How to make electronic music live without a laptop 

Ugh the people commenting about the laptop, I'll just assume they just don't get it. It's just a convenience, it's not a creative part of the process, it's optional.

i think this is what my grandma sees when trying to use my smartphone...

I love your setup. I am a 48 yo female from the US and have been working with keyboards and midi since the 80’s as a hobby. I can tell you that it is SO boring working with music on a computer. I actually used to work for a pretty famous company that made music software, soundcards and midi keyboards (long ago). The owner was involved with writing the midi standard. Everybody at the company thought that keyboards and outboard gear would be dead with computers, but just the opposite has happened. There is no fun to clicking a mouse. For true lovers of keyboards and midi music, they want their hands to be involved with moving with the music (like pressing keys on a keyboard, drum machine, etc.). People spend their money on what makes them happy. And anonymous animal is technically good at what he’s doing. Enjoy making your music, that’s what life is about.

total cost: 3 kidneys

For those saying that he could just do all of this with just a laptop, you are completely missing the point and obviously haven't been making electronic music long enough to understand. Sure, you could make something all on a laptop, but it is so uninspiring and boring clicking on tabs, sorting through too much junk and dialing in endless parameters with a fucking mouse. You don't need all the equipment this guy has, and the gear in this video is some of the cheaper gear you can buy. I use all hardware to create my music, and the only thing ableton is used for in my setup is mixing and arranging after the recording has been done. I used to make music using just software, but my productivity went up 800% after moving to hardware solutions. Software and Hardware are both valid solutions, each with their own pros and cons. The only cons of hardware are the price and limitations, but I would personally consider limitations a pro.

You can have all this digital in a laptop BUT it's so much more fun to do this with hardware

Everyone here complaining about the laptop clearely doesn't know how electronic music production works, and that it is completely optionnal. Thoses complaning that all of this is too expensive and who "can make music on a gameboy" : he never said it was necesary. A single synth is needed, but he uses multiples because more options is great. All of this costs 3500$ new, much less used. He's using the best low to mid range synths, so he's getting a great price/quality ratio. A macbook pro (ew) costs alone 1200-2800$, and good music vsts are in the hundreds. You can spend more on a single Roland synth ;). Point of this vid is to show an analogue hardware setup, not brag. He's obviously a pro, it's his work station, and theses are great hardware choices, which give you a huge amount of live production freedom. Comparing digital to analogue often leads to a dumb conversation sadly. Would you tell a pro harp player with his 15000$ harp that he's a show of for using expensive physical gear when you can get free shitty harp vsts online?

Now show us the barnacles of 9V adaptors that cling to the underside.

Thank you. This video has invigorated some of us "old guys" from the 80's and 90's who love gear, plain and simple. I just invested in the TR8 and TB3, they are not expensive! Let's not forget that these units are considered instruments, which is more than I can say for any laptop I've ever owned, then discarded a couple years later.

Thank you so much for making this video. I'm just starting to get a setup together - Tr-8, Volca Bass with an Ultranova on the way. You have made it simple to understand this language!

The absolute nightmare I've had trying to sync equipment (MC 909 , MicroBrute,TB 3 & Beatstep pro) I've visited many forums and gotten no help and even trawled RU-vid. Yet you have debunked it all for me , thank you x 1,00,000 . I was getting very frustrated. I just came across this video by chance.. Thanks again.

Cool use of your vocal samples. I especially like the up-pitched ones.

Nice hardware setup! Thanks for taking the time to talk about how it's all routed. I need to hook up my Venom and ES-1 again soon.

Now THIS is what I call OBSESSION, why live any other way? I'm inspired to go create something. Subbed.

very cool demo! i've changed my routing of midi and audio many times over the years. I likely spend more time wiring that playing. :/

Excellent set up man! Really good to see and understand how it all works!

this was really helpful thanks man. Ive been looking into using live loops in my set up and this has really inspired me. Id really like to see how you move between songs when doing live sets, unless you just use this for production

How to do it without a laptop. "well, the first thing in the chain is my laptop running Ableton." LOL

great vid! love the midi routing explanation. I had a KP3 and couldn't get the sampling to sync right. as another person said here, it would start to drift. The esx1 is so great for chopping up vocals and spoken word.

I have an ipad with around a grand worth of synths, daws, sequencers , Arturia Pro fabfilter plugins, etc., but your rig makes me want to go hardware ;) . then I remember how fond I am of the portability, reminding me why I love my iPad setup.

Nicely done, I find it very interesting to see how others connect their various systems up!

