Ableton Live 9

[Guest ryanmcallister]

'Scuse the newbie question but, well I'm a newbie! I'm a little confused about moving clips from the session view to the arrangement view. In buzz I make a pattern (I guess, synonymous to a 'clip') and then put that pattern into the sequence editor (i.e. arrangement view). So far so good, but later on when the song is coming together I might decide to tweak one of the patterns/clips (adjust a note etc.). In buzz I'll just update the one pattern and it'll update all the instances of that pattern laid down in the sequence, but it seems that clips in the session view are 'unlinked' to those placed in the arrangement view (i.e. changing a note in that session clip wont then update any of the instances of that clip in the arrangement and vice versa).

 

Is this just the way the workflow is in Ableton and I shouldn't really use arrangement view until I'm certain I won't be updating any clips, or is there any way of making the clips in session view link up with those clips in arrangement view ?

You are fairly accurate in your analysis of how Live handles clips independently of each other. The only thing that comes close to what you describe is with audio clips that all reference the same file throughout your set, it is possible to replace that single file that is being referenced while preserving the rest of your clip settings and edits in the arrangement, but no such solution with midi really. Funny, I've never really noticed it to be detrimental to my workflow although what you describe could be considered a bit of a gap in the feature set. I guess you just get used to it, and honestly it could be worse the other way around not being able to set individual clip settings for the same pattern (for example maybe I want this clip to have this loop start and length when I trigger it, and another to have a different start and length. Ya dig?

 

Edit: here's a link to a write up I did a while back about the audio hot-swap function. Pretty cool and pretty advanced so even you veteran Live users may find a use for this.

[Hautlle]

I've decided to check out jbridge as a way of using 32bit VSTs in Live 9. Installing the demo now, will report back with results.

[Guest ryanmcallister]

Are any of you guys really running Live sets so demanding that you need 64-bit? I mean I respect Ableton's decision to future proof by going 64-bit, but honestly in most hobbyists' studios it seems a little overkill unless you guys are legit using more than 4gb of ram. I personally only have 4gb in my machine so maybe I've become accustomed to running things a little more efficiently (freezing, stems, etc.), but I've never really felt like I've hit a memory ceiling where I wish I was running 64-bit. Sure it could be cool to have it, but it's certainly possible to get work done without it.

 

Not trying to judge just seems like going 64-bit at the moment seems like more trouble than it's worth until it has become more standardized amongst the 3rd party plugin community.

[mcbpete]

I agree, I think the 64 bit movement has become a little misunderstood. I've got 8gb ram and have >50Gb worth of Ableton packs and as yet not even come remotely close to there being an issue with the 32 bit version (nor will I expect there to be in the future). Their FAQ really nailed the myths behind this recent software compilation change.

[Hautlle]

I just didn't want to wait and DL 32bit Suite + uninstall/re-install. Read about jbridge, it's tiny. Worth a try if I don't have to go to all that trouble. I did crash it once, but that was with a VST that, if you had more than one instance running in Live8 it would crash Live. If I run into any issues I'll just move back to 32 and have no problems, but I'm good for now.

 

I have 8GB as well, never had any problems, just didn't know there would be compatibility problems.

 

S'all good though :sup:

[halisray]

Ableton even say to use the 32-bit version over the 64-bit..

[A Reggae Lee Bowyer]

I have been playing with the drums to midi feature and it seems to have some powerful potential but every loop I throw at it gets converted to a simple 3 lane midi track of just kick snare and hat. All other percussion in the loop is lumped into those 3 hits and more often than not interpreted as snares. As a result I find this a bit of a dull feature

[A Reggae Lee Bowyer]

Also it appears the feature updates from 8 to 9 are very minimal. I find it very arrogant that they must think they were already so close to perfection that only a few tweaks were needed to justify a new suite release. New browser is not such a big deal, session view automation is so overdue that it should be considered more of a fix than a new feature and the audio to midi feels far from a finished model. I'm new to ableton but that's my initial impression on live 9.

[awepittance]

how is the new clip automation feature? That was always a short coming for me in Live that it would have such a cool idea of doing a 'clip jam' so to speak but not have easy to record or loopabable automation built in.

[kcinsu]

It is nice! Makes taking ideas between session and arrange a breeze. The first time I played with it, I had a crazy collision jam morphing all over the place.

[sheatheman]

you guys, I have never learned how to really use ableton. i just use it to record stuff and chop it up/sequence it with effects. the whole thing with scenes has always been lost on me.

[A Reggae Lee Bowyer]

I have read that a good approach for someone struggling to break free from conventional daw layouts is to work in arrange view and then copy sections to session view as scenes for experimenting and development. Personally I feel that a new approach to composing should be embraced rather than avoided or using workarounds but its a start.

[sheatheman]

yes, i should probably learn. then i can play LIVE and be FAMOUS

[A Reggae Lee Bowyer]

I spent a long time constructing a beast of a drum rack with device randomizers assigned to macro knobs but they are ridiculously heavy on cpu load once you have a few working together. Some Max effects tend to be hogs so I started thinking maybe instead of randomizing macros with the max device randomizer, I can modulate the macros knobs with lfos but I'm yet to find a way to do this. Does anyone know a way?

[A Reggae Lee Bowyer]

Nevermind, I just pulled out the iPad with Lemur and realized that everything is possible, everywhere and all of the time.

[sheatheman]

Lemur looks sweet.

[mcbpete]

Wooh, 9.2 is coming soon (available now as beta) and looks like they've bundled in some nice stuff: https://www.ableton.com/en/blog/live-9-2-in-public-beta/

 

Most important for me is this:

Latency compensation

Live 9.2 also introduces a number of latency-related improvements. Sets that contain Max for Live devices or third-party plug-ins now have lower latency. And automation is now fully latency compensated.

So this problem is now (hopefully) now in the past -

 

[Silent Member]

Niiice!

[b born droid]

Wooh, 9.2 is coming soon (available now as beta) and looks like they've bundled in some nice stuff: https://www.ableton.com/en/blog/live-9-2-in-public-beta/

 

Most important for me is this:

Latency compensation

Live 9.2 also introduces a number of latency-related improvements. Sets that contain Max for Live devices or third-party plug-ins now have lower latency. And automation is now fully latency compensated.

 

Came out a few weeks ago now, only just seen it.

[b born droid]

Damn it's worth the update just for their finished retina support. It looks fucking gorgeous.

[mcbpete]

Actually it's only been a couple of days ! The 64-pad version of drum mode is great fun for going wild.

 

From a developers point of view there's apparently changes to the API allowing 'Live Object Mode' which (from creativedigitalmusic.com) "means ... add-ons built by users and third-party developers in Max for Live interact with Live itself. If you’re a hard-core Live geek, this means more power for you to create new tools. But even if you aren’t, it means that those add-ons will be able to do things they couldn’t previously."

[Silent Member]

I decided to update to 9.2 before finishing my track for the olympus mons tribute comp. this is what I've been doing since.

[mcbpete]

Shhhhhhhhhh :( ...... Damn, well the old versions are still available, even if they're not on the drop down - check out the first reply to the question here to find out how to get them- https://www.ableton.com/answers/downgrade-from-9-1-to-9-0-6

 

So you'll want something like-

 

http://cdn2-downloads.ableton.com/channels/9.1.7/ableton_live_suite_9.1.7_32.zip

[Silent Member]

Cheers!

 

edit: finally managed to fix it, apparently something in my vst folder was making it bug out.