What piece of equipment do you have to show us today?
The Ableton Push (MK1, haven’t got the MK2 into the live show yet).
How did you come across this particular item?
I’m pretty much a professional Ableton nerd, teaching production and running a user group in Melbourne. I borrowed a friends when they first came out and was sold.
What is it that you like so much about it?
It’s quite exible, in that you can control drum rack / one shot type instruments, or pitched melodic parts and access macros for whatever instrument is in focus. It’s sort of replaced a keyboard for me live, and it has lots of other useful studio features like sequencing controls. After I started using it to write a lot, it just became my default instrument.
When has it come in handy most? Do you recall any time this has got you out of a tough spot?
It’s great to take the laptop and Push and a pair of headphones away for the weekend and have lots of flexible hands on control to tinker with. It’s not a small unit but it does a lot. As for tough spots… every piece of tech has some quirks, and its maybe made one or two tough spots of its own. But there’s still nothing like it and nothing I’d rather trade it for.
How do you use it, and how has it shaped the way that you write music?
It’s absolutely changed the way I write music. The easiest thing to point to would be the sequencing mode for drums. Nothing that hasn’t existed before in other forms, but for whatever reason the layout got me thinking about drums differently and trying different rhythms. It made me a fan of interesting broken beats. I’m also a huge proponent of working quickly and I’ve got my work flow with the Push down.
Tell us a little about what you’ve got coming up.
We just released our new EP The Morning After / The Night Before, including our last single ‘Lost In Each Other’ which we just released a video for (a pseudo tour docco of us goofjng off around Australia). We’re taking these new galactic soul break jams to a couple shows including the Moomba festival, visiting Sydney in March and we’re very excited about being a part of the ROAR festival in dubbo in April. And of course we’re always working on new music, so more on that soon.
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