Note that Max 4 Live is not included in Standard.

Ableton is a great inspiration for software devs. It's stable and efficient, and has amazing undo and file recovery systems. An antidote to Electron and chatbots.

Ableton is pretty unique in focusing on it's namesake "Live" (although Bitwig has clear lineage), and it definitely clicks together well. I think it would pair well with Logic or Cubase if you were doing "serious" work for a variety of reasons. But it is easily one of the better choices for getting started and for ideation.

you’ll need Studio for this, not standard. but i’d recommend Ableton over Logic right now. they are on the cutting edge of DAWs and have been for years.

you might also consider Reaper which is infinity customizable, I personally use both Ableton and Reaper both are fantastic (as is Logic and Renoise which I also sometimes use). Might be worth noting that Max4Live is only included in Ableton Suite not Standard and other but can be added separately.

I have and use both Logic and Ableton Live Suite (which is needed for Max 4 live.) They are both great DAWs, and they can complement each other well. Which one you may prefer comes down to the type of music you create and whether you prefer a traditional linear arrangement style of recording (Logic and Ableton are both strong here, although Logic has a more traditional UI) or a session/live-loops based style of recording (Ableton is much stronger here than Logic IMHO.)

If your budget constrains you to Garage Band -> Logic or Ableton Lite -> Standard, you will get more with the upgrade to Logic, especially if you rely on the instruments/presets that come with the DAW rather than 3rd party plugins. Note that you can't use the Scheme integration unless you buy Ableton Live Suite, which costs considerably more than Logic or Standard.