Minimal Wave Records

So what does everyone use when they perform live?

i don’t want to start a digital/analog conflict or anti-laptop tirade, i’m just interested in seeing what folks use when they perform live.

currently live my band, Void Vision, I use an sh101, korg monopoly controlled by csq600, tr606 and kr55 drum machines. My bandmate uses a roland jx3p and yamaha an1x. But, we are constantly switching out our gear. Still, it usually revolves around that synth layout.

We use a combination of old and newer but mainly revolving around an MS10, CT202 &  DX72D. The DX7 is used via Midi to control the rack synths (M1r, Novations, Oberheim matrix , Roland JV).

Same with drum machines, we use and old Sound Master SR88, Alesis, HR16 and a Novation Drum Station. The Drum sounds in the Korg Mr1 we also use as they are quite good but these on backing tracks so the M1r can be used for synth sounds.

I am still trying to work out if CD backing is better than a Laptop or vice versa and would welcome any thoughts on this.

We have also invested in a TC-Helicon VoiceWorks unit for its vocal processing abilities which allows a range of vocal effects to be pre-programmed and switched easily. It also has 4 harmony voices which can control via midi so a vocal harmony can be played via the DX7. We also Motu MTP/AV’s for the Midi network to stop sync issues.

SC

Thanks for the input so far folks.

As for CD backing vs. laptop here’s my $.02

CDs get scratched, can skip, are pretty crummy in general as far as archiving goes.  I wouldn’t want to rely on one for a show.

as far as laptops go, they can be tempermental (especially if bogged down with a ton of applications with little harddrive space left over) and are for the most part pretty fragile (there are exceptions of course, a touring companion dropped a macbook from his top bunk on a bus, it dented but still worked fine…wouldn’t recommend that approach).  However, with Laptops you can, for example use a program like Ableton Live and run higher quality 24-36 bit backing tracks and still re-sequence/edit/effect on the fly if you want.  So i’d go laptop but be sure to treat it well because i’ve seen laptops crash and ruin shows for bands.  Even a band like nine inch nails has TWO full blown protools rigs synced and running during their set just in case.  Or atleast they did a few years ago.

Thanks for that insight, your arguement in favour of laptops seems compelling and well reasoned. Perhaps the best would be to plan to use a laptop but do some CD’s as a backup just in case.

Cheers - SC

With The Trapezoids I bought a Tascam DP-02 for the drums and bass synth tracks.  Its just a digital multi-track recorder that I can load .wav files into from my PC.  It was cheaper than a laptop, can have 8 tracks play simultaneously (although I only use at most 4, usually only 2; 1 for drums and 1 for bass).  For live synths I use a Korg R3 and a Sequential Circuits Prophet 600.  The Prophet has been acting up and will probably get replaced with my Roland Alpha Juno-1.

live rig

That is great ollie, I’ve done some research on a similar solution.  I’d like to find such a unit that has a midi clock output where timing is derived from the master audio clock.  This would drive something like a kenton unit that would produce DIN and/or divided down clock for the old gear used live.

The trouble I’ve encountered so far is that the MIDI clock is typically NOT derived from the sample clock.  (in my case I was using an akai MPC500 rather than a multitrack, but the problem is the same.)  So if you load in some 44.1 audio from a PC and play them back the MIDI clock can be out of sync over the course of a song.

A possible solution would be to use the recorder as the master clock when recording on the PC… drive all your drum machines and sequencers with it and record into the PC ‘wild’.  When you load the audio back into the recorder it should stay pretty tight over the course of a song.

What I would like about the digital multitrack approach is that you could do a little balancing between bass, drums, noises against the live synths.  I didn’t really see using more than 4 tracks either.  Some of those recorders are seriously tiny too!  And cheap, you could get two and load the tracks on both ‘just in case’.

[quote author=“Ollie_Stench”]With The Trapezoids I bought a Tascam DP-02 for the drums and bass synth tracks.  Its just a digital multi-track recorder that I can load .wav files into from my PC.  It was cheaper than a laptop, can have 8 tracks play simultaneously (although I only use at most 4, usually only 2; 1 for drums and 1 for bass).  For live synths I use a Korg R3 and a Sequential Circuits Prophet 600.  The Prophet has been acting up and will probably get replaced with my Roland Alpha Juno-1.

if the digital multi-track unit has individual outputs, you could also record a click track from the trigger output of whatever drum machine you’re using, no?

From my experience….
once you bring a voltage pulse into the digital domain, i.e. digital delay, sequncer, digital multitrak - it emasculates it rendering it audio, uselsss…..If you have access to a Schmitt trigger or MS 20/MS 03 you maybe able to convert the audio into a tenable pulse….