I've watched this like 5 times already. Excellent vid!!!

great!!!! awesome setup, great configuration! cheers

Man thank you! I was hoping this could be longer!! Very intuitive and Musical, keep on!

i'm always fascinated by this kind of stuff thanks for sharing your method and creative process. its helping me strategize how i'm gonna get around to the music i'm thinking of

Super Sweet and informative. Thanks. I didn't even know what a Kaos Pad was until your video. :) I usually only plug in a synth, drum machine, and sequencer for my songs. It seems pretty simple compared to your amazing set up. Keep up the great videos.

Nice video. Lots of gear to keep track of, too much for my simple mind :) Having synced patterns is amazing. I have played around with that a bit. It's nice to trigger stuff, and have it be perfectly in sync

pretty concise and clear examples of a live hardware setup and use. I use all hardware myself, though I don't use midi at all. Been thinking of making a similar video with my setup, and yours isn't too different from what I had in mind. Thanks for making it.

FN tight dude. The world needs more of this.

"Have a lot of money"

Good to see someone who can use Roland Scatter in a right way!

A very nice explanation of your setup. I like to watch this kind of videos to learn how some people get their results. And that can be quite challenging to understand if it isn't explained. So thanks for that. For me you showed here the practical use of the KP3. Thanks!

Thumbnail: "How to make electronic music live without a laptop" = "How to fly the space shuttle"

like way you have your Korg ESX as the focal point of the setup use to have that myself awesome piece of kit ;)

Solid tutorial for beginner to intermediate. Much appreciated my dude

Oh and the midi routing and chain flow really helps clear things up thanks¡

*"without a laptop"* "we have my laptop over here"

So have you tried the Roland MX-1? What would your setup be? I usually use the KP3 as the midi-clock source so I can scrub out on auto bpm.It would seem that the MX-1 could replace those tiny mixers and one of the kaos pads. It's big though, big foot print.

this right there is art. he is so creative with his effects, it s amazing

Thanks for the video. That sounded great!

When you said "Starting with the top of the midi clock chain we have my LAPTOP over here running Ableton live..." I was about to skip the video right away... luckily I didn't do it!!! Keep up the great work

this is how artists made electronic music back in the 80's

very impress with your musical setup. you are the electronic wizard.

Cheers,ive been leaving them unconnected midi wise and just setting tempos the same.it works really well and havent noticed any tempo drift etc.love your set up,mines based around concept,love having no laptop too!!

dude this is the first video I've watched of yours and I'm in love. what should I get/do first to get in this community?

i use my laptop for midi clock like you and i record into audacity. i run 3 usb>midi cables so its kind of hard to get rid of the pc altogether.

Really enjoyed this video,. Thank you so much for explaining everything so clear made sense and very inspiring. Motivated me to keep on learning my own gear and spark some creativity using similar approach as what you have showed us here,

Very usefull information on routing of both midi and audio, I'm currently running my electribe 2 with clock send to sq1 sequencer cv/ gate to microbrute and sq1 clock to volca bass, with midi clock from my new Octatrack into the tribe, although was toying with the idea of getting a midi master clock to run all devices. loved the live vocal looping with the kaoss pads (again been thinking on getting 1 of these (when i've saved my pennies up that is, lol))

Next one, How to make electronic music with stones...

3:08 "I can side chain it" Is side chaining an effect that is offered by the TR-3 or how do you achieve that with your setup?

Great setup!! Thanks for sharing

Great setup, great video, gave me some ideas to try with my own system. Thanks!

this looks like fun

Titel: "How to make electronic music live WITHOUT a laptop".... 0:24 "We have my laptop over here"....

So cool. Thank you for uploading!

you got it all synch'd up good, pretty good setup for creativity, I kinda go between ableton and a electribe & hard synth setup as well. twiddling knobs is a lot of fun. I like the way you explained your midi out/thru clock setups.

Are you trying to make music or launch a nuke? o_O

as a laptop producer I can only imagine the feeling of having complete control over a setup like that, must be the closest thing to being god there is...

awesome video! very helpful I'm building a midi chain like this, appreciate the info!

Great video and generous of you to share your set up with all of us. Thanks.

This demo was siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiick. So I have 2 questions. 1. Is this totally different from sequencer programs because it is all live 2. Where do you get your voice loops those chant or sounds the voices made. Please lmk with these questions it'd be a biiiiig help.

1st step: spend $10000 on equipment.

