I got to spend yesterday working with the Launchpad; see the video above which I think should help you get a sense of scale and what it looks like. (Also on YouTube) We have additional videos from other sources below.

It’s only been public for less than 24 hours, but as we did with the APC40, I think it’s time for a superguide answering questions about the Novation Launchpad controller.

The Launchpad and the way it works reveals a lot about how controllers work with Ableton Live. You may be surprised to learn a lot of this doesn’t require a special controller and doesn’t require Max for Live – it’s standard Ableton stuff that works with MIDI. (Remember MIDI?) And I think some of these answers could be worth a read if you have interest in hardware control hacking in general.

There have been a lot of questions from myself and readers, so I’ve done my best to get answers. Realize, a lot of this information is developing and is based on my limited understanding, so it’s all subject to change. I’ll update this guide over the next couple of days if I get any corrections.

Side note: What about interoperability? I intend to talk more about OSC and the Live API (and each separately) in coming weeks. I think it’s impossible to judge the full picture of how Live can interoperate with other tools, though, until there’s some more information, so stay tuned on that.

Basic Questions

Q. What do you get with Live 8 Launchpad Edition, the bundled software?

New to Ableton Live, and wondering if you can get anything done with the “lite” Launchpad Edition bundled with the hardware. The short answer is, yes you can. The included edition has restrictions, but it’s still a reasonably capable version if you’re new to Live and want to experiment.

Ableton Live 8 Launchpad Edition vs. Live 8

The Launchpad Edition even comes with 1 GB of Loopmasters loops to get you started.

Most importantly, ReWire support for Master and Slave (Host and Client) is included. That means if you have an existing host and just want to play with Live’s non-linear clip launching features, you can stick with that host, using Live alongside software like Reaper and Reason. You may want to consider upgrading, though, as some cool features like the use of Racks and the ability to slice instruments, plus the “Complex” warp mode, are missing.

Q. What the heck is going on in the crazy Novation video demo? How do I do that myself?

There isn’t any Max patch or other voodoo in the video demo from Novation. It’s all just a standard Ableton Live set, and the fact that the Launchpad responds to MIDI messages as well as sending them (something useful if you’re scripting the Launchpad in software other than Ableton, too).

Matt Derbyshire of Novation put together the video. Matt’s an interesting guy musically when not working for Novation, too – he’s part of a DJ Shadow cover band, for one. He shares with CDM how he went about this:

It’s actually a very simple session.

1) There are four clips only for drums in the drumrack channel

2) Each clip is pre-recorded but EMPTY at 1 bar length

3) These four clips are the first four clips in session mode but for convenience I also learned these to to User 1 mode bottom four left buttons.  Basically setting this up removes the need to rush back to session mode to drop out of record

4) Obviously quantize is on ‘cos my playing ain’t that great.

LED feedback

In User 1 mode the bottom left button turns on/off LED feedback.

The important thing I want from the video is to show that I personally do not think the lack of velocity sensitivity stops drums being played. In fact, to the contrary, I think in creative electronic music it helps to even out the playing.

The still-simpler explanation:

So long as you use the User Mode to play, enable LED feedback, and route MIDI from Live back to the Launchpad, you can get interactive light modes, as seen on the monome and Tenori-On.

Q. Okay, the Launchpad can assign control to continuous values. But it’s got buttons. How do you get eight buttons to replace a fader?

Actually, thanks to an Ableton feature that works with any MIDI controller (not just Novation or Akai), this is quite easy to do. You can assign any range on your controller by holding it down.

From Novation’s Matt Derbyshire:

Step 1: Choose the slider/knob you want (i.e. cross fader)

Step 2: Select USER 1 or 2 mode on launchpad

Step 3: Select MIDI learn mode in Ableton

Step 4: Select the thing you want to control (ie crossfader)

Step 5: Select the range of buttons on launchpad

Note that this also works for playing clips.

Now, obviously, if you control something like a volume fader with a set of buttons, you won’t get continuous values. And unfortunately neither Ableton nor Novation has designed any sort of interpolation between button values (though DIYers could find a way to do that). But I’m kind of finding the angular changes in buttons to be fun to play with. If I want a knob or fader, I’ll use a knob or fader.

Q. What can you do with these User Modes?

There are two User pages. User 1 sends basic note values – minus any velocity sensitivity, just on/off. User 2 sends control changes. User 1 by default will play any active MIDI inputs listening to channel 1. In Ableton Live, User 2 only sends control changes once you’ve mapped it using the MIDI Map, to avoid accidentally triggering notes when trying to control something else. (See also the special behavior with Max for Live below.) Of course, in software other than Live, you’ll set up whatever layout you want.

You can’t rearrange the organization of pitches on User 1 because there’s no real editor for the device; everything is hard-wired. On the other hand, you can always make this adjustment in software, as in a Rack in Live.

Advanced Live Use

Q. How will Max for Live integration work?

Max for Live will use the User 2 page. The good news here is, Max by default will listen only to User 2 while the other modes get routed to Live.

Q. Can you control Devices dynamically using the Launchpad?

No. Unfortunately, while there are pages for mixer settings and a generic way to transmit MIDI control changes, you can’t click a device and have a page on the Launchpad automatically make its eight columns control eight parameters / macros. That’s actually a feature enabled by the simple scripts available for the Korg nano series here on CDM (see my post explaining how this works, follow-up script from reader Raymond).

Of course, because this feature is supported by the Korg with our scripts and it’s very, very compact, the nanoKONTROL and Launchpad could make a great, cheap combo. And if you have Novation’s ReMOTE, Nocturn, and the like, you can alternatively use them – so, for instance, a keyboardist could stick the Launchpad atop a keyboard.

