Akai MPC Live – Portable, Affordable And Standalone For Live Performances & Studio Sessions

You might have already seen that Akai just announced the new MPC X, but the Japanese company didn’t stop there.
Today it also launched the more affordable and portable MPC Live, the little brother of the MPC X and a sort of standalone follow-up to the MPC Touch.

Starting with the immersive production workflow and performance breakthroughs introduced by the MPC Touch, Akai Professional ratchets up the stakes with MPC Live by adding standalone functionality and a revised feature set empowering musicians, producers and DJs with MPCs unrivalled workflow and reimagined performance capability.

While sharing a similar architecture with the MPC X, the MPC Live adopts a more lightweight approach (smaller screen, much simpler connectivity options, etc.).

At the heart of the new MPC Live is a full-colour 7-inch multi-touch screen, 16 responsive, velocity- and pressure-sensitive RGB pads, four touch-capacitive Q-Link controls and a large, clickable master encoder knob.

Featuring multicore processing technology, 2GB of RAM and an expandable 16GB of on-board storage, Live is as powerful as any MPC that has preceded it.

Thanks to a ultra-portable lightweight footprint (5.5 lbs) and battery powered operation via the internal, rechargeable lithium-ion battery, MPC Live provides an unleashed creative experience honed for expressive live performances and immersive, self-contained production – launch clips with real-time time-stretching; sample, grab, pinch & edit waveforms; program the step sequencer; record, sequence & edit audio/MIDI live; apply XY FX in real-time, and much more directly from MPC Live’s gesture controlled capacitive color screen.

With the MPC Live, seamless integration into production and live performance scenarios is a breeze thanks to a range of conveniently-located studio-grade inputs and outputs. A 2-in/2-out MIDI interface connects to controllers and MIDI compatible sound modules, drum machines and synthesizers – the perfect solution for unprecedented control of outboard equipment using MPCs unrivalled MIDI sequencing capability. Combining two selectable audio inputs (RCA and balanced 1⁄4-ich jack), plus 6 configurable 1⁄4-inch jack outputs, MPC Live connects to virtually all studio and live equipment providing core recording, monitoring and playback functionality.

Powering Live is MPC Software 2.0TM, Akai Professional’s reimagined update of the critically acclaimed MPC software. Capable of running natively on the MPC Live in standalone mode, MPC Software 2.0 can also be run from a Mac or PC as a plugin in all popular DAWs, or as a full-featured standalone application.

In the video below you can see how the new MPC Live handles audio tracks. Using a vocal a cappella, the user tweaks the pitch and tempo of the audio using the new powerful real-time timestretch and pitch-shift algorithm.

Features:

• Also acts as a control surface for MPC 2.0 software, compatible with Mac & PC
• Internal, rechargeable lithium-ion battery
• Selectable inputs: Turntable (RCA) with ground peg and stereo balanced 1⁄4-inch jack
• 6 configurable 1⁄4” balanced jack outputs
• 1/8” headphone output
• Standalone MPC – no computer required – natively powered by MPC Software 2.0
• 7-inch full-colour multi-touch display
• 2 pairs of full-size MIDI inputs and outputs
• 16GB of on-board storage (over 10GB of premium sound content included from leading sound
  designers including CR2, TOOLROOM, Loopmasters, Capsun Pro Audio, and more)
• User-expandable 2.5” SATA drive connector (SSD or HDD)
• 2 USB-A 3.0 slots for thumb drives or MIDI controllers
• SD Card slot for loading samples and projects

Which MPC should you get?
If money and space are not an issue, the MPC X is the way to go. Much more powerful and future-proof in my opinion. Younger producers and live performers might opt for the smaller model though. Especially if they don’t need the plethora of outputs and connectivity options offered by its bigger brother, MPC Live can be a great option.

Price & Availability:
MPC Live will ship with an MSRP of £799.99/$1,199.00 and will be available Q1 2017. For more information, visit akaipro.com.