Tonight, I'll cry for hours thinking about your configuration because it is fabulous! I'm pretty disappointed with my equipment, so I also have some beautiful machines, but nothing compared to yours! ... It's impressive! You had to pay it a fortune, but it must be worth it, it makes me dream ... Bouhou! I'd be happy to just work one day with your equipment. I guess you had to work hard to offer you all this, so I congratulate you ... and I know what I will dream tonight! (Translated with Google Trad, I'm French)

The setup you presented is very informative and very helpful, I used it for quite a long time, sending the stereo sum through KP3 to TR-8 external ins. HOWEVER :) in this way, the sound looses a lot, because the TR-8 (and KP3+ too) crunches/changes it in it's guts. A far better setup is to get a mixer with 2x FX send (or the Mackie's with 1x FX send & "ALT 3/4") and mix your instruments separately. The quality of sounds greatly increases and you can hear each sound's quality, rather than a bunch of sound compacted & sent as "one pile".

This would be amazing if it wasnt for the worthless loop-funktion in KP3 that drifts as hell. I have tried this myself a couple of times. Epic rig, anyway!

people bitching about how much your stuff costs. I'm a guitarist. An Ibanez Prestige guitar and a Mesa amp with the standard tubescreamer and decimater setup is roughly $3,500.

This was fun to watch, thanks!

really Oldschool! Me too, I love those old devices and i collect them. But I never made a live set like yours. I prefer the editing Track by track. Thank you for sharing this!

stuff like this is great except for one thing - moving it out of the studio to play live - utter hassle - thats why i use a laptop and midi controller now...great fun but breaking it down, transporting it and setting it up only to do the reverse at end of gig is a nightmare....

nice, got it ! now where is the music please?

I'm a huge hardware enthusiast, and for a while I was strictly limited to keep my live set as clean as possible, free of any screens whatsoever. But one day a close friend of mine introduced me to the world of MIDI, and that's where my life changed. Now I use an iPad to control as many synths as I can afford with the ability to program chords, rolls, automated CCs, and a huge universe of possibilities. I've learned that hardware is all about pushing its limitations, but MIDI really opens a realm of possibilities that internal sequencers just can't replicate easily. So to all hardware purists: Try using a laptop once. It's mind-blowing.

Great setup and really helpful stuff thanks

Very cool set-up. 2 Kaoss pad questions. How do you sync the KP3+ sampler to the MIDI clock? I find that even if I have sync enabled (as opposed to just matching the BPM) it seems to drift out of time after 3 or 4 minutes. Secondly, what are your favourite KP3 effects?

This is just AWESOME!

Nicely done, good demo of combining various hardware modules. I date back to a much earlier time, before there were laptops or even personal computers. Much of my time had been spent experimenting with my own home made synth modules . . . and yes, Kraftwork was among my inspirations along the way. What's interesting now is that one can have a fantastic assortment of VSTs on their computer, combined with interactive external hardware . . . the possibilities are endless.

Great talent. Loved the improv!

All that matters is the result really. Aphex Twin said he prefers producing with analogues because it's more organic and has a human touch.

"How to make electronic music live without a laptop"...... firstly here is my laptop

This is completely awesome!

Amazing setup love it mate keep at it :)

u pley keyborb reel gud

6:38 straight from hotline miami

Very nice setup and inspiring !

I don't know anything about this but I love the creative process. I'd like to see this live like an actual band and not that pre-made stuff.

title: without a laptop first sentence: first I send a midi signal from my laptop this does not make sense 😂😂

Just buy a 24/32 track and be creative on each track! From an ageing musician....I repeat....MUSICIAN! 🕶

Awesome set up Loved this

OMG, this is crazy. big thumbs up man!

Step 1 get a shitload of equipment worth more than a laptop

what is the price for all this

Well done! Really great!

interesting workflow with the 2 kaospads!

You are an ELECTRONIC god

A lot of repetitive haterid here. The laptop is just for the bpm, timing. And most likely how he recorded or uploaded the video to try teach you something. Spend 10k? You're laughing. I laugh at you! 10k can be the cost of a studio desk. And that's not even expensive. Hands up, how many of you laughing at the cost and wiring efforts use your dad's laptop that he worked and paid for and are running cracked software cause you're so tight you can't spend 500 - 1000 k on genuine software? Rip off samples online and then sync it on ableton and "produce" your own music on beatport? Do you even know the difference between analogue and digital audio? Yeah, I thought so. It's like calling yourself a dj cause you downloaded some nasty software and 1000'a of tunes and call yourself a dj.. really?? I guess if you scribble on a piece of paper it's cause you're an artist ..right?

Fantastic demonstration.

wow - such a great setup!

well, the title of the video is a little wrong... i know you are not making the sound with the laptop but... you need a laptop, anyway great video

Why the hell do some people work like this when you have a lot more control over everything if using a DAW?!

This is great dude. Clear explanations, appreciate it!

Brilliant setup my man