Q. Can you edit MIDI assignments? Is there a MIDI template editor, in other words?

No. All the MIDI assignments are hard-wired. The good news is, everything appears to send MIDI, though I still need to investigate how that works outside Live. The bad news is, as with the APC40, a lot of functionality is organized around Live.

That would be my one potential criticism, which is that we’re moving away from hardware that’s useful everywhere to hardware that’s useful only in one program. But I want more time to see how the Launchpad performs outside Live before I pass judgment on the Launchpad in particular, especially as I don’t even have the final software yet.

I still like editors, though, Novation, if you’re listening.

Q. What if you still have Live 7?

Update – official word: Ableton’s Baptiste Grange tells CDM:

On Nov 1 we’ll release two updates: Live 8.0.7 and Live 7.0.17. These will both support Launchpad.

So, Live 6 and earlier would need to upgrade, but not Live 7.

Hacking

Q. Will we get the full MIDI implementation and protocol for creating custom patches or custom setups with our own software? Will that be true outside of Live, too?

Novation confirms that they plan to release the full MIDI implementation and communication protocol for the Launchpad at launch. That’s something that was missing on the APC40, leaving us all to figure it out ourselves, so I’m looking forward to seeing that documentation. Part of the reason to use MIDI is to have a spec that everyone can read so power users can do what they want.

Q. Can you control the lights using MIDI?

Yep. This should be in the full documentation, too, but here’s a sneak peak. Bjorn from the awesome Covert Operators sent me the velocity assignments, which I’ll be using to hack my Launchpad setup:

Velocity 0 = Off
Velocity 1 = light red
Velocity 2 = medium red
Velocity 3 = full red
Velocity 16 = light green
Velocity 32 = medium green
Velocity 48 = full green
Velocity 17 = light amber
Velocity 34 = medium amber
Velocity 55 = full amber
Velocity 18 = light orange (Lighter > red / darker > amber)
Velocity 35 = medium orange (Lighter > red / darker > amber)
Velocity 31 = full orange (Lighter > red / darker > amber)

The Competition, and the monome

Q. How does this compare to the Akai APC40 / controller XX / the monome as far as Live integration?

The most important point here is that you can easily mix and match. You can even have multiple control surfaces active, operating dynamically, at the same time, as well as multiple MIDI inputs for instruments. Also, most of the features of the Launchpad are available to all controllers. Novation is emphasizing the mix-and-match functionality of the Launchpad. Basically, the feeling is, there is no one control scheme that works for everyone.

The Launchpad is quite similar to the APC40. The clip functions are nearly identical, if in a slightly different (8×8) layout – you get the red onscreen rectangle, the red/green/amber LED indicators, scene launching, the ability to page through clips, and so on.

Basically, the major difference with the APC40 is trading functionality for size and price. The APC40 has the ability to map to Devices automatically, as does Novation’s own ReMOTE series; the Launchpad does not. The APC40 also has encoders, faders, a crossfader, and a number of shortcuts. On the other hand, you can get a lot of the APC40’s functionality in other hardware, meaning the Launchpad can combine nicely with other gear you already have.

One significant edge the Launchpad has over the APC40, though, is that the Launchpad is set up to play drum racks.

The monome is also capable of nearly everything you see the Launchpad doing, with the exception of the clip selection rectangle (though I find that a bit hard to see, personally). In fact, the pages on the Launchpad are clearly inspired (directly or indirectly) by Pages, a GPL-licensed, fully-free, Java-based tool for monome which even appeared in action on David Letterman with Imogen Heap.

You certainly have other options that provide dynamic, automatic control mappings, including the M-Audio Axiom Pro series, the Korg kontrol and nano series, Novation’s ReMOTE line, the Faderfox series, and various others. You can see the built-in scripts available on the Control Surface menu, and anything that supports MIDI can be adapted for additional functionality.

I expect that with the release of Max for Live, scripting custom control for other controllers should be more powerful, even if you don’t have Max for Live installed. Stay tuned in the coming weeks as I’ll be trying to get more complete information on this.

The Live API improvements should be especially benefit the monome project. And remember, the monome isn’t standing still. Because it’s open, it’s conceivable clever users could hack new features.

Q. Can I run monome software on it? OSC?

Yes and – no.

The Launchpad uses MIDI, not OpenSoundControl (OSC). That means you have to translate incoming, sometimes arbitrary MIDI numbers to useful information, and that the Launchpad can’t natively interpret messages in the way the OSC-native monome can. However, as noted in our APC40 hacking superguide, it is possible to use an emulator to translate between MIDI and OSC. That should also be possible with the Launchpad. One challenge is the extra buttons around the grid. I’m going to have to write some Java MIDI code that can map to an arbitrary array of buttons, huh?

Q. Does the Launchpad violate monome’s license and design? How is the monome licensed? How “open” is the Launchpad?

I don’t want to – and cannot – speak for the monome project. However, while the Launchpad is unmistakably similar to the 8×8 grid of pads on the monome, it is not a “clone.” It’s only superficially similar to the monome. Cloning isn’t necessarily healthy for design, but a certain amount of copying can be. Without the spread of keyboard layouts, for instance, we wouldn’t have any of the keyboard instruments we have today – and, indeed, before the standardization on the fortepiano, a lot of keyboard instruments were strange copies of one another. In modern design, the monome is itself indebted to the pad layouts on early drum samplers.

I mention the word “clone” because the Arduinome is an clone of the monome which is distributed non-commercially as a result. It actually duplicates major portions of the design, PCB, and protocol, which is not remotely true of the Launchpad. Because their intention was cloning (for the purpose of ready availability of parts), the creators of the Arduinome consulted with the monome project.

