[coldtea]

>That said, there must be reasons why Live is sooo popular...?

the clip launching workflow makes it a great file for live sets, improvised electronic (or any other kind of music based on blocks), and so on

very streamlined for easy focus - many DAWs suffer from windows upon windows, in Live it's all (including built-in fx and instruments) in a single, non-MDI window, and all tools, fx, instruments, windows use the same widgets and concepts (not the case in e.g. Logic or Cubase)

automatic (and good) sync-to-tempo for audio, including several manual manipulation options (pitch/tempo/combo/etc)

opinionated fx and built-in instruments tuned to electronic and experimental music (including a full-on built-in version of Max, one of the most popular visual programming environments for building your own fx, instruments, audio/midi processing tools, and so on)