Chris of Pixelsumo alerts us to the Beatbox “physical programmable drum machine” at the RCA show in the UK. (see additional commentary at MusicThing) So, is this the future of drum machines? Of course not. An Akai-style sampler has a physical interface, too, and it’s more usable than these. But after a slow start, watch […]

Remember the golden age of HyperCard, when we dreamed of software as something users would create themselves, interactively? The folks at Sibelius, the notation software company, have come up with an Xtra for Macromedia Director MX/2004 that lets you add a full-featured custom sequencer / score editor to your Director apps. You can record from […]

For those of you not on the Cycling `74 mailing list, the future is now: the Lemur touchscreens are on their way. So if you thought this would never be a real product, think again. Cycling tells us that the new machines “are out of the factory” and after final testing will be in San […]

Using conductive inks and ordinary pencils, the CD Sequencer lets you remix CDs right from the packaging. The circuitry is drawn onto printed postcards; the circuitry measures change in resistance created by a pencil. Plug it into the computer via USB, and you’re ready to remix. Cool, but what I’m not clear on is how […]

Breaking news from our knob beat department — remember the Reflex Audio Sonia, which I looked at when it was announced in March? This knob-laden MIDI box is back, it’s shipping, and it’s cheaper: US$109 for 22 user memories, or $129 for 44. There’s no USB, but that shaves more off the price, and you […]

Sorry for the late notice, but just found this myself: tonight 6-8 pm Eastern USA time, you can jam along with other online musicians via the Web-based instrument PitchWeb. Let us know if you try it, because up until moments ago I knew nothing about this. This doubles as a virtual book launch party, to […]

Pierre Hilaire writes: Thank you for taking my e-mail. I am a Recording Engineer who has [Cakewalk] SONAR Producer Edition Software. Can I Master songs on SONAR? I know the ideal mastering tool is Pro Tools, but how about SONAR? This sounded like an important opportunity to correct some common misinformation — namely, that Pro […]

We’re going to need a “Where are they now?” edition for bizarre instrument design projects. Case in point: the Drum Buddy. Reader “fer” writes, succinctly, “wassup with this?” The answer, fer, is wassup indeed. This strange light-powered instrument had its fifteen seconds of fame on the Music Thing blog last summer, but its whereabouts now […]

Good news, Mac fans. The Ecler NUO4 DJ mixer we covered last week in fact has Mac software, according to Ecler. That means you can easily assign the NUO4’s fabulous MIDI-capable knobs to whatever you want. This thing is seriously drool-worthy for Ableton Live and Native Instruments Traktor DJ, among others, so I hope I […]

Artists letting you rethink or destroy their work? You bet — Trent is at it again. When Nine Inch Nails released their single The Hand That Feeds in GarageBand 2.0 format, it was a huge hit. Hundreds of fans posted remixes in the first week after the release. But Windows users — and even GarageBand […]