For the record, the monome’s software is released under an open source license, and it uses fully-documented, open protocols, including OSC. The hardware is not technically open source, but it is open to the extent that specifications for the hardware, PCB, and firmware are provided for customization and modification, and the construction of custom housing. You are restricted from using the hardware design to make your own commercial hardware, which means the monome doesn’t fit some more restrictive definitions of what qualifies as open hardware. But it does offer some components that are truly open source, and it affords a great degree of real-world openness for its users.

None of the “openess” of the monome is true of the Launchpad, which operates under more traditional and proprietary models. You can’t easily physically open the Launchpad case (and I expect you’d void your warranty if you did). It uses MIDI, an open protocol, but has a proprietary mechanism for interacting with Ableton Live (at least so far as I can tell). It uses USB, but does not support class-compliant operation – you must install your own drivers, which means you can’t use it with some devices (like Linux netbooks). And the process and operation of the Launchpad are not available or documented. That’s not to discourage the Launchpad, and you still have plenty of power via its MIDI implementation to keep you busy. But that does differentiate it from open hardware like the monome and the newer Livid Ohm64, and it’s worth considering how this difference impacts the ways you want to use the hardware. That issue is much bigger than any one piece of gear, and it’s one I hope we can cover in more depth.

More Videos

MusicRadar did their own hands-on:

Actually, judging by the LEDs, I think they were also working from a prototype and not the final production run. But you will also notice they have an L-shaped USB cord, which I believe is what the final unit will have. (And, heck, that’d be a useful thing to have around here, I may have to pick up some.)

Novation TV also has their own set of videos:

http://www.youtube.com/user/NovationTV

And DJ Tech Tools got a hands-on, too.

Not a whole lot to see in this very first video, but it does give you a feel for what the hardware itself is like.  Update: AKAI requested that the first video in this story be removed by its author on Vimeo, so we no longer have a video to embed.

The integration between software and hardware we should see revealed more over the coming weeks. I’m hoping to get my hands on one myself in the near future; I haven’t yet.

Of course, the APC isn’t alone. I’m still eagerly awaiting the Ohm64 from Livid, a beautiful controller with a wooden body, made with care in the US. Unlike the APC, the Ohm has a customizable MIDI response — the way the hardware itself responds is programmable. And, of course, there’s still the classic monome (site | cdm tag), open source hardware with an elegant minimalist design. Custom Max control patches have made the monome a favorite, especially for those with the chops to not only use the community-made patches, but build their own – by coincidence, the monome folks just posted a link to a library of Max monome objects. For both the Ohm and monome, it’ll be easier and more powerful to integrate Max objects with Live when Max for Live ships later this year. Even the APC will get its own custom patches. And, as Hédi points out, there’s also the elegant, compact, solidly-built Faderfox, which could also get a new lease on life with Max patching.

The upshot of all of this: even if people are using the same controller, they won’t necessarily use it the same way, which is how it should be. Stay tuned.

Update: this just in – a second video of the APC, this one sent to us by our friend Stephan Vankov (tetmusic.com). We’ve seen Stephan before, tearing up a wild audiovisual remix of The Karate Kid with the crew at the CDM NAMM party last year. It’s nice to see the APC out of the trade show floors, naturally.

You buy a box. You unwrap the box. You plug it in. You read the manual to learn what it does. Or you bring a box home, and meanwhile a community of people – possibly including you – works to imagine new possibilities for what the box can do and share them with each other. It’s clear that the idea of open hardware (free hardware?) has a lot of potential. But it’s a matter of finding products that realize that vision. And today alone, I’ve got a lot of good news on that front.

There’s some wonderfully good news for fans of DIY music tech. And the homebrewed, open, hackable tools often outshine commercially-available options. For developers, they’re a change to hack on something, but they serve as end-user products, too. The GorF step sequencer and minicommand — the latter tough to describe but a sort of do-everything magical box o’ MIDI — are each nearing shipment, complete with preorders. And the folks at BUG Labs have added sound capabilities, which is already turning into some interesting prototypes of alternative mobile music devices.

Back-to-Basics, DIY Step Sequencer Kit

The GorF step sequencer appeared in a video demo a few weeks ago. But if you were intrigued by the YouTube rendition of GorF, the time to get your own is nearing. PCBs have arrived and, in a DIY Valentine’s Day present, there’s a poll about interest.

Black Box Performer

GorF is impressive, and I like its elegant, simple step interface. But the tool that’s been really blowing my mind is the minicommand. At first, it looks like just a simple, compact controller – nice knobs, and a screen you can customize. That’s all well and good. But the minicommand is better understood as a do-everything, magical black box. Programmable with the Arduino environment, the minicommand can become a controller, an arpeggiator, a Euclidian polyrhythm maker… out of the box, it’ll already have a ton of firmware tools, alone. Maker wesen writes:

- standard midi controller firmware
- machinedrum notes (hook up a keyboard to the machinedrum). The device has an additional MIDI IN for that kind of purposes
- monomachine firmware (revert to kit, etc…)
- supatrigga for the machinedrum
- genetic patch mutation firmware for machiinedrum and monomachine
- polyrhythmic sequencer (with MIDI CLOCK slave or master function)
- arpeggiator
- much more…

It’s like what a lot of people do with Max or AudioMulch patches, but in a hardware box, with tight timing, that you can either plug into your computer or into hardware synths. It’s like MIDI hardware for the year 2009. You might wind up just using it as a reliable clock source for your software with hardware controls, or you might drive hardware with it, or you might control visuals – it’ll become whatever you like.

