My turn.
My Music
Tech House / Melodic Techno, so a lot of synths that modulate, some pads and a lot of drums.
My Gear
I use an Octatrack and a Circuit, the Circuit is Midi slave to OT but sequences on its own – that way it is independent of the Tracks I play and I can easily use it in transitions.
My Octatrack Setup
-
Kick Drum Loop Filter
Kick Loop of one or four bars -
Bassline Loop Filter
Full Stem sliced into 4/8bar loops -
Percussion Loop Filter, Delay
Full Stem sliced into 4/8bar loops, containing claps/snares, glitches and percussion. -
Hihat Loop Filter, Reverb
Full Stem sliced into 4/8bar loops, containing CH, OH and shakers. -
Circuit Thru DJ-EQ, Compressor
My Circuit goes in here, I remove the bass Frequencies and compress it a bit. -
Instruments Filter, Dark Verb
Full Stem sliced into 4/8bar loops, sort of a backing track with everything except the primary lead which is done via circuit. -
Effects Dark Verb
Full Stem sliced into 4/8bar loops -
Master DJ-EQ, Compressor
Master EQ for adjusting and bass cuts via scenes. Compressor gels everything together.
If anyone found a real nice setting for punch and limiting PM me please.
Thought about using two compressors. one for glue, one for peaks.
####BANKS
…are Tracks to me
####PARTS
…I don’t fully utilize. I use Part one, working settings are saved there including scenes A and B set to an empty one. that way I can go crazy and then return to default via Part reload.
####PATTERNS
…are segments of a track, I use them in a linear fashion. most of them are 64/64 [1/8] or 32/32 [1/8]. They contain single trigs that define the slice that should be played on each track.
####SCENES
…contain different “variation” effect settings, so that I don’t have to mess that much with the track parameters.
####LFOs
…don’t get used much, but they are set on every channel so I can make them modulate the Pan or Filter Cutoff. I really should use them more.
How I prepare the set
I’m a hybrid guy, and all of my tracks come together in Bitwig. I render full stems for all groups, but mute some hihats and leads that I rebuild on Circuit. I import all stems in the OT, and slice them into 4bar/8bar chunks, setting quantize to 4/16 – that way I can manually trigger them in time. I then recreate/redefine the arrangement in the patterns.
How I Play
The Octatrack works as sort of a Ableton-like backbone. The Circuit is synced, but I use its own sequencer in order to be able to change the Bank on the OT and still jam some transitional elements. Every Bank on the OT has a corresponding Circuit session – That way I have good control over the tracks elements and timing on the OT but can jam in the drums and control my synths’ parameters live. I’m the kind of guy that constantly turns the cutoff knob.
My Transitions
I don’t use the resampling transitions but rather capitalize on the OT running audio loops indefinitely until a new trig gives new instructions.
The first pattern in every bank has no triggers except for the thru machine, so switching to it does nothing initially. I can then trigger every Track’s new loop by pressing the sample triggers on the right – sort of like the plays-free-Bionik-transition (In every loops setting I have quantized play set to 4/16th so that I don’t screw up the timing), so I gradually switch out the parts for the new ones while the circuit is playing some hihats to gel it together. And then on to the next pattern where every Track has a defined trig