Ableton Live & The best way to multi track.

["Bass Player" <mrbigpantz@gmail.com>]

Hi

Does anyone know a way that I can record the synchronized multi track output of Ableton Live? Using the provisions within the program don't seem to work. That's because of the fact that I do NOT have the monitors of the audio tracks switched on. If I do, I get audible latency issues while monitoring the instruments being played as initial improv sets are being recorded. I am using a PC and the following is a basic run down scenario of what I am doing.   

 

2 people are sitting in a room. The room has two computers in it. One is a desktop and one is a laptop. The Desktop's only function in this scenario is to record a stereo feed via it's outboard soundcard via the output of the laptop's audio/midi interface in which all improvisational instruments (guitar & bass & VSTi) and Ableton Live audio tracks are being input.

The audio "big picture" is something like this. With Live as the laptop's host DAW, Stylus RMX is hammering out some beat insanity possibly triggered by Simpler, The Instrument Rack, Impulse, maybe Reaktor, whatever. The guitarist and bassist are jamming along on their respective instruments while clips are being recorded of what they are doing in Live's respective audio tracks. All of sudden the bassist gets this crazy notion to extend his somewhat dorky tennis shoe and stomp on his RC-50 without missing a beat. He volumes down his bass, sits it on a stand and wheels his lunky clunky ass over to the laptop where some real diabolism begins. The guitarists and bassist have been recording into four tracks total. Two for MR. G and Two for MR. B. The first thing I am going to do (yes, that's right, I am the bassist dorky shoe and all) is stop one clip from MR. G and one clip from MR. B. At this point all I do is go in and grab a 2 or 4 bar loop of myself, hit the clips play button and cross fade it out with the track that my looper is going to. We have still never detected an absence of my bass in the audio big picture and whereas the guitarist may be involved in all kinds of rhythmic or lead based tom foolery, I am able to quickly and seamlessly change out my own bass guitar loops so that there is no "fake" feeling of too much repetition per my bass looper. I am now fully free to "hot swap" midi instruments in midi tracks and audio effects in audio tracks, call up all kinds of sound bytes and synthesizer manipulations and so forth. All this is damn wonderful (or torturesque depending on your perspective) for the audience, but what if we REALLY like the performance and want to go back and remix the tracks? This being because as we recorded the stereo feed and later normalized the feed, we need to. What if we just want to keep and synchronize a few of the tracks while eliminating the clutter?

None of this is possible from an after the event standpoint when recording from session into arrangement if you are attempting to record into tracks within the session view as they are recorded into the arrangement. <---(that's F'ed up but it's what I need!) Automation does not retain the switching (hot swapping or auditioning) of audio effects or midi instruments. So, if as I am recording simpler into the arrangement during a performance's session view , and then hot swap out a different sound in simpler in the process, I loose the original sound when playing back the arrangement multi track because of not being able to eliminate automation of midi devices.

 

I simply want to be able to retain all audio as it's performed in an improvisational sense, no matter it's source as long as it's hosted in Live, in an independent yet synchronized (FULLY DESTRUCTIVE EDIT READY) multi track session.

 

Can I somehow route the output of each Live track's audio (midi derived audio included) into a separate multi track editor like Audition 3?  

 

If so, how?

 

 

Thanks,

Jeff