Dave Mech live @ About Blank Berlin

:smile: well actually with the new DT and DN you can lock that note parameter to scale so that would actually be quite easy :grin:

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man, what a time to be alive, isnt it :smiley:

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dang it, I forgot about this!
Maybe next time :slight_smile:
I’ll take a listen at the recording though!

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Sounds great. I like the relentless pace of pattern changes.

I am curious to see how (if?) do you do PFL monitoring + pattern selection and switching. Often the transition feel like traditional 2 decks mixouts, which is quite refreshing.

Do you use sequential / categorical / other organization of patterns? How do you avoid re-playing already played patterns? Do you use some naming scheme or pattern locations to link layers (vertical layering of patterns) together?

Also, what should I listen for to hear what the microcosm does? Is it for example facilitating the breakdown at 37:00? Any other less obvious examples?

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Awesome set. Very aspirational :slight_smile:

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Oh man I wish I had known about your show, blank is my favorite club in town! Are you playing in Berlin again on the 3rd? Listening to the set right now, great vibes - i love the tempo, continually changing themes and tensions. Would be curious about how you go about sound design and layering of your various hats and percussions

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HardGroove exactly as I like. I took a break with Techno, bored by warehouse/big floor/rumble that absolutely take over all the over club electronic music subgenre. (and damn I didn’t like Melodic Techno too)

(If you’d told me 15 years ago that I’d be sick of it and saying this, I wouldn’t have bought it.)

But If I would still producing & playing some Techno, it would be more towards that HardGroove style, kinda tribal in lock groove, dope sound design, dope sound choosing, minimal just what’s needed. And it’s what you are doing my friend @DaveMech (to me, and the very good way.)

Big fan of Chicago & Detroit First, Jeff Mills… Drexciya, Suburban Knight, then… ignition technician, Deetron, The Advent, Hertz, Danilo Vigorito, Samuel L, Paul Mac, Surgeon, … then Ben Sims, DVS1, Mark Broom…

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The idea of doing this is the reason I’ve considered getting a second Syntakt.

Listened to the first 8 minutes, the music (and mix!) sounds incredible. I’ll be giving the whole set a full attention listen soon though. Thanks for sharing it, Dave! :heart:

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I have a question abut the Digitakt II samples, did you prepare them? In the DAW, like Compress, EQ, gain stage, delay, distorted… and so on.

Big fan of your work, you are also who convinced me to get the xone px5 mixer. love it!!!

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Hm, this seems to be a thing :thinking:. I’m not sure whether that would really make it easier for me, if I used more machines but less patterns. But might try it one day, since it seems to work for several people on here.

Thanks for taking the time to explain your approach :pray:. So are you only/mainly using macros for performance or also jumping around on pages of the Elektrons?

Btw: I was trying to find dates on your website but couldn’t. Let me know if they can be found somewhere / if you’re ever playing in southern Germany in the next months.

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Wow, you must have exceptional mental capacity to be able to handle all those seqs live. What’s that, 60 tracks! Makes me stressed even thinking about that, but surely you have your battle-tested logic for handling these machines. Would love to see a demonstration video of how you make it work.

I will have a proper listen later when I head to bed! Respect

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Curious what you’ll think of it !
It looks like I’ll be playing in Berlin and hopefully this year. The aim is to do it on a regular basis so stay tuned

Thanks! For starters I make sure that my patterns are more or less relatively similar in LUFS testings. I often have 2 to 3 ā€œdecksā€ running. The second DT II for example is mostly used for percussive layers and I throw that in there quite a lot (like additional hi hats and so on). I sort of order them in a flow that I predict will work for the evening. For example I was in between a hard Groove DJ and a hard techno DJ, so naturally I’ll begin with a bit more funk and end with a darker more in your face pattern. In between I’ll have a pretty good idea of where I want to take the crowd but am free to change course or change the order. I do name most patterns, but not a specific naming scheme. Good to know maybe is that each groove box is treated as a standalone unit. This way I never have to play a specific pattern on multiple boxes. This gives me a lot of freedom and keeps me flowing in high speed :slight_smile:

@ 6:30 you can hear it a bit. And a couple of times later in the set as well. I honestly didn’t use it nearly as much as I wanted. So much is new in this setup both musically and in terms of gear that I still have a lot to explore. Microcosm can add very flavory wicked rhythms and sound scapes, plus it’s insane when I start using feedback loops with it, which I only did one or two times very subtly. This is one of many aspects that will grow when I play out more.

