Pure Paddy Goodness...

Can I get a witness? I’ve been saying since the iPad was first rumored that TouchOSC and its ilk are the “killer apps” for such a device, and tonight I was led in to the light. People, I’m gonna need an a-men for this bitch.

TouchOSC is, of course, what it is, and everyone knows what it is: essentially a JazzMutant Lemur clone for iStuff. And the Launchpad and APC-40 are, obviously, what they are: controllers for Ableton Live. Let’s accept those as immutable facts.

Now we come to the tricky part: TouchOSC can conceivably control Ableton Live, but you’ve got a lot of hoops to jump through, and it’ll never quite be as sexy as an ACP-40, really. Or will it? I took the above screenshot from my iPad running TouchOSC with something called LiveControl. This is a free package consisting of a Python script which interfaces with Live in the same way as a Launchpad or APC-40, a template for TouchOSC (iPhone or iPad), and a listener application that takes the place of Pd or OSCulator.

With this entire package running (it took a couple minutes to configure properly, but wasn’t anything drastic) I’ve got a full clip launching panel with clip names, natch. I’ve also got full channel control, device control, a sequencer, and an X/Y pad. Now, to be clear, it’s a little bit hinky in operation. Sometimes the names don’t update immediately when you load a new song, and the sequencer in particular, while crafty, feels a touch jank-esque, but on the whole, this rig is the motherfucking bomb.

Or, to look at it another way: total cost is $509 and you not only get a full APC-40, but you can also check your email and look at porn, two things the APC-40 is singularly unsuited for. Launchpad: sold. It is totally obviated by this bad boy.

LiveControl page.
TouchOSC page.

Anyhow, I don’t know how I missed this shit. It must have got lost in the deluge of iPad nonsense leading up to, and immediately following, the Launch. Thanks to DJ Twitch for hipping me to this scene.