preparing for live shows

[jude]

how do you guys prepare you tracks to be played live?

ive got a few gigs comming up soon that i need to get around an hour of my better songs prepped to play live. I usually cut everything back into 16bar loop and trigger then from abelton, with all my drums comming from an akai 3000xl, keys comming from abelton, S2800 and Ms2000

so my real question is do you cut your multi-tracks up into loops and trigger them off at will, or do you stick to the origional arangement

cheers

Jude

[Konketsu]

I'd say that your answer is dependent on what you intend to accomplish by performing a live set, your confidence level with performing, and the amount of work that you want to do onstage. Personally, my intent when performing is a "live" show in a real sense and for me, that means that I cannot be confined by strict adherence to a predetermined studio arrangement.

otoh, I've shared the stage with artists that have their live sets timed down to the second, and essentially play their studio tracks from front to back while occasionally tweaking a cutoff knob or something between beers.

Which brings us to the amount of work you want to do while on stage and how confident you are in your ability to pull off a successful live set.

Check out livepa.org :: Index, and then for giggles check out deadAct.com - Do they think we're stupid?.

[theque]

this guy tom cosm has some good advice, check out this list particularly moving from studio to laptop performance.

Ableton Forum • View topic - All Tom Cosm Live Packs, Tutorials, Videos and Music

[Rusty_OHara]

Originally Posted by jude

how do you guys prepare you tracks to be played live?

Yamaha RS7000 + Access Virus TI + Akai Z4 into a Mackie 1604VLZ3-Pro

RS7000 is the sequencing engine only, driving 16 tracks of midi.

10 parts for drums, percussion, loops, fx and vocals etc, independent tracks, 01 Kick, 02 Snare etc, being triggered off the Z4.

Some parts are hits, some are loops, mainly percussion and some synths parts, normally due to the way they've been created previously.

6 parts for synths, independent tracks, 11 Lead1, 12 Lead2, 13 Strings, 14 Pad, 15 Random, 16 Bass being triggered off the Virus.

Mainly pre-sequenced midi due to the nature of the beast, but tweaked thanks to the awesomeness of the RS7000's midi effects. delay, etc etc

Each track into it's own channel on the Mackie, so:

RS7000 Midi Track 01 -> Akai Z4 Part 01 (Kick) -> Mackie Channel 01
RS7000 Midi Track 02 -> Akai Z4 Part 02 (Snare) -> Mackie Channel 02
...
RS7000 Midi Track 11 -> Virus Part 01 (Lead) -> Mackie Channel 11
RS7000 Midi Track 16 -> Virus Part 06 (Bass) -> Mackie Channel 16

Midi knobs on the RS7000 mapped to the Akai for tweakage of samples. Tweakage of the Virus on the fly.

RS7000 is the awesome for the parts drop in/out, so I feel I have a lot of flexibility, can then drop in/out/tweak as I see fit.

I should play more gigs though....

[Meriphew]

If you're using a computer onstage that's going to be plugged into an outlet, make sure you're using a UPS. Otherwise, if you get a hiccup in the power, you're going to be fvcked.

[rhizomeman]

I use ableton live also and trigger clips/scenes during the show. Usually I stick to a certain overall structure and improv a bit within that structure. It's usually my friend and I so we need a certain amount of pre-planning to work out forms, order, timings, etc. Otherwise, everything ends up sounding like a "free improv" masturbation set.

[Derp]

Originally Posted by dynamicproducer

thats interesting

WWW.DYNAMICPRODUCER.COM

I hate you so much...

[msl]

The wisest thing is what Konketsu said "the amount of work you want to do while on stage". In an ideal world I'd love to go the full hardware route, have a proper stage to play on, a house engineer and a real soundcheck. Unless your playing in super clubs the reality is often very different. I use Ableton with a small controller, depending on weather I'm going to be in a tiny dj booth or not I bring other things, vocoder, kaoss pad. I also like to avoid the complete improv and prefer to have the basics set up in Live that I can add to, mix up, and play over. So I'll stick to the original arrangements but I'll have extra parts, breakdowns, transitions, fx etc that I can mix in.


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