Oh, and by the way, while the Akai APC is cool, I’d love to see an ultra-compact setup with one of the minicommands and perhaps a Faderfox or two. Time to dust off your 5-pin MIDI cables, huh?

If you’re interested in preordering yourself, you can get on the (limited) first production run by placing an order at:
http://ruinwesen.com/preorder

US$275/EUR220 including shipping.

Hack-a-Pod: BUGsound

At the opposite end of the spectrum, the folks at BUG Labs have added a sound input/output module to their hot-swappable, LEGO-esque modular mobile gadgets. The BUG is basically a modular computer that runs an open source OS and Java stack and is pretty intelligent about talking to sensors and the Web. As readers have noted, it’s not cheap, but I think it’s best understood as a prototyping device. As such, it has some competition from even devices like Google’s Android, but with a key difference: you have total control over the OS and the hardware you plug in. So, Android may also have GPS, but it doesn’t have audio input, or the ability to connect sensors or servos via bare wires, and you probably don’t want to take your 2-year-contract phone and strap it to a mobile robot.

Why prototype mobile devices? Because it becomes possible to imagine just how interesting mobile gadgets in the future could be. Instead of passive devices for consuming approved content (cough, iTunes), they become open-ended, handheld computers that do whatever you like.

And that could mean you could also prototype musical instruments with the flexibility of computers, instead of the closed-box, commercial options we have now.

BUGsound Available Today

BUGsound isn’t quite high-fidelity: the internal speaker is a simple mono speaker, though at least it makes noise, and there’s a simple, built-in electret condenser mic. But it can drive headphones, it has stereo input and output, controllable gain, and even automatic gain control. Where it gets interesting is that you can combine these features with other modules, like the accelerometer or GPS, for mashed-up gadgets. And there are some simple DSP-based sound functions on the board, too.

I’m finally blocking aside some time to work with BUGsound myself, but there’s already a cool demo app from the community called Phunky. It mixes three sound files using accelerometer data. This also demonstrates why we need to get more robust sound-crunching capabilities going (Pd, perhaps) so the applications can get more interesting.

I’m really excited about all three projects. You know where to stay tuned for more. And by the way, we might just have some new ways of covering these kinds of projects and helping folks collaborate … soon.

Price: US$499 / EUR499 / street US$399
Availability: April/May (also about the same time you’ll see Live 8 – Max for Live coming later this year)

APC 40 FAQs, features and questions [Ableton Forum]

Since they were frequently asked around these parts, I want to single out these answers:

In one of the NAMM videos, somebody at AKAI proudly mentions a secret handshake between Live and the APC. But other reports seem to indicate that this unit just sends out MIDI. Does the device or Live send anything other than MIDI signals?

The APC Sends simple midi messages, and most of the banking and Session View control is handled internally in Live. Connecting another controller and selecting the APC40 preset will not work, even if that controller sends the same MIDI messages.

Will this secret handshake prevent us from turning a Monome + BCR into an APC?

Yes.

Will it be possible to use the APC with Live 7 out of the box with default mapping intact, or will I have to purchase live 8 to use the APC.

We’ll have a point release update for Live 7 with support for the APC40 in Live’s preferences, Live 8 will work with the APC40 when it is released.

So, you won’t be able to turn a monome into an APC – well, unless someone figures out a way to emulate the secret handshake. I’m guessing you curl your pinkies, then do a fist bump …

Of course, there are plenty of other interesting ways of integrating a monome with Live, some of which aren’t possible out of the box with the APC, and more should be possible with Max for Live (and other tools).

It’s been eight years since Ableton Live introduced its signature screen layout for live performance: clips, scenes, sends, tracks, and devices. For the first time, a single controller combines all the basic elements of that Live set in a single hardware layout. Akai’s APC40 is a plug-and-play, driver-free hardware controller developed with Ableton.

The APC has certainly got enough buttons and knobs and faders to cover those Live features, but it also raises a couple of questions. One is, does one-size-fits-all work for Ableton Live? The other is, will Ableton open up the “exclusive bidirectional communication” used for clip status to other hardware – for those people who decide the APC40 isn’t perfect? (My guess on that: yes, it will, but no, Live still doesn’t make everything you want available available, APC aside.)

There’s plenty of reason to go dance in the streets on this announcement, but it’s worth asking those questions, too. Here’s a look at what I’ve been able to pick apart on the APC40 so far. Hopefully this will generate some more questions and thoughts, which I’ll take to my first hands-on experience with the device.

Note: This is one of three announcements we’re watching from Ableton; I’ll have the big picture (including one CDM-y bit of info regarding the APC40) at 3:30pm Eastern time, about six hours from now. No, I’m not especially thrilled about embargoes, either, but the folks going to that press conference are watching us on their iPhones as I write this, so it’d be a bit like me telling everyone that Bruce Willis’ character is already dead.

What it is:

• Controllers for just about everything as far as clip launching and mixing
• A dynamic interface for manipulating tracks and devices (controls assigned on the fly to what you need)
• A plug-and-play device you don’t have to manually map or configure
• Hackable with Max
• Something every Live user will want to at least test drive

What it isn’t:

• A velocity-sensitive sample playing device – you’ll probably still want a drum pad (and one would fit next to this very nicely!)
• A tool for manipulating the insides of samples – there are still reasons to go beyond just triggering clips
• Something with any kind of screen – you’ll need to use the Live screen for some visual feedback as to what you’re doing, as opposed to Novation’s Automap-equipped controllers and others (and it is possible to get that feedback from Live)

Predictions:

• This device will become ubiquitous as long as the price is within reach
• You’ll see open-source monome patches adapted to the APC40
• People will use the APC40 for software other than Live (VJs?)

