The perfect composing software?

I have to say I am a HUGE fan of Pro-Tools. Although it is pricey I considered it the king of recording/editing/mixing audio. UNTIL NOW?

I believe Ableton Live 7 has to be the most versatile DAW program out there with its MIDI sequencing, loop-based production, virtual instruments, effects, and great out of the box instruments. . It's not the most powerful audio editor or MIDI sequencer out there (i will stick with protools). Yet, for most musicians, it could take care of all your needs in a simple but flexible program with a revolutionary GUI that keeps everything within reach -without drowning your screen with multiple windows.


Live gives me a great way to take the mood of a sample and completely manipulate and change it to the point where it's totally unrecognizable, but it still retains some spirit of the original. Then I can fuck it up further — chop it up, take sections and move them around. You CANNOT do this in Ptools without great effort. It takes seconds in Live.

I recommend anyone to download a copy of Ableton Live. Its free to try. If your a beginner you will find yourself makings sounds and composing clips in just a few mins. If you are a advanced DAW user that does a good deal of re-mixing, composing, or sound/sample manipulation you will be sold after your first test drive. Its like getting a Ferrari for the price of a Honda.

My Setup

My setup is very unique and can produce amazing samples and live sounds. Many of them I trigger through m1d1 interfaces and/or guitar.


My setup is very unique and can produce amazing samples and live sounds. Many of them I trigger through m1d1 interfaces and/or guitar.

Home studio for power processing of complex sounds(pictured above)

Its a Pro-tools based rig --> Sheman Filterbank --> tons of softsynths and sound modules (50 plugins) ran on an 8CPU computer. Then a Marshal JMP1--> looped back into the live Pro-tools rig. It creates sounds, samples, and live ambiances, that are nearly impossible for someone to re-create. All of this is driven by various analog synths and outboard effects that are ran back into the digital world for mega sound mutilation. Most sounds I create are custom engineered sound modules in Native Instruments ReaKtor, Reason, and pushed through analog filters (Sherman Filterbank), I also use Izotope trash on plenty of things. Thats one plugin I have to plug.

Portable studio (live rig).

Macbook Pro hosting Ableton live and a plethora of digital audio plugins that can be called up on the fly. Motu Ultralite is interface that drives the audio routing and various line/mic inputs. Novation remote 25key sl midi controller is the workhorse working with Ableton for instant sonic gratification. Ableton hosts the samples and mega soft synths to include my Reaktor and Reason patches. After the sound leaves the moto it is routed through. Finally the JMP-1 for those hard stabbing Pchords or hard rhythm guitars.