect way to do it, and not that hard to get set up initially. Can anyone add any pros/cons to this way of performing?

Thanks alot guys

Froschfinger · Post by **Froschfinger** » Sat May 24, 2008 12:53 am

I did the exact same route you proposed, one scene for each track with separate 'channels' for each instrument. The first disadvantage seemed that Ableton Live seemed to have more workload with those long files loaded, maybe this is complete shit. But seems reasonable especially when you have instruments starting later in the track. Second disadvantage is that you are not able to jump in a track while you're either practicing or performing - it's more like a playback machine then, almost unstoppable:).
This comes also quite little handy when doing a soundcheck, once you're not having all instruments starting at once. So the one-part-per-scene version might come more funky then, though requiring you to change between the different parts of a song manually.

Froschfinger · Post by **Froschfinger** » Sat May 24, 2008 12:54 am

Oops, double post.

Khazul · Post by **Khazul** » Sat May 24, 2008 1:44 am

Rant...

Why is it when year after year we keep posting these question, and all suggestion of pain in the arse work around that ableton have done absolutely nothing to help this?

Session view is great for working on one a track... yes you can run a mashed loops set of it easily too.

But TBH, its a real hard choice between live and DJing mp3 when it comes to doing a set consisting of lots of your own tracks rather than just mashing up lots of loops. Yes once your preped its ok, but its a hell of alot of work remixing, bouncing etc and all the other prep that goes into taking a tyrack and turning it into a live set - half the time Im thinking f*** it - turn them into mp3s and just soft-dj them - at least then I can find a contrlller for them job that I like.

Pages ableton - we want pages - two song pages + global active - A page and B page (song A, song B) + a global loops/phrases/fx page. How many of us keep hacking this up by working across and down in diagnonal blocks?

And some support to improve the workflow around mix-down to stems (or your working audio phrase/loop set), exporting multiple stems together and reloading them as part of live prep etc.

This is where I want these guys to be thinking more rather than the current cant-make-their-mind-up between wannabe daw and wanna be mp3 dj box.

End rant.

danshaw · Post by **danshaw** » Sat May 24, 2008 9:29 am

I agree Khazul

It's called Ableton "Live" and is supposed to be the complete solution for performing your tunes live, but this seems to be the one thing that it fails on miserably.

How do they suggest you perform live? There must be a set way that the software has been designed to do it.

I can see if you make fairly straight house/techno you could basically create the tune on the fly in session view using short clips, but I make IDM/ambient stuff where no 2 bars are the same, so need full length tracks for each part and not just short clips.

Any admins on here care to chip in?

Atomikat · Post by **Atomikat** » Sat May 24, 2008 4:04 pm

Danshaw...if you found you own way to do it and it works fine for you...why the h*ll you need some advices from other people that have problems with the program?

I think no two guys will have the same set up or use it in the same way.
Khazul...I'm sorry if you don't feel comfortable with Live.
Do you guys, imagine how we did it with the very first versions of Ableton Live with no midi,no racks,warping was a pita,less effects,no instruments,etc,etc...just using the mouse?...

Personally, depending on what I want to do...I set up my toys...

ie. a simple Live set of house,electro...just Ableton with 2-3 tracks,Cue,few effects,midi controller. For a Live act (Idm,ambient,electronica,minimal,techno,etc) I use, besides the Laptop,plugins and midi controllers,some hardware like drum machines,samplers,synths,Guitars,etc.
There are times when I start with one sample...and then build up a set adding tracks,samples (or whole songs),effects,remixing on the fly,using plugins (I like to use Guitar rig 3 as an effect to destroy the samples/songs and create different and weird things).
Don't limit yourself...explore,experiment,create,enjoy...have fun.
Live is great to perform live, but you have to find out how...

synnack · Post by **synnack** » Sat May 24, 2008 4:27 pm

Many of us do something similar to that though usually with many scenes per song.

To switch to the next song, well just start the first scene of that song. Most people just make one huge set with every song in it.

What exactly is everyone bitching about? Try doing anything close to this with anything else.

pepezabala · Post by **pepezabala** » Sat May 24, 2008 4:34 pm

Khazul wrote:Rant...

