I’m getting one this week, after having decided to sell my Maschine Studio (too many bugs and really too many features I don’t need). Been looking at the “learn Push” videos, and damn, it looks incredibly intuitive. Especially like the fact that you can fingerdrum and step sequence several bars at the same time and skip between which parts of a loop you want to step sequence (I miss that on the Elektrons and on Maschine).
Are anyone here using it? How do you like it? 
I own it but don’t mess with it much. It’s a leap to go from using Ableton to all Elektron. But it’s an even bigger leap to go back to using Ableton from Elektron gear.
Something clicked for me with my Elektron machines a couple months ago and it’s hard to use Ableton now. I tried using Push again but it’s just not has hands on as say, my Analog 4. Or as instantaneous as say, my OT.
But Push is nice and very straight forward.
Hey I sold my Maschine for Push and it was an amazing decision. Push is the happiest Ive ever been using the computer to make music. It makes ITB so much more fun. I still use Live mostly with external instruments, but it makes using Live more fun. As much as Im already getting a bit bored with ITB Ill always keep Push as long as Ableton is part of my studio. I don’t really ever see that changing unless Bitwig is a real game changer in some way. I fully endorse push, I’ve been converted to use the computer at least a little bit more since I got it and it’s been good for my music!
I like it a lot. I use Ableton for recording and after a 30 day trial with an Octatrack, I took the plunge and got Live Suite 9 and Push.
Some of my favorite things about it:
[ul]
[li]The ease of adding new sounds & fx makes coming up with ideas super fun.[/li]
[li]Recording clips is a breeze either real time or via the step sequencer. [/li]
[li]Scales / In Key mode lets me shred like a guitar player[/li]
[li]Makes plugins feel more like real instruments[/li]
[li]Pads feel great for playing keys and are perfect size for running scales[/li]
[/ul]
Some of my (minor) gripes:
[ul]
[li]No copy/paste of clips. [/li]
[li]Instrument names are truncated in the browser, making it hard to select between “Trombone Section Legato” and “Trombone Section Solo” for example. [/li]
[li]Sometimes I find myself starting a recording earlier than I expected, resulting in the first half of a phrase being recorded on the second half of a clip. I blame my poor timing for this though.[/li]
[li]Pads are not the best for finger drumming. I overcame this by adding a SparkLE. (I mean for $250, c’mon!)[/li]
[li]If you use aftertouch, it’s hard to play without it, and there’s no other modulation options…[/li]
[li]Can’t add an audio track from the controller[/li]
[li]Can’t edit sends of individual drums in a drum rack via controller[/li]
[/ul]
Overall the gripes are minor things that I can live without, and a small price to pay for the fun it injects into Live.
However I do plan to go back to the OT at some point, this time approaching it more as an instrument than an anti-DAW.
Use Push for a while and you’ll see it’s the way Ableton was always meant to be used.
You don’t need to touch a mouse once you set up your track the way you want.
Finding the perfect tones and harmonics and FX to settle a complex lead into a mix is almost TOO easy. You can then record the MIDI to a track, then switch to an external instrument(s) which will be triggered by the midi track- which is a great way to audition your synths for timbres/tones and then program the perfect patch to go along with the sequence. Or you can just play the synth straight up from the Push, but I’ve decided building subtlety into melodic tracks is easier when you are only focused on composition and not programming.
Then (and this may be the best part) recording clips at preset lengths is a breeze- and actually having multitrack recordings with multiple takes to audition and mix together- or totally glitch out/live resample.
At it’s best, it can bring all your gear into the Ableton environment in a way that makes logical sense.
It isn’t perfect (and I agree the pads, while perfectly velocity sensitive, aren’t really the best for MPC style drumming/sample triggering- your fingertips will feel like you just played guitar for the fist time in years for days after serious percussion sessions.!)
But, as always, the OT is kind of left out of the Ableton process due to the fact neither respond well to slavery with HW->SW SW->HW connections.
It depends a bit on how you use it though, no? 
But I agree, the decision to go back to using Ableton wasn’t an easy one, and I never would’ve done it if it wasn’t for Push. The workflow just looks really nice, and I’ve always struggled with trying to compose tracks with several synths without using a DAW. I guess that part is really best done with a DAW.