I used a system in which we recorded the trigger output of (mostly a TR 808) drummachine on one of the multitracks. During playback the output of that track was fed through an optocoupler. The “output” side of the coupler was put over the step button of a Roland WS-1 programmer. The output of the WS-1 fed the Din-Sync input of a Roland drummachine or sequencer.
The system was very realible, Studio recordings and numerous live performances were done with this system steering an 808 and the 808 of course steering other synths.
If anybody is interested I can dig up more details about it.

@ nuit-exterieur:
I don’t think it has anything to do with the digital domain. What you probably expirienced is that the audio outputs of the equipment you mentioned are DC-decoupled thus crippling the pulse. That also happens with analog equipment audio output.

Ton

That’s a good idea Mr.O, the ones I’ve looked at are all stereo outs but I’m not against mono backing.

[quote author=“nuit-exterieur”]From my experience….
once you bring a voltage pulse into the digital domain, i.e. digital delay, sequncer, digital multitrak - it emasculates it rendering it audio, uselsss…..If you have access to a Schmitt trigger or MS 20/MS 03 you maybe able to convert the audio into a tenable pulse….

Yeah, that’s a problem Mr.M, I think the AC coupling is the problem, sometimes removing the coupling capacitors is supposed to help that.  The other side of the story is that most recorders aren’t capable of recording and reproducing the CV-Gate-Trigger voltage levels.  Way back in the early ‘90s when I first started mucking about w/ my own music I tied to jerry-rig a MIDI to CV converter by creating (in Sample Vision for DOS!) a full scale sample, sending to an EMAXII, looping it and mapping the Amplitude to note #.  It didn’t work for the two reasons above.  The Pro-One would still trigger from audio but I couldn’t vary the pitch with my MIDI sequencer (so of course I used the on board one instead… wish I still had that thing now, didn’t care for the sound but 2 sequences & and arpeggiator!)

Lately I’ve been experimenting with Garfield electronics boxes and have been thinking about using one live in some capacity.  Their ‘Drum Doctor’ will turn audio into nice pulses (is that correct Shawn O?)  The MINI DOC is a great piece for dividing down DIN sync into various pulse streams (it does two at once, as well as e.g. manage start/stop and sync at various rates.)  It takes a while to hunt them up and both the Dr. Clicks’ I’ve found are broken.  They have different problems though so confidence is high I can get at least one fully operational.  These do a great job turning any sort of trigger or audio hit into all sorts of sync signals.  I had an 808 synced quite nicely to a quarter note clock from a KR-55 for a while.

The appeal for me of the recorder as per Mr. Ollie is being able to quickly compose at home without worrying much about a computer sequencer, and then dump it into the recorder without a lot of editing.  Using the Akai requires a bunch of messing about setting up samples and programs and sequences.  The point of using the recorder is not that it’s impossible to perform the songs without assistance, but that it saves lugging all the gear around and boring the audience with lots of set up between numbers.

More and more I’m just seeing the wisdom in keeping it simple and working towards mastery of a small set of gear that you can work with live.  I don’t even use that many sounds in a song, but sometimes there are almost as many sequencers or sync devices involved as synths and in different configurations as dictated by the song.

I guess what I’m getting at here is that the songs should be thought out, composed and practiced enough that they are kind of second nature and a recognizable compelling version can be pulled of without backing tracks or 20 synths.  It’s minimal after all, right!?!  Sometimes I practice a bit on the piano to make sure I remember the various parts of a song.  Maybe I should do one ‘unplugged!’

Usually it’s the csq600/100 that takes up time live since it needs to be programmed between almost every song. In a perfect world, its memory (since that part is digital) should be expanded to hold at least enough sequences for a whole set. Maybe something to switch banks of 4 sequences (since there are usually no more than that per song). Keep dreaming…

That mod has been done for YMO I’ve heard.  Mr M. and I had some serious talks about doing it.  It’s not as easy as piggybacking the SRAM chips as has been done to expand JP-4 memory.  There is some extra logic in there that handles addressing that isn’t quite clear to me, but yes, in theory you could put a bigger chip in there and a rotary switch to select banks.  That seems to be the #1 essential needed mod for live use.

Currently, just Korg MS-10, and a tape machine with Korg DDD-1 and 1 other MS-10 track.

Nice and minimal!  :wink:

its been different every time… last time it was a virus TI, MPC1000, Nord Lead 3, and ensoniq sq80.

this time it will be an MS2000, alpha juno, and laptop doing the drums.  and geetars. because my band is oh so metal .

just load a wav file onto your ipod or mp3 player if you want the quality. either way skip the CDs.. hell tape is better than CDs.

back in the day i used a minidisk player for backing tracks and a poly800 live.