And some support to improve the workflow around mix-down to stems (or your working audio phrase/loop set), exporting multiple stems together and reloading them as part of live prep etc.

End rant.

I agree that it's some thinking and some working ... but exporting stems and mixdowns is really quite easy. resampling, freezing/flattening, its all just two clicks away.

what bothers me most is that I can't import midi-assignments from other songs or AT LEAST EDIT THEM IN A MAP. grrrr

I have a couple of experimental sets where I did funny stuff with the WII or with reactivision, and it's nearly impossible to import that stuff into my existing big liveset.

epiphanius · Post by **epiphanius** » Sat May 24, 2008 6:08 pm

I agree with Khazul that this is where Ableton should focus in terms of changes (as opposed to fixing broken things like file management).

Id then arrange these in Session view creating a scene per song

I hadn't thought of this approach, I've been concentrating on the 'giant diagonal' one instead. "scene per song" with perhaps a couple of tracks of live synths sounds more manageable - thanks for the idea.

e.

SimonPHC · Post by **SimonPHC** » Sat May 24, 2008 8:14 pm

wow you guys haven't had the pleasure of playing a live set with a sampler with limited memory, synths without presets and sequencers that you can't edit when they are in "play" mode, with limited MIDI.

Live has done a lot to make playing live with a computer easy and fun.

Yes preparing a liveset takes some time, but if it didn't, just imagine how rewarding a life set would become. don't nag about hard work.

There are plenty of tricks and options like Racks and such to construct an easy playable liveset. Just get your head around them.

Don't blame the screwdriver it's not a good hammer. I'm not saying you can't use it like that, just don't complain about it.

Machinate · Post by **Machinate** » Sat May 24, 2008 8:26 pm

SimonPHC wrote:wow you guys haven't had the pleasure of playing a live set with a sampler with limited memory, synths without presets and sequencers that you can't edit when they are in "play" mode, with limited MIDI.

Live has done a lot to make playing live with a computer easy and fun.

Yes. Live 3 and 4, most notably. No really big shifts in paradigm since.

Sure, racks and so on are cool, but I am starting to think it's a fair thing to ask for a live version of Live, to be honest.

SimonPHC · Post by **SimonPHC** » Sat May 24, 2008 8:51 pm

Racks in combination with clip envelopes do everything I every needed from a computer on stage. It's easy, use it.

Machinate · Post by **Machinate** » Sat May 24, 2008 10:04 pm

SimonPHC wrote:Racks in combination with clip envelopes do everything I every needed from a computer on stage. It's easy, use it.

dude, I'm GLAD it works for you, but maybe we're.. .you know... different people with different needs? And thanks, but I use racks every day, I know how they work

SimonPHC · Post by **SimonPHC** » Sat May 24, 2008 10:36 pm

If I understand the complaint right it's based upon the simple fact that every different song has different track count, tempo and effects on each track.

Converting these to a single live set cost some effort and adaptation. Or you could search for an application that, from the core up is more fitting for you expectations.

Different needs, sure, but trying to squeeze lemon juice out of a coconut isn't going to be successful.

Just saying you guys should maybe try more with the tools at hand and don't blame a software company you're not able to perform the liveset you have in mind. Ableton never promised anything concerning multiple sets running at the same time, in fact I believe they've added things like Racks and track import to answer your needs.

Khazul · Post by **Khazul** » Sat May 24, 2008 11:14 pm

Atomikat wrote:Khazul...I'm sorry if you don't feel comfortable with Live.

I'm sorry you seem unable to think of the possibilities beyond whats in front of your face.

Did I say I wasnt comfortable with it?

No.

That doesnt mean there isnt *huge* room for improvement given the number of us who seem to be taking a similar approach with bigger more complex sets.

Folks here have done more to help me manage are large sets dealing with lots of different and complete tracks as stems way more than ableton have improved this apparently target use of the product over the last few versions. Thanksfullyb some of those folks have found way of dealling with really big sets and spend the time to spread their experience perhaps ableton should talk to some of them/us occasionally.