Basic Specs

Akai doesn’t actually list these yet, but I can count! The controls:

• 72 controllers
• Clip launch section: 8 x 5 = 40 clip slots, plus 5 scene launch buttons, with dedicated clip stop and stop all clip buttons. Scroll and shift for more than 40 clips; dedicated bank select and shift buttons.
• Faders: 8 faders, 1 master fader, 1 horizontal crossfader
• Dedicated track buttons: Record arm, solo/cue, and something called “activator” (Andreas Wetterberg suggests this just a track enable/disable, though I think it could also be related to what the Track Controls are controlling)
• Headphone cue level encoder
• 8 track control encoders: Switchable via dedicated buttons to pan, send A/B/C
• 8 device control encoders: Control those Drum Racks, Instrument Racks, effects, plug-ins and the like with dedicated buttons to select and toggle devices, turn MIDI overdub on and off and toggle record quantization (thank you), toggle the metronome, switch between clip and track tabs, select detail view
• Tap Tempo, Transport, Nudge +/- (note that it’s missing forward/reverse transport buttons, which could be inconvenient for conventional tracking, though that’s about the only thing I don’t see on this)
• Interactive feedback: Buttons light up via a color scheme to show play status and record enable, and the encoders have rings of light around them to give you feedback. (Oddly, though, Akai says this means you can see the controller in the dark, except they didn’t light the crossfader or faders.)

You don’t map these controls. They’re set up to use right out of the box. Plug it in, and you’re ready to go – no drivers required. (I assume you do may to open the Preferences dialog to enable the device, but beyond that, Akai says you’re good to go.) Don’t like any one of the mappings? You can edit them – though Akai and Ableton haven’t yet revealed how that editing will work, and it may not be as interactive as these default mappings; that’s another detail I’m looking into.

The device itself:

• Metal chassis
• “Slip-proof” rubber detailing
• Assignable footswitch inputs
• Power supply (I’m hoping that it’s still bus-powered, though)
• Optional “beer-proof” slip slipcovers and Burning Man Extreme Desert Protection Kit (okay, I made those last ones up – there’s an opportunity there for someone)

Pricing/availability: Unknown at this point. We’ve heard from multiple sources that a very reasonable US$399 is expected to be the Akai list price, but that hasn’t been made public officially.

By the way, having just said I don’t think “one size fits all,” I do love that Akai is being completely agnostic on genre. From their press release: “for electronic-music performance artists, DJs, hip-hop producers and traditional musicians.” Amen.

Playing It: Even 72 Controls Isn’t Enough

Now, you know that even though this thing is bestrewn with controls, it won’t be enough. But Akai and Ableton did make this device pretty dynamic, effectively allowing three kinds of play:

Clip control

Without a doubt, this looks like the best interface for controlling clips yet, if that’s your style of play. If your Live sets tend to have a bunch of clips for triggering loaded into Session View, you can finally trigger those from the same controller that you use for adjusting mixing and parameters.

You have access to forty clips at a time, and the bank select and shift controls appear to be the facility that allows you to move to other ones. The boutique Faderfox line had previously come the closest to this mark with the LX2, a little box just for triggering clips, which – while Akai says this is “exclusive” – also had the ability to show clip status so you knew what was switched on. But I suspect people may prefer these pads, and it appears to also show record status, which is important.

The problem with all of this is the problem with using clips as your main performance method. It’s tough to keep track of which clips are where. I wonder what kind of visual feedback the Live software will give you. Triggering clips means triggering them from the beginning, which can get a little musically stale. And you don’t have velocity control – for that, you’re better off with Live’s Drum Rack.

So while this is great, I think I’d still want a conventional set of drum pads with velocity control; in fact, the two together could be a fantastic combination. The Korg padKONTROL is already popular with Live users; you could use it in place of Akai’s own MPD24, because with the controls on the APC40, the MPD24’s faders and knobs are overkill. Akai, of course, hopes you still use an MPC for this purpose, and I’ve seen people do that, but I’m happier in Liveland myself.

Track control

This part is pretty easy: you know what you want. You need the ability to adjust mix levels, the crossfader, effects levels, and pan, and trigger each track for cueing and recording. Where other controllers have usually fallen apart for Live is the effects sends and pan, because you would need a whole bunch of knobs. The solution from Akai: dynamically assign eight encoders. Since a lot of Live artists use effects sends for creative purposes, this should be just fantastic.

Note that the one device that came closest to the arrangement of the MPC40 had exactly this problem. The Livid Ohm is a beautiful device – in fact, I might even argue the layout is more intuitive than on the MPC40. But it has only eight encoders for everything, which means there’s no easy way to get at multiple send levels.

Device control

This, though, is actually my favorite part of the device. Because Live Devices can all be mapped to eight macros, these eight encoders are actually the part of the device you may use the most. If you have samples loaded into Drum Racks, if you use Racks for effects extensively, if you use Racks for instruments, you can access all of that here. (And you can still play on a keyboard, pads, or whatever on your existing controller of choice, or a keytar.)

It appears that in addition to the usual dynamic assignment from Live (that is, click the mouse and select a device), you can also use the buttons on the Akai to select devices. Since the US Ableton offices are around the corner from me, this will call for a hands-on – stay tuned.

You can tell Ableton had a hand in designing this, because they knew that dedicated access to record quantization, MIDI overdub, and switching between views in Live was critical.

What About Other Controllers? (No, it’s not a monome…)

Live’s been around about eight years – that’s enough time for it to go to high school and college – and I don’t think there’s ever been a controller that’s been the bombshell this one has. So everything is perfect and every Live user will go get this, right? Not so fast.

