Both but i’m lazy. Finding ways to make loops in ableton that I don’t hate has been at the root of almost every concentrics tape
I’m also keen to use the series to learn: new gear, old/neglected plugins, some mixing technique i read about recently…i try it all
My laziness takes both forms depending on the day
olous, for example, was produced live with minimal changes to the structure or arrangement to interrupt the flow ~ i’m drumming with samples (mpc) straight into a looper (norns)…the norns tape was imported to daw, i then edited it for length and made fx tweaks
sign of laziness? i could never force myself to program drums in a pattern like that so i don’t try, also i refrained from adding more explicit melody to allow listeners to focus on the rhythmic progressions
jcama on the other hand, was 100% in-the-box daw production built with m4l devices on a day i didn’t feel like patching outboard instruments together