- It feels like it's been ages since Novation released the original Launchpad, their seminal grid controller for Ableton Live. Since its release in 2009, the unassuming little device has been spotted in countless artists' setups, both live and in the studio. It has even served as a springboard to viral popularity for some musicians, Madeon being a prominent example. Despite its raging success, Novation held off from expanding the Launch line for four years, a surprisingly long stretch. Last year they unleashed a barrage of new devices, raising the number of controllers sharing the Launch family name to eight. The latest is the Launch Control XL, a mixer-style MIDI controller with built-in integration for Ableton Live.
The Launch Control XL expands on the original Launch Control design, stretching it so it shares the same dimensions of the LaunchPad S (239 x 239 x 22 mm). Novation suggests that the two can be combined to achieve a new level of hands-on control over Ableton Live. Due to the way Novation achieves their Live integration—with integrated scripts that ship with Live—the Launch Control XL is only supported on version 9.1.3 or later. The obvious downside is that anyone still sticking with older versions of Live won't benefit from the dynamic integration; you can still map it like a normal MIDI controller. It's not all bad news, though—installation on the current version of Live could not be easier. Ableton actually configured itself when it detected the Launch Control XL connected to my system.
Novation's integration for Live is pretty straightforward here: the three rows of knobs and eight 60 mm faders automatically map to control Live's mixer by default. The top two rows of knobs are mapped to the mixer sends, with the ability to control more than two sends via the Send Select arrow buttons off to the right. The third row controls pan by default, and as one might expect, the faders map to Live's volume faders. Sitting below the faders are another two rows of buttons. The first row is locked to a single function: track focus. But the second row can be switched between three different modes, via buttons off to the right. This allows these Track Control buttons to toggle the mute, solo and record-arm buttons for each track within Live, with the multicolored LEDs behind the buttons providing helpful visual cues as to which mode is currently active. (Yellow is mute, green is solo and red is record arm.)
As you might expect, you're not limited to controlling just the first eight tracks within Live. The Track Select left and right buttons on the Launch Control XL allow you to scroll through the Live mixer channels, similar to the way the Launchpad can scroll through the session view. The LEDs on the controller indicate when you've reached the end of the available channels of the current set, but within Live the only visual cue of what's being currently controlled is a small line of text in the status bar at the bottom of the Live window. It would be nice to have the same box outline on the mixer that Live provides for clip navigation—I found myself lost more than once when trying to mix a large set. To be fair, I have to assume that's a limitation on Ableton's side rather than a conscious design decision by Novation.
If the Launch Control XL was released as a dedicated mixer controller only, it would still be a functional (if a bit boring) offering. Thankfully, Novation also built in support for device control via the Device button. This transforms the third row of knobs from controlling pan and puts them on device parameter duty instead, with the LEDs underneath the knobs switching from red to green to indicate this. By default these knobs map to the first eight parameters of the first device on the track that's currently selected within Live. We've already covered how you can select other tracks via the XL, but you can also navigate to select other devices within that track by holding the Device button while using the Track Select buttons. If the selected device has more than eight parameters, you can switch to them by again holding the Device button and then using the Track Control buttons to switch between the banks of parameters for the current device. As you switch between banks, the status bar provides a helpful tip into what type of parameters are in each one. I was pleasantly surprised to see that in many cases for Live's devices, these banks are thoughtfully organized. For example, on Operator the banks include oscillators, filters, filter envelopes, etc.
Overall, this is a rock-solid addition to any Ableton-based studio setup. But how does it fare for live performance? Looking at the Launch Control XL's physical controls in that context, I would much rather be able to reassign those top three rows of knobs to EQ or filter instead of their default sends-and-pan mapping. Doing this requires using the Launch Control's custom template functionality, which in turn sacrifices the power yielded by Novation's controller scripts that allow you to navigate through a set with more than eight channels. Still, it might be possible to hack something together using a Max For Live device like Multimapper to transform the XL's device control knobs into one-knob filters. In any case, I came away satisfied with what Novation put together here. The hardware feels extremely solid, and when combined with the Launchpad, the Launch Control XL gives you an impressive amount of hands-on control for an affordable price.
Ratings:
Cost: 4/5
Build: 5/5
Versatility: 3.5/5
Ease of use: 5/5