Creating the ultimate workspace for digital music creation isn't easy. You need the right mood — available liquor cabinet and copious candles lining the piano is always a good start. And you need a great desk and office chair. Right now, I'm thinking about finding a great new, ergonomic chair — see Joy of Tech's […]

Josh Spear writes CDM to point out the Optek Fretlight Guitar. (see Josh's story) It connects to your computer via a single USB cable (pay attention, Gibson) and includes light-up frets to teach you how to play. Light-up teaching frets are a little corny (I'm resisting making a guitar player joke here), but how about […]

Mike from GarageSpin points us to a big story from Microsoft: they've launched a new community site "for the global electronic artist" called Crossfader. It's in beta form, so there's not much there yet, though the focus is clearly on DJs and electronica. There's a section called "The Knowledge" that will eventually have information on […]

Stephen Schleicher has a great tutorial at Digital Media Net for recreating those slick moving arrows in Apple's iPod Shuffle Ad. Basically, you need Adobe After Effects and a working knowledge of paths. See Stephen's site for more AE tutorial goodness. Tutorial Part I Tutorial Part II Which brings up an interesting question — how […]

Prolific plug-in virtuoso Urs Heckmann is bringing his Filterscape bundle (filter + EQ with dynamics + analog synth) to Windows; join in on the beta and Windows users get a special discount (US$89 instead of US$129) before 4/15. (thanks, kvraudio) This is Urs' first outing on Windows, and he's pleased as punch: "I'm very excited […]

ProDAW.com has a huge database of links to online articles, everything from how-to basics to advanced details of signal processing and mastering, plus a healthy selection of music-related links. There's a heavy tilt towards old Electronic Musician articles, though, so, hey, Keyboard gang, let's submit some stories from our glitzy new website. I still love […]

Cover band mania continues: why, now there's even an all-female Devo cover band, called Deva. If you're in New York and need some "dome energizing," check them out Friday night. No audio clips up yet. Just bask in the randomness. Oh, and it turns out the real Devo is still touring.

Neuromixer Pro 0.5 is here for Windows XP and Mac OS X: Load up video, and scratch it like vinyl. Neuromixer Pro features playback speed, range/cue points, forward/reverse, dual video "decks", and real-time MIDI-based manipulations. The new version features: Support for Ms. Pinky (so you can scratch with real vinyl!) Feedback video effect BPM counter […]

Native's soon-to-ship flagship sampler Kontakt 2 wowed audiences at its unveiling earlier this year, but some of its features seemed a little too advanced to be of general appeal — how many of us will really be creating surround-sound patches? If you weren't sold then, Native Instruments is sweetening the deal with an insane collection […]

New Yorker "imagineer and visualnaut" Melissa Ulto, aka VJ Miixxy, is interviewed by Vidvox, developers of GRID and VDMX VJ software. Melissa chats about her latest gigs (Museum of Modern Art, Madame Tassauds Wax Museum, Broadway, The Ramones, and a Pilates vid for MTV enough variety for you?), and her dreamy rig: Edirol V4s, Canon […]