It’s easy to forget that all video is illusion, a matter of perspective. In 2013’s Simulacra, Germany-based artist Karina Smigla-Bobinski, images seem to merge directly from light in the eyes of the viewer, pulled from space into being by magnifying glasses suspended from the ceiling. Even an element as basic as focus, then, is game […]

You say you want a resolution? Calendar years may be largely arbitrary deadlines, but arbitrary deadlines can be a boon to creativity. Online community Weekly Beats is again launching a project for producers that invites them to upload new music tracks every week for the year. By the end of 2014, it means each artist […]

Loe Pesci loves his sampler. No, really loves his sampler. (Video omits any NSFW parts, though; you only see smoking in bad afterward.) Lyrics in this number are — well, complex. It seems there was more sampling going on early in the relationship. That didn’t stop AKAI from sharing the video, even if there is […]

DbN – The Found Tapes Project 2014 from DA BOOK on Vimeo. If Auld Lang Syne and predictable “best of” lists are getting you down, here’s likely the weirdest-sounding New Years’ greeting you’ll get, to kick off 2014. Düsseldorf by Night (DbN) improvises strange, creepy-beautiful soundscapes from cassettes. It turns the flea market into a […]

Happy New Year, everyone. We’re taking the day off, but while we’re putting together a year-end review of musical technology and invention, any nominees for stories that fell under the radar, that people might have missed? DIY projects, unique tools, or anything of the sort welcome; we do appreciate your ideas, as always. Let us […]

Robotkid, aka Josh Randall, is the veteran former Creative Director at Harmonix who regularly infused VJ and real-time visual aesthetics into the company’s games (Beatles Rock Band, VibRibbon, etc.). Now, he’s gone to LA, where his passion for the most fantastically colorful trips of the past is feeding new visual fancies. And they’re too good […]

Mixes these days have become almost too common, many of them somewhat random selections of crowd-pleasing tracks, in no particular order. And they tend to be solo endeavors. modernluv, apart from being a duo of two significant stastemakers, is significant in that they’ve put together a real sound. It actually is “sultry” and “dark” and […]

With sounds from Hannes Rasmus to Cosmin TRG, Sofia hand-picks some of the finest production work of the last couple of years – sharply-focused, beautifully-made gems, all.

The LFO – Low Frequency Oscillator – is one of the most fundamental of electronic music elements. Creating a signal that modulates the sound of something else, the LFO has a history that’s roughly as old as sound-making electronic circuits themselves. And yet, there’s still more that can be done with them. Two new LFOs […]

They’re a recent addition to popular OS X live visual app VDMX. But now is the perfect time to talk about the magic of shaders, generally. Standard “fragment shaders” are capable of performing feats of visual wonder as both generators and effects, using geometry and pixels. Written in GLSL, they are portable to any OpenGL-compliant […]