[adam]

Most people use the session view - I believe "tab" switches between session and arrangement views. I'm a big fan of the arrangement view...having things layed out in time works well for me...being able to see how two loops are lining up and all that, you can sort of work your transitions in advance. Both have major advantages; experiment and find what works for you.

Also, consider a controller like the BCR-2000. Tremendous value, tons of knobs, and Live makes it ridiculously easy to program. Hit the MIDI learn button, hit the feature you want the knob control, turn the knob. Presto - learned. Having knobs for volume, panning, EQ kill switches, delay sends is super useful.

The other thing that really helps is to build a good template set. For mixing, for instance, I had a template set with a certain number of audio tracks, a three-band EQ on each track, a delay on one send and a reverb on the other, appropriate knobs mapped to them all, etc. Oh, and that MIDI button in the top row has a KEY button near it. Hit it, and you can map keyboard commands to any highlighted button.

Example: hit KEY, then channel 1 on/off, then "a" on your keyboard. Then channel 2 on/off, then "s" on your keyboard. Etc. Now that row of your keyboard a-s-d-f etc gives you mute switches for your channels.

Save all that shit as your template track and you don't have to do it again each session.