In those eight years, of course, Live users have prided themselves on being different from one another. And I don’t think the APC40 comes close to being the most beautiful Live controller. That honor, in my book, at least, would have to go to William Logo’s device, seen below. The APC may actual more functional, but it doesn’t have fantastic arcade buttons, and it’s aesthetically no match.

Naturally, some of the alternative controllers that come to mind:

• Pad controllers from M-Audio, Korg, and even Akai (and some, ahem, new options today at NAMM)
• The Faderfox line, which can be combined as tiny portable modules
• Little controller’s like Korg’s new nano line
• Novation’s Automap-equipped ReMOTE line of keyboards/controllers
• Livid’s Ohm, which has its own open-source, Max-based software for sample manipulation (pictured above)
• monome
• Many, many, many DIY controllers

In various ways, none of these does what the APC does. But the love of variety may mean that even APC users look at these controllers as alternatives – and if the APC becomes ubiquitous, you score extra points bringing something unusual to a gig.

Even as the APC was still a rumor on message forums and the like, I heard people claiming this would be a monome killer, which to me utterly misses the point. Physically, they’re totally different. The monome has no logo on it. The Akai has faders and encoders and dynamic assignment and does mix control, while the monome is almost religiously minimalist. The Akai has 40 clip buttons the monome has 64, or 128, or 256. The Akai is a conventional commodity piece of gear; the monome is a case study in eco-friendly, labor-friendly small production. Can’t actually get a monome? Well, that’s the point: it’s designed to be scarce. And the because the monome is open source, I expect that in 2009 it’ll actually be easy for the first time to just get a cloned piece of hardware you build yourself.

That also doesn’t get to the fundamental difference between an APC and a monome, which is the software. The APC is designed to work effectively in one way – even if you customize it, the idea is still one control per function. The monome is more like a software screen: its minimalism allows it to be a blank canvas that can do anything, and you can even configure software to switch between pages of different functions. In fact, I don’t think people really “get” the monome until they see the software side, and the extraordinary patches assembled in Max/MSP.

Now, I don’t think the APC40 is really designed as a blank canvas. But we do know that hacking it with Max is part of the plan – at least for Ableton and Cycling ‘74; see a brief mention of that in Akai’s interview with Ableton’s CEO Gerhard Behles and more on this later today.

[I get to finally talk about the Ableton – Cycling ‘74 relationship in six hours, which will happen in this space.]

So here’s my big, fundamental question. Akai claims that this is “exclusive bidirectional control.” As near as I can figure, that’s not actually true. The only instance appears to be bidirectional communication about clip status, which I haven’t seen in other devices. Even that would be a disastrous choice for “exclusivity” – I would hope that, once exposed for the Akai, other hardware could use this information, too. And I know that remains of utmost importance to Live performers.

My guess is, that data actually is exposed to other devices and isn’t exclusive to the Akai, but – as always – Live users will find other parts of the tool that they’ll want to be able to control with hardware but can’t (yet).

The desire to make Live into the “sequencing instrument” it wants to be (Ableton’s original tagline) is all about getting away from the screen and exposing the wonderful things Live does live to gear. The APC already looks to be the closest we’ve gotten that to a product. If, under the hood, Live is exposing more functionality to hardware, this is a perfect announcement. Either way, I don’t think the Live community will ever lose their hunger for getting more control, even with a shiny, new APC box at their ready.

We’ll be looking more at the APC; I hope to get additional details from Ableton and Akai during NAMM, but expect really in-depth coverage and a hands-on after the show – and without the roar of a show floor in the background.

Akai APC40 Product Page

Interview with Gerhard Behles [suffice to say, we have some other questions!]

Manufacturers have attempted to make USB connections for audio and MIDI more transparent before. We’ve seen mics with USB cords instead of XLR, and USB cables with little humps in the middle with built-in circuitry for MIDI connections. But new cables announced this week by Chinese manufacturer CME go further: a USB/MIDI cable that’s as thin as a standard USB connection, a USB mic interface with integrated +48V phantom power, and a guitar/bass/keyboard USB interface.

The U2MIDI is a USB 2.0 (not the usual 1.1) MIDI interface, with plug-and-play driver-less connection to Windows, Linux, and Mac. You can even use multiple cables on the same setup. This could be a perfect complement to the MIDI-only Faderfox control hardware beloved by Traktor and Ableton users.

The U2GKB plugs guitars, keyboards, and bass into a USB 2.0 connection, with a minijack for plugging in headphones for monitoring. The U2MIC does the same for microphones, but surprisingly with +48V phantom power (according to CME, the “first” such device to do so). Conveniently enough, both include a dedicated mute switch and pre-amp on/off buttons.

The big question for me on the audio devices is quality. CME promises “high-quality” A/D converters and pre-amps, but since I’ve never seen a press release that promises “low-grade, cheap electronics”, there’s no saying for sure until this ships. Keep your fingers crossed. I’m certainly excited about the MIDI cables. With most of my gear having gone USB, this could be just the thing for the last holdovers when I want to reduce cables and gear — and I’m sure I’m not alone.

Availability: Spring 2007
Pricing: US$34.95 and up

CME Products Site

Sometimes limitations can lead to the purest forms of self-expression. That’s what Roger O’Donnell found. After years of access to unlimited resources with The Cure, he decided to record an entire album, “The Truth In Me,” with but a single Moog Voyager synth. I caught up with O’Donnell at a recent Apple Store appearance in San Francisco, where he was amazingly candid about his compositional and recording process (which in fact is one and the same). His live setup was suitably minimal, a pair of Voyagers (one was just a backup), a newly acquired Little Phatty (there for show), a Motu UltraLite audio interface, a Faderfox controller, and a Mac laptop running Apple Logic and Ableton Live.

