If you want your MTV, you’ve got it back. The Internet Archive and Wayback Machine has restored the archives of MTV News (and VICE, while we’re on the subject) shortly after their corporate overlords nuked everything. It’s a move crucial to research – and pleasantly wasting time online.
Music
In music video, Lebanese duo Rust captures emotions of “Diaspora”
Music October 11, 2024
Go support these Lebanese releases on Bandcamp
Music October 4, 2024
Asheville and southeast USA, we’re thinking of you
Music Music tech September 30, 2024
Power, broken complexity in new Liliane Chlela album, “Anatomy of a Jerk”
There’s always storytelling and throughline in Liliane Chlela’s work, even in the most brutal driving grooves. Anatomy of a Jerk delivers that same narrative clarity and floor-rumbling authority, out on Mexico City’s Infinite Machine imprint.
Free, ultra-deep spectral synth from Steinberg: X-Stream
Here’s still more experimental sound and cinematic soundscape creation for free. X-Stream is a new free monophonic spectral instrument from Steinberg, complete with support for manipulating your own samples.
Inside Cristian Vogel’s ShifterMesh, a multi-effect inspired by Chilean forests
We’ve got ancient Chilean trees, a serial/parallel frequency shifter effect combined with a rich reverb, and a tool you can try in your browser as well as in plug-in form. Let’s talk to acclaimed composer Cristian Vogel about the art and code of NEL ShifterMesh.
1978’s Oberheim OB-1 synth is getting its due; watch this short documentary
The 1978 (or 77, or 79… ish…) Oberheim OB-1 is an underrated gem in Tom Oberheim’s incredible synthesizer legacy. So it’s about time it get its due. Here’s a short documentary by software developer GForce explaining why the OB-1 was such a great instrument.
rr is a free Max for Live gizmo that lets you play Roar with MIDI notes
What’s great? Roar. What’s the best part of Roar? Feedback. What could make it even better? The ability to play it with MIDI notes. Perfect.
Ableton Live 12.1 is in public beta, and it’s a huge release for Live
Live 12.1 just hit public beta, bringing more than you might expect: major Push additions, new ways of working more quickly with keyboards (and screen readers), a new Drum Sampler and pitch tracking and correction device, and more. Oh, and they finally fixed (my) single most annoying omission in Live. Here’s what’s new in Live (I’ll cover Push separately).
Ableton Push with Live 12.1: what’s new in the beta for Push users
A new Live release also means updates for Push, both in standalone and controller modes. At last, that includes macro mapping and macro variations, among other enhancements.
Baby Audio Humanoid review: hard tuning, vocal transformer, wavetables
More then just a vocoder, Baby Audio’s latest effect packs all the hardcore vocal special effects into one. It’s hard tuning meets phase vocoding meets wavetables.
Polyend Tracker Mini 2.0: synth engines, PERC drum synth, more of everything
Right after the major Tracker+ release, Polyend has a big update for the little Mini: now with Synth Engines, PERC drum engine, USB mass storage, more MIDI tracks, and other enhancements. And there’s a big sale on now, this week only.