Hey I sold my Maschine for Push and it was an amazing decision. Push is the happiest Ive ever been using the computer to make music. It makes ITB so much more fun. I still use Live mostly with external instruments, but it makes using Live more fun. As much as Im already getting a bit bored with ITB Ill always keep Push as long as Ableton is part of my studio. I don’t really ever see that changing unless Bitwig is a real game changer in some way. I fully endorse push, I’ve been converted to use the computer at least a little bit more since I got it and it’s been good for my music![/quote]
Nice! Good to hear! I’m basically just going to use it with external gear as well. Whatever might be inside the box is just a bonus, although I doubt I’ll even touch it.
Doesn’t the duplicate function as a sort of copy and paste? That’s the impression I got from the videos I saw, but I guess the pasting part isn’t all that well implemented.
I really look forward to trying out the scales thing, looks like cheating somehow, haha, but looks cool too.
Yeah, that’s the idea, to just make one template which has everything set up, and then just open that template whenver I wanna start a song.
I’ve read a lot of different things about the pads. Some say they’re better than the MPC pads, some say they’re a lot worse, and that the sensitivity of them are even individual on a Push. Which sounds weird. I don’t think I’ll ever pound away for really long sessions, really, but it’s good to know!
Thanks a lot for all your input, guys! I really hope the Octatrack gets an update and can respond to MIDI-notes soon, that would just be perfect.
Madrona Labs’ Aalto got me back into Live last year. It’s an incredible Buchle-style modular plugin and he’s about to release an additive synth too which promises to be just as awesome.
Anyway, that aside, I’m focusing more of my setup around my computer again because of Live + Push. It’s an incredibly seductive combo. The ease at which you can get a recording down and setup complex automation and live tweaking often makes me just giggle - it opens up Live and puts the power at your fingertips. The step sequencer is one of the best I’ve used - very intuitive and very fun.
I’ve put my traditional keyboard in the cupboard for a while to see if I can live without one now that I use Push. So far I’m not missing it at all but then I’m not really a keyboard player to I find Push’s interface very comfortable.
Something else I discovered recently was the Ableton Options.txt startup file. Amongst other things this enables you to populate an Instrument Rack with every parameter of the contained AU/VST plugin so you can easily create custom Macro controls for any plugin to then be controllable by Push’s knobs etc. Super cool!
Push is great. For composition, it’s very quick to get down melodies and beats and rapidly layer tracks and make pattern variations.
I prefer using it to sequence melodies for external synths, and then use the synth’s hardware knobs to modulate by hand. It’s also pretty quick to make a instrument rack in Ableton which maps CCs to Push’s encoders.
There are Max4Live patches which let you map pad aftertouch and the touch strip to what ever parameter you like as well.
I would love a sampling workflow ala NI’s Maschine, but I’m not sure if that’s part of Ableton’s agenda.
Really solid bit of hardware engineering too. Looks and feels top notch.
Nice, thanks for the tip! Don’t think I will be using a lot of VSTs to be honest, but it’s good to know.
Yeah, that was one of the thing that sold the Push to me, automating stuff just looked like a breeze, very very intuitive.
You need the Suite version of Live to be able to use Max For Live with it, right?
A question for the Push owners on here - do I need Max4Live to be able to automate MIDI CC from Push to say a Monomachine (or any other hardware synthesizer)? It just seems that way from the tutorial video, but apart from that feature, I really don’t need any of the stuff that comes with Ableton Suite, so it feels a bit ridiculous paying all that money for it.
quick question can you use Push to sequence for example Battery or Massive?.
Have access to all the parameters?.
Press and hold “Add Track”. Then you can add either a Midi or an Audio track.
Yes, with a little preparation. If you put your VST instruments inside an Instrument Rack, and name / map the macros you will have convenient access to at least 8 of the parameters. Just save some Instrument Racks with Battery or Massive in them and you’re good to go.
Finally using Ableton early this year really helped in being the best way to get my music ideas out of my head. Push however has been the added and much needed boost to be able to help refine ideas and added various parts (melodies, chords etc). For drums i’m still using maschine inside ableton.
The most important factor of push for me has to be the scales options, since i know very very very little about music theory having selectable scales and keys opens up the playing field for me.
For push I would highly recommend getting PXT Live by nativeKontrol
http://www.nativekontrol.com/PXT-Live.html
It is a user option (so you will still be able to use push normally by pressing the user button) that just adds a lot of functionality to push that most should’ve already been included.
Check the videos at the bottom they all give great insight into what every button and mode does.
Cool, that’s a great tip! I’ll definitely check that out when I get one.