Whitebox Synth Makers has released XY, a free sound pack for Ableton Live.
Freedom from sequencing! This instrument plays on it’s own and in a remarkably realistic way if the samples are chosen carefully. I like to think the selection of eight sounds bundled with this pack do the job.
The rack starts by using Whitebox KEY PAD’s dial idea to mix between two different samples using a tweak on their relative filter frequencies.
The samples chosen here are between 5 and 8 minutes long and are percussion performances from Ableton’s ORCHESTRAL MALLETS PACK. This is a bonus if you don’t have Suite…
Then it adds Max for Live’s frankly AMAZING Device Randomiser on both samples to mess with the playback on start and end points (tweak-able to the nth degree).
The heart of the instrument is turned on when you hit PLAY: an M4L random sequencer (renamed YX here) creates a user-variable random set of midi events. Both samples have very little repetition and have a lot of material to choose from so the overall music produced has an uncannily live quality and non-linear feel.
So hit play and sit back. When it gets on your nerves drop some different sounds in from the clips included… and play along on the keyboard!
The XY Live Pack is a free download (540MB). Requires Live 9 plus Max for Live or Live 9 Suite.