The idea began with his haunting “Another Year Away,” on the soundtrack to the Moog movie. The track’s layered instrumental, made entirely of Voyager parts, worked so well he decided to do the whole album in the same way. His compositional process was old-school: he eschewed presets, preferring to program all sounds himself. The sounds suggested parts, which he played live and then looped so that he could improvise new parts on top of the old ones. None of the sounds were sequenced and nothing was quantized. He didn’t even bother to learn his parts before laying them down; everything was improvised. Sometimes this lead to interesting accidents, like when he’d play the same thing slightly differently resulting in a subtly different part. These differences are what give the music an organic quality not normally associated with electronica. Even effects were kept to a smattering of reverb and delay and a wah-wah pedal or moogerfooger here and there.

O’Donnell’s lead work is simple but lyrical. Rather than becoming a hindrance, the monophonic nature of the instrument lends itself to a fluid sound that at times sounds more like a guitarist stretching out than a keyboardist. A few songs, notably the single “Treasure,” feature the guest vocals of Erin Lang. In keeping with the DIY nature of the project, Lang not only sings the song, she stars in and directed and edited the video. O’Donnell himself served as director of photography.

O’Donnell is a brave man. Not only is the magician willing to show you how he does his tricks, he’ll also share his loops (”just email me”) and he recorded an entirely new improvised composition on the day I saw him. If you had to limit yourself to a single instrument, which one would it be?

Roger O’Donnell [Official Site]

Eric Richmond is a “deep house DJ who was looking for a dedicated MIDI controller for ’standard’ 2 channel mixing.” Amidst all the buzz about M-Audio’s new X-Session Pro (XSP) DJ-style controller, even before it had been released, it’s been hard to get solid information on how the gear works in the real world. Eric took the plunge early and brings us some hands-on testing from the DJ booth.

The XSP is a new MIDI controller by M-Audio set to replace the older “X-Session” MIDI device, and attempts to replicate the standard 2-4 channel audio mixers with which most of us are familiar.

The device feels sturdy, better than my M-Audio Oxygen 8, and on par with my M-Audio Trigger Finger. One nice touch is the crossfader slider is much less resistant then the volume/pitch sliders, as you’d expect. The EQ/aux knobs are tall and spread out apart, so it’s very easy to tweak just the ones you want. The only real complaint I might have is that the top piece of plastic feels a little “cheap”, and the knobs and sliders stick up so high that if you pack it in a bag as-is, you need to take care that nothing would come crushing down on top of it. However, for $100 retail, these are minor complaints. [Ed: I will say, such is the case with the protruding controls on most controllers. -PK]

Choosing MIDI Assignments

Getting the XSP to work in Live 5.2.2 (my DJ tool of choice) was a snap. Just load up Live, press the “MIDI” button, and assign away. No problems/gotchas here. My first test was going to just be a standard 2-channel DJ gig, so I assigned things in a pretty standard way. The EQ knobs went to each channel respectively, and two of the aux knobs went to aux send levels for each channel (where I had various effects). Volume sliders, crossfader, and the start and stop buttons were standard as well.

Instead of using the “cue” buttons for cueing, I decided to use the “pitch” sliders as independent cue volumes for each channel. This way, I could easily mix the two channels in my headphones, independently of how the individual volume sliders were set up. With the cue buttons, I set one to toggle “loop on/off” for the selected clip in live. I mapped the sets of REW/FF buttons to moving around the session view in Live. This way, the only time I had to touch the mouse was when I was dragging in a clip. Once I did that, I could use the REW/FF buttons to navigate session view to the correct clip and use the start/stop buttons to fire them off.

This setup worked extremely well: I had only used the XSP for a few hours before the gig, but since it felt like a standard mixer, it was obvious what was doing what, and I didn’t make any mistakes. If anything, it was pretty liberating rarely having to look at the computer screen — there was none of the dreaded “he’s checking e-mail” syndrome that people complain about with “digital DJs”.

Comparisons

Lastly, I know we’ve all probably tested a ton of devices in searching for MIDI controller nirvana. In my particular quest to find the perfect “standard DJ midi mixer” I looked into and have had physical experience with:

1. Kontrol DJ – A good friend of mine who DJs in Traktor uses this, and it’s an AMAZING controller, and is perfect for Traktor. Unfortunately, it does not map to Ableton Live that well.
2. Faderfox LV2, DJ2, DX2, LX2 devices – I know someone who has a couple of these, and they’re amazing, but the problem was I couldn’t find a combo of any two of them that gave me “everything” I wanted. Plus, they’re quite pricey, and at that price point, I would want things to be perfect.
3. M-Audio Trigger Finger – Before getting the XSP, I was using a TF as my main mixing controller. While it actually worked OK (I could use pads as EQ kill switches, which was sweet), I was leery of using other banks for one-shots and fx. Since the TF does not tell you which bank is loaded in the LCD display, I was fearful that I’d be in the wrong bank, trying to do the wrong thing.

Conclusions

So, what’s the verdict? In my case, it’s EXACTLY what I was looking for. Now when I have “standard” DJ gigs, I have a perfect controller just for that task. No more making a wacky Trigger Finger bank to try and fake it. The only thing I would have liked to have seen were kill switches for the EQs, but again, for $100, it’s hard to complain.

