Hello my dear Elektronauts (it’ll be a little while before I can properly call myself that!),
I’ve recently acquired the Analog RYTM to replace my trusty old MPC 500 and my beloved Alesis Micron on stage. The van is just getting full. I play in a band that mixes a lot of different instruments and I want to get a lot deeper into electronic beats, loops and all that RYTM goodness with a reliable, compact setup.
So far, everything feels rather intuitive. I’ve been warned about the learning curve of these machines but within a few days, I was able to recreate most of what I’ve been doing with the MPC and the Micron on stage – and then some. Here’s a sample of what we do:
//EDIT: Oh wow, Embedding that video caused all kinds of havoc… read first reply for the actual question… Re-typing right now…
So here’s my 2nd attempt at posing that question, embedding that video replaced three paragraphs with the same video again so yeah… obviously I need help with using these forums as well!
Now, I need the RYTM to do the following things:
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[li]serve as master clock to ableton which re-distributes it to a bunch of other synths (dsi prophet, nord lead, arp odyssey, microkorg…)[/li]
[li]save presets with kit sounds and tempo information as well as empty patterns. I want to record the beats live.[/li]
[li]ideally: save pre-programmed scenes that I can use to create mute groups for instance.[/li]
[li]ideally: save pre-programmed performance settings so I can use the pads as mod wheels for instance.[/li]
[/ul]
I’m unsure as how to save a preset like this? Do I save an individual project for every song (actual song, that is, not RYTMs “Song”)? That’d make changing presets a bit of a hassle on stage as I understand that program changes only change patterns? Is it possible to save all the things I need within a pattern? Is a song just a pre-programmed sequence of patterns or can I save all this as a “song” which, at least linguistically, would make the most sense?
Sorry if these are very basic questions. I’ve read the full manual (which seems to barely scratch the surface?!) and watched cuckoo’s very instructional hour-long https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1egKAzWVfo4. But even after many years of toying with, at times, very idiosyncratic synths (has anyone here ever used a micron? my god), elektron’s way of doing things poses a bit of a challenge to me in this regard.
Kit sounds are absolutely tied to patterns. If you change the sound of a kit, it will change in all patterns that use that kit. I suggest correlating kit # with Pattern# in a project.
As far as saving tempo info on a per pattern basis…sorry. Tempo is a global setting. I wish this were different myself. So either change tempo per pattern (not easy if a tempo change is in a song and you are playing other instruments) or find something else that is the Master Clock and can send cc info (I guess).
I’ll let others tackle more as I have to get ready for work.
So I guess I should be a) saving every song as a project of its own or b) write down pattern #s and bpm speeds on a piece of paper and save empty patterns with kits assigned to them…
a) seems more thorough and structured but means I’ll have to press a few buttons between songs and program changes won’t work. b) will be quicker but I’ll have to set tempo manually every song (or let Ableton be the clock master which scares me?). I’ll also need to remember to clear pattern after every performance…
Am I missing something? Surely my way of using the AR can’t be that exotic?!
We’ve been clocking Ableton to my MPC for almost two years now and it has been very reliable – before I got the MPC, we had a much less stable MIDI clock. That said, we don’t use many instruments within live, we just pretty much use it as a glorified sub-mixer for hardware synths with FX etc.
It seems, however, that option b) (saving my presets as empty patterns) is out anyways. It appears, the AR only loads a kit when the pattern contains saved trigs. Empty patterns won’t load a different kit. I do, however, want to record the beats live.
Such a bummer… the AR really sounds amazing and I’m starting to create very cool sounds and rhythms with it but I’m still not sure how to best use it on stage without pre-programming stuff.
I guess I’ll just edit, save and load kits, set tempo manually and clear the pattern after each song, although that’ll render Scenes largely useless, I guess…?
Here’s what I do to keep kits assigned to “empty” patterns.
Simply put a trigless lock somewhere in the pattern. It could be something very simple that won’t get touched much, like pan or amp-attack.
Do that, and there is no notation on the pattern, but it will hold the kit in place.
Good idea. That’d open up the possibility of program changes and scenes again! Instead of clearing a pattern after a song, I’d have to re-load the saved pattern with that one trigless lock after the song ends.
Come to think of it and after having checked the manual… there’s no MIDI CC for the global tempo (or even “reload pattern”), is there? That’d just be great…
Yeah that seems to work really well! Now if only Tempo could be saved with patterns or changed with a trigless lock or via MIDI CC… Ah, well… Thanks everyone for now. I’ll just quickly document how I’m doing things now for the next novice that might stumble upon this thread:
[ul]
[li]I use one project for everything that has to do with this band. If I ever run out of sample space within that project, I’ll use one project for our live repertoire and move all the kits and sounds of songs we’re not currently playing into another project.[/li]
[li]I edit, save and name kits I want to go with a song.[/li]
[li]I use one pattern per song and place a trigless lock that doesn’t do anything on the second trig (because it is used less frequently than the first one) so the pattern loads the kit as suggested by AdamJay.[/li]
[li]I’ll pre-program scenes and performance macros and probably some automation, then clear all the trigs except for that one cheatcode-trigless-lock. Save that pattern for recall on stage with the hotkey tsutek mentioned. Et voila![/li]
[/ul]
Thanks! Looking forward to knowing wtf I’m doing with this beautiful machine!
All these boxes are fun, inventive, expensive, never ending puzzles to me.
Believe it, or not, the limitations help a lot of the time. Have fun with it!
Ah, well… Thanks everyone for now. I’ll just quickly document how I’m doing things now for the next novice that might stumble upon this thread: