I’ll try to revive the topic, as I am currently preparing for a live gig at the end of April and the stress is piling up! (first time playing in a proper venue, still small though). If there’s anyone here from La Réunion, come along, it will be awesome Tzetze + Pamplemousse + Taba! - Le Kabardock (we’re TABA!)
I hope I can get some feedback in case I’m missing something important. Also, writing it down is a good way for me to get my thoughts in order, so even if it’s a shout in the void it doesn’t matter so much.
The set up : Access Virus TI / Digitone /Analog Heat (used only on the digitone to warm it up)/ Digitakt / LXR 02 all being controlled by the Squarp Pyramid with a keystep connected to it.
The genre : something along Peaches, Santigold, Le Tigre. I control the synths while the singer screams and jumps around.
The form: The songs were composed using the Pyramid workflow and our live are “semi” jams. The songs’ structures are fixed, but the Pyramid allows for flexibility in the duration of the songs, and I can slightly alter some parts on the fly.
What I’m fixated on: Having a decent sound and mix for live venues while remaining strictly dawless.
I am relatively new to this; I started getting into elektron machines 2 and a half years ago, and I played live for the first time in February 2022, so I am still learning by doing. For our first gigs, I used to connect all the synths to a mixing table and send everything to the sound guy as one big sonic stereo lump. No way for the sound engineer to pump the kick up, lower the bass or whatever. EQ was the only option for them. So we had some good gigs, and some truly awful ones. Also, I did not have a specialized approached for my gear. Everything would be doing a bit of everything. For example, the digitakt would have a track with a synth, a track with a kick, a track with a pad…
The preparatory steps:
- Specializing and separating
I’m trying to make sure that the sound person gets dedicated and coherent tracks. To do so, I focus on the available outputs of my synths. All in all, I’ll be sending out 5 tracks, some stereo, some mono.
One stereo track for the bass (output 1/2 of the virus)
One mono track for the kick (output 1 of the LXR)
One mono track for the snare/clap (output 2 of the LXR)
One stereo track for melodic elements (digitione via AH + output 3/4 of the virus in a small mixer)
One stereo track for percussive elements (output 3/4 of the LXR into digitakt)
The logic here is to mimic what a live band would do in terms of patching. During the sound check, I have a dedicated song project that builds up with each track so the levels can be set properly for the entire set.
Here’s where the DAW comes in (can’t escape it!). I use youlean loudness meter via ableton to make sure that each song is relatively similar in terms of volume and dynamic range. This way, I try to avoid surprises where the engineer has to readjust things on the fly.
I also check the mix of the songs with sonarworks to see how they might translate on different systems. I can only use headphones at home, so I’m always super anxious about my songs will actually sound on big sound systems. I also suck at mixing even though I try to get better.
And voilà, that’s it basically. We rehearse once a week for 2 hours and we go through the songs to make sure everything is perfect. We still have to come up with little fillers for the space in between the songs where I switch projects on the Pyramid.
I hope this can be useful for other people thinking about live gigs with only synths, drum machines and grooveboxes. If there’s only one thing I would recommend is that you always have at least a dedicated output for the kick and the bass.
Cheers, and have a nice weekend!
