After a long learning curve I’ve successfully managed to live loop using the “looper” feature of Ableton – I’m using an old midi pedal to send patch changes to midi-ox, which converts them to CC messages so Ableton can respond to them. The features I control via foot include

record / playback / clear / undo / half speed or double speed (both multiple octaves) / reverse / half or double loop length

Of course, this is massively extended using the VST and native audio effects within Ableton, which are virtually unlimited. It’s a very flexible solution and has persuaded me to forsake my EDP rack for a laptop running XP. Touch wood, it’s worked fine so far!

If anyone is interested, I can explain how this is done at greater length. I’m not so savvy with making videos of the screen, so it would be text based.