Thanks ! The 3rd I play in my hometown Utrecht. But as I said above, I’m very confident I’l play in Berlin again soon :slight_smile: Best to keep an eye on my instagram. Thanks for listening to the set. Really appreciate it. Might do a video later this year about this setup and workflow. It’s very similar to what I used when just starting the YouTube channel but a very supercharged version :wink:

Thank you so much William. Really appreciate that coming from you :heart: . Thanks for checking out the set.

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Wish I could answer that question with a simple yes or no, but it’s eh both I guess :). Most of the sound design really is done within the Digitakt. I do use field recording samples for example which will have a bit of processing and EQing and such to clean them up a bit. Some samples are the result of years of destroying them and resampling them. Some are just very vanilla and processed within Digitakt. I also use a couple of factory samples that I really like. One of the closed hi hats (fertids or something?) which I really really like the sound of.

Regarding the px5: Awesome ! :). Great mixer . And thanks for listening

The Faderfox is used for multi-parameter macros. Which makes it possible to make sounds change in a way that would not be possible by jumping around pages. But I definitely still also jump around pages to change parameters :wink:

Regarding dates: Only the 3rd of May in Utrecht at the moment. This BErlin gig and its recording were really important so I’m glad it went so well, because I’ll be using this to contact bookers everywhere as I ant to play as much as possible as soon as possible :wink: . Best to keep an eye on my insta for dates. Still need to add an element for dates on my website.

Haha not at all. It’s indeed because of a system I use that applies to both Digitakt and Digitone. Syntakt only has 12 tracks so it’s different. But each Audio track on each machine has either a specific use or a variable use that’s quite easy to work with. I’ll make a video about this.

Haha, good sleepy time music ;). Looking forward to your thoughts on the set!

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Great set Dave, loving the faster tempo :clap:

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Currently listening with some biscuits (ok, they are long gone now). Very interesting music! I can hear how those layered sounds come handy for this type of stuff.
Love how you added the ambience to the mix too.

Yeah haha, not typical bed-time stuff 4 sure. Luckily it’s sunday and I’m getting old, otherwise might have jumped out of my night robe. And who even decided you cant dance in bed?!

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This sounds great! Congrats!

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@DaveMech : I check your website because I wasn’t sure. All people needs as learning elektron machines you use in your Live Performances are there.
(Digitakt II, Digitak, Syntakt, Digitone, Analog Heat+fx) truely awesome what you achieve.

But what about a course on Live Performance with an Elektron setup?
like ok I have mostly my setup, I mostly know my machines, where to go from there - including the creation process and expert advises on how to propose/sell Live Performance

creating ideas, creating your own sound signature, field recordings, rework field rec sounds, mind thinking the setup, train yourself to create a whole, preparing a live gigs before, setup and sound balance in the club, keep people interested along a live show, how to ā€œbeā€ / ā€œactā€ regarding a crowd and technical stuff, order ideas specifically for a location and depending artist before and after, how to deal with accident that can disturb, how to manage and deal the gigs, how to promote yourself online and make a pro network maybe with footage in real event that way you can show some stuff, how it actually work in the real life

That’s the kind of things no-one do (at least I didn’t see much regarding Live artists) and I would be interested to buy that kind of courses beginner, advanced, expert make also sense in a way in that kind of course.

I’m sure a lot of people would be interested. me, included.

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Is this what you want, James Orvis course?
Live Performance Masterclass

All I can say for now is, something’s already cooking and it’s going to be deep :wink:

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60 minutes ??? no way… for a Live Performance with everything I said ? common it’s impossible. but thanks for heads up
but not for me I like to pay for in depth stuff

  • it’s only focus on the technical side of the Machines in a Live setup.

a wide angle overview, the workflow, the mind thinking… the stress, overcome failing stuff, preparing yourself, preparing the setup, assurance, travelling with a Live Setup, +everything I said… there’s a lot missing in the Ben pest. Transition (already know), Elektron machines (already know) Midi Audio (already know)

I’m more interested by an A to Z overview, the ā€œArtistic Visionā€, the ā€œPerformingā€ a crowd came for dancing, How to entertain the crowd… How to sell-promote-extend the network etc… maybe an interview of a tour manager, an interview of a club PA engineer stuff like that. so you actually take a lot of advises instead of learning by missing&failure by doing it.

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