Mr. Bill’s Ultimate MIDI Masher

Ableton Live Set Template
Take a closer look at the template file
Unpopulated (What You Get)
Populated (How It Might Look)
Today I want to share with you, the best way I’ve personally found to perform “DJ” sets using Ableton Live!
After performing around 300 live shows over the past 8 years & spending the past 6-8 months trialling this new method of performing out of this Live template, you can now download the template I’m currently using to perform my solo sets!

It’s a little bit confusing to get your head around and a little bit of a pain to set-up at first, but I’m sure you’ll enjoy playing with it & get a lot out of it if you’re struggling with finding ways to spice up your live performance.

Watch the videos and read on to learn more.

The Setup
Setup References
Here are some naming conventions you’ll need to know whilst doing this.

The key & BPM conventions come from Mixed In Key and you can have that software rename your tracks in this way for you simply by loading them in (it’s a preference you can set).

– KEY – BPM – TRACKNAME – #First Chain Value (between 0-127) #Second Chain Value (between 0-127) #Quantisation Value (See Quantisation Value Reference) #Scratch Sample value (optional)

Example of a “cut” track (tracks you’ll be cutting up on the MIDI fighter)
– 9A – 126 – MIDICHONDRIA – #000 #000 #16n

Example of a “scratch” track (tracks you’ll scratch over with the Twister)
– 9A – 126 – MIDICHONDRIA – #000 #006 #16n #037

The values #000 & #006 are arbitrary & always have to be these values if you’re doing a scratch track.

Additionally, the 4th number has 2 functions:

  1. It selects the scratch sample on “Scratchy” (Woulgs Max device)
  2. It tells that little box you’ll see (when you click “Open me fuckboi” on the master channel) to either say “SCRATCH” or “CUT”
Quantisation Value Reference
32n – 32nd Note
16t – 16th Triplet
16n – 16th Note
8t – 8th Note Triplet
8n – 8th Note
4t – Quarter Note Triplet
4n – Quarter Note
2t – Half Note Triplet
2n – Half Note
1n – Whole Note
0n – No Quantisation (freestylin’)
Credits
Big thanks to the following people for the following reasons:

  • Woulg: For finishing the Chain Selector Max device & creating scratchy & just generally making this whole set possible, honestly.
  • Tom Cosm: For starting the Chain Selector Max device.
  • Jesse Poulton: For creating the Beats to Complex warp mode switching component in the Chain Selector Max device.
  • Beats Antique: For having me on tour in the first place & forcing me to come up with a cool idea like this.
  • DJ Tech Tools: For letting me show you this through their networks.