For many of us, there’s a special pleasure to seeing someone play live – and dancing to someone playing live. And by “live,” I don’t mean “a bunch of your tracks cued up as scenes in Ableton Live or on an Elektron.” I mean genuinely improvised. Electronic dance music naturally lends itself to on-the-spot creation. […]

Touchplates are so in this year. Yes, it’s a testament to the legacy of synthesizer pioneer Don Buchla: electronic musicians evidently long for something new. And the latest is a glimpse of something found in our news tip inbox. It’s called “HYVE” and it’s a hybrid synthesizer, combining a number of ideas about pitch arrangement […]

Okay, we’ve had pirates and Star Wars and cute houses and such. It’s about time synth lovers got the LEGO set they deserve. Andy Grobengieser is a music pro and LEGO enthusiast out of New York, and he’s got one heck of a Minimoog set designed. (Thanks for telling us about this on Twitter, Andy.) […]

Reaktor 6 is a powerful blank canvas that can turn into almost any music tool imaginable. But that much power can be, well, overwhelming. So today, we’re fortunate to have some guides into what that means. Today in Berlin, I’m fortunate to emcee an evening in Berlin featuring both the people who built Reaktor and […]

It’s the instrument that was the first real electronic music product. And it’s the reason we even know the name Bob Moog – as it inspired Moog to go into electronics and the sale of electronic musical instruments. So, when the Theremin is the subject of a video by Bob Moog himself, it’s a big […]

If you’re using Ableton Live, you simply need to know about Sonic Bloom. It’s like a spa-slash-university for your Live-using self: you’ll come out refreshed, smarter, and even a bit better looking. Creator Madeleine Bloom has been busy. The site, at the age of three this month, now has five hundred tips, tutorials, and informational […]

You’re under stress. Trapped in a fluorescent-lit prison of your own making, chained to your desk behind the cold glow of your computer. You dream of being a futuristic cosmonaut-tourist, truly getting away from it all. French-born photographer/filmmaker Diane Drubay has what you need. Her hyperreal, dreamy videos use real seaside footage, warped into acidic […]

It’s the future – this time, for real. Yes, today, the 21st of October 2015, is the destination “future” in the Back to the Future movies. (Photoshopping created some false alarms on other dates.) And that’s time to look back. Ha, remember 1985? An arcane format called “MIDI” was king. (Kids, ask your parents.) The […]

Fans of northern sounds and nordic mythology, cock your ear for another label discovery. Nordanvind is the vinyl imprint of Swedish artist Fjäder. We profile the artist, the label, and then talk to Fjäder herself. Let’s first let her put us in an evocatively occult mood: In the eye of the storm Mithya spears Logos […]

Eventide’s effects over the past four decades have had an enormous reputation – the marketing folks aren’t exaggerating with words like “mainstays” and “classics.” Now, imagine getting basically everything – past, present, and some new stuff – in a bundle of 17 plug-ins for an intro price of US$699. (That price drops to as little […]