I know people will say “but the power of Live is being freed from two channels; I want to mix 13 clips at once and I only want to use one end-all-be-all device while doing it!” If this is the case, then this is not the device for you. With the XSP able to handle my “standard” DJ gigs, I can free up my Trigger Finger to be a wacky FX board, as well as programming a couple of banks for triggering one-shots and loops.

Anyway, hope this review helps, and if you guys have any further questions about the device, feel free to email me @ eric DOT richmond AT gmail DOT com

Ed: If anyone else has hands-on experience with the X-Session Pro, we’ll post that, too; I’m still interested in what non-traditional DJs, electronic musicians, and VJs might do with this device! -PK

Related:

M-Audio Releases X-Session Pro DJ Controller, $129

Cheap, Functional, Quirky: BCD2000 Mix & Scratch MIDI Controller Review, Part I

Faderfox Controllers for Live, DJing: US Distribution, Upcoming Models

Faders, Knobs, Crossfader: New VMX Control Surface

Take a close look at this piece of hardware, because you’re going to be seeing a lot of them around: the X-Session Pro is cheap, simple, functional controller hardware with a DJ-style layout.

Laptop musicians, DJs, and VJs/visualists have been seeking affordable, basic hardware with a crossfader for years. One of the only options had been the X-Session, a decent but unspectacular box with a crossfader and some knobs. M-Audio inherited the X-Session with their acquisition of its manufacturer, UK controller maker Evolution. But as a controller, it’s pretty limited. Enter the X-Session Pro:

M-Audio X-Session Pro [M-Audio Product Page]

There’s nothing fancy here, but you get all the basics: crossfader, four sets of EQ knobs, four vertical faders (for emulating 4-channel DJ mixers), a crossfader, and two sets of transport controls. I’m not going to throw out my Faderfox DJ2, which is a Porsche to M-Audio’s Ford Taurus as far as controllers (heck, it’s even German), but as a budget buy, the X-Session Pro is likely to become an instant blockbuster.

The controller appears to have the new, improved build quality and feel of recent M-Audio controllers, and the price is dirt cheap: US$129.

Compatibility is a no-brainer, too, as the device is fully class-compliant USB (no drivers needed on Windows, Mac, or Linux).

I have only two criticisms:

First, although this is to be expected, M-Audio describes this exclusively as a “DJ device.” Sure, DJs will love this, but M-Audio has long been a distributor for VJ software (ArKaos) and laptop performance software that goes beyond DJing (Ableton Live). I don’t expect it to happen any time soon, but some day music product makers will realize there’s a convergence going on between computer music, DJing, and live visuals, blurring the lines between these different markets.

Second, M-Audio touts the fact that the X-Session Pro supports “MIDI learn.” Woo-hoo!

The X-Session Pro brings DJ mixer-style tactile control to any software that supports MIDI Learn. … For example, you can easily assign the crossfader on the X-Session Pro to the crossfader within Ableton Live and add a new dynamic to your live performances or studio work. With a digital DJ application like Traktor, you can assign the various level, EQ and crossfader controls to the X-Session Pro. The possibilities are virtually endless.

Wow, the possibilities are virtually endless — just as they are with any MIDI controller. What M-Audio actually appears to be saying is that they didn’t bother to create any MIDI templates, so you can manually create your own by using the MIDI learn function in your software. I’m guessing that’s either a) laziness, b) not wanting to include a disc in the package (though they could have put them online), c) wanting to make plug-and-play compatibility happen only with M-Audio’s own DJ software, Torq, or d) a combination of all of the above.

But no matter: the layout looks great, the price is fantastic, class-compliance is a huge bonus, and I’m sure smart readers here will happily create their own template. I might even pick one up as an extra VJ controller.

In other news: for those of you who liked the X-Session, better try to find one now, as it seems M-Audio has discontinued the original.

The ReMOTE SL is a fantastic keyboard in terms of hardware, but the software when released was a work-in-progress, at least when it came to the much-publicized “Automap” capabilities. Fortunately, Novation’s been making steady progress on its SL keyboard software over the past months, as have some of its partners. When I first fired up Ableton Live 6, for instance, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that many things “just worked”, thanks to new features on the Live end.

This week, Novation has released its new version 2 of its SL operating system, with some major new features:

1. Mackie HUI support
2. Automatically maps to Pro Tools tracks, sends, panning, record arming, plug-ins, effects, and even window navigation
3. Use manual and automatic templates simultaneously in software like Pro Tools and Live

Those of you who have an SL will recognize right away what this means. It sounds like Novation is really listening to user feedback on the SL, because this is exactly what a lot of us wanted.

For those of you who haven’t tried the SL, what’s great about the Automap feature is the ability to get hands-on physical control of parameters without having to switch between a lot of templates and manually assign MIDI controls. The Pro Tools integration appears to be the tightest yet, with the ability to select plug-ins and navigate windows directly from the SL without touching the mouse. (In Ableton Live, by contrast, you have to click a device first, then let the SL’s Automap take over.)

At the same time, though, what many early adopters of the SL found was that automatic mapping isn’t always what you want — it’s actually too much control. What’s nice about the v2 update is that you can use manual assignments (like those you hand-picked out of a Live session to control in performance) while still taking advantage of Automap (saving you a lot of work).

What I don’t see mentioned is Apple Logic Pro support, for which there are still some issues that need addressing (see my review); I’ll have to check to see if fixes are hiding in there and Novation just isn’t talking about them.

I’m deep in Live 6 template creation for the ReMOTE SL and my Faderfox control surfaces, so stay tuned and I should be able to share some tips.

Novation ReMOTE SL v.2 Announcement and Downloads [Novation]

Previously:
Novation ReMote SL Keyboard Reviewed: Automapping Control Surface