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2 approaches to building a set in AL
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Imperets
IsraTrance Junior Member
Started Topics :
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Posted : Apr 5, 2011 19:28:25
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I feel like I have enough original metrial for a short 45 minut live set. I plan on using Ableton Live as my main interface. Since it is my first electronic music live set, I want it to be linear. I am debating between 2 approaches to building it:
1) I create "live" versions of my existing songs by extending their length and simplifying the beats and arrangements. Then I work with master tracks in a new Live project.
2) I bounce each of my songs into separate tracks. I create a new Live project and use those tracks to create loops for the entire DJ set.
Questions to people who both perform and produce:
- Which approach would you take and why?
- What is the best way to structure a set like that? |
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willsanquil
IsraTrance Full Member
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2822
Posted : Apr 5, 2011 22:43
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check out electrypnose's website, he gives a nice overview of how he does his live set in ableton. Or Tom Cosm. If you haven't seen their videos about this, they'll give you a lot of ideas.
There are a million and one ways to do a live set in ableton, from a really locked down completely audio based set all the way to a 100% live MIDI based performance where you start with nothing.
Personally I would go for option 2, where you break your tracks down into their stems and make loops out of the stems.
Cheers 
 If you want to make an apple pie from scratch...you must first invent the universe
www.soundcloud.com/tasp
www.soundcloud.com/kinematic-records |
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mudpeople
IsraTrance Full Member
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Posted : Apr 6, 2011 05:23
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I arranged my live set around Electrypnose's tutorial's concept, it feels less linear and more like a box of sounds to play around with. Before that I was rendering stems and basically just going down the list playing them, sometimes letting em go longer or playng em rearranged...
But the way Ive been doing it now, its more like a half-live, half-dj set, I dont have finished tracks rendered as stems, rather as whole tracks in a dj channel with a 3 band EQ, the idea is that the finished track plays while I arrange loops and midi for the live portion. Gives me more that 8 bars worth of time to work.
For the live portion I have a kick loop track, 2 perc loop tracks (one for hat-clap-snare foundation and teh other for single-element accents and weird perc) and a synth loop track, 3 midi tracks and a Rewire track that I run Renoise (primary DAW) as a bass box in, so I can mess with the key and octave of the bass without affecting the kick, since in Renoise transposition is as easy as ctrl+f1/2 for single steps or ctrl+f11/f12 for octaves. In my experience just tweaking the bass can change the entire mood of the set, so I prefer to have that much control. I had a kick/bass box in one version, but it was too much copypasta to arrange both kick and bass, so the kick is loops. THe bass box Renoise project has something like 30 odd different bass patterns using 4 different samples (so far) in inactive tracks that I can copy and paste into the active track. I guess a sampler vst or Live native could do the trick but I work way faster in Renoise. Also I have a channel for one-shot samples, intro/break dittys that Ive made over the yrs for dj sets, and looped found audio.
Still working on a viable clip-view navigation control, tho a USB 10-key would be perfect. The way Vince ELectryp's tutorial arranges the set, its not something you can just run down teh scene list pressing enter in.
But liek I said, I was originally outing tracks as stems then doing the go-down-the-right-side-pressing-enter thing at first and it was a lot of fun. Even had one of the sets on one of Triplag's live shows (prerecorded). Its a good place to start, Id say. I also made a bunch of like, 12-18 pattern skeleton tracks built to be played like that, with just like basic synth backing tracks to play over, which added a not-heard-in-my-finished-work sound, and thats something I always like to hear in others' lives, nto just remixes or rearranges but whole tracks, basically, that never really exist as finished material.
So yeah bottom line i guess, experiment with stems to start with, but keep in mind the nonlinearity of Vince's tutorial method, cuz, its a LOT of fun, and feels less like a pre-arrangement and more like a box of loops to play with.
But find your own best way, mine is just my own way. I do recommend having the bass be something like my method if youre going with the LeBarde Loop Box, it seems to add a whole lot of spontaneity, every time I play with the loop box it sounds different (I never bother saving the basslines i end up with, except for whatever happens to be in the active channel when closing the thing).
Personally, RE: Tom Cosms live, his looks more arrangement view oriented or so it seemed when i watched the vid, rather than Vince's which is clip view oriented. Depends on whether you want to play essentially a complex, control-freak dj set or a more musician-like arrangement. I prefer the dj perspective. With midi instruments.
ALso another point I always try to convey when talking about Live; consider whether Live 8 offers anything better than Live 7 or even 6. I was using 8 and the CPU kept maxing with more than one vsti, switched back to 7 and it runs all the 24/44.1 loops, the rewire, 3 MIDI vstis with automations, and master channel FX (I ran it all at once just to test) and it peaked at 60% cpu on a p4 2.4ghz with a gig of ram. 8 is nice but doesnt offer anything, to me, that 7 cant do with less cpu use. Also I much prefer the 7 warp, but I learned Live in 7 and I hear a lot of 7 users dont like 8's warp and vice versa. In Pitch Black's Live tut vids theyre using 6 Lite  , cuz, really, why not. The key points seem to be 1. does it play full quality loops, 2. does it play MIDI instruments, 3. does it let you mess with and chain fx, 4. does it Rewire. The other bells and whistles of more recent versions aren't so important once youve already got the final loops produced, and even Live 4 Lite taht came with my Korg plays vsti's and lets you chain fx. Why the eff not.
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willsanquil
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
93
Posts :
2822
Posted : Apr 6, 2011 21:23
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Cosm's live is not arrangement view oriented, arrangement view is only used in his method to chop the stems at which point they get cut/pasted into clips.
It's pretty similar to the Electrypnose technique.
If you want to make an apple pie from scratch...you must first invent the universe
www.soundcloud.com/tasp
www.soundcloud.com/kinematic-records |
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mudpeople
IsraTrance Full Member
Started Topics :
113
Posts :
1785
Posted : Apr 7, 2011 05:04
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Well then... I guess I didnt pay attention Nevermind then heh.
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