Futuristic iPad Konkreet Performer Get Twisted with MIDI, Even Analog, to Control Everything

Analog synths, meet spacey, abstract touch controls. And Konkreet Labs Performer – the futuristic iPad controller app – meet everything else, including, for those not lucky enough to own racks of modulars, MIDI. Twisted KP is effectively a clever helper app, taking in messages (as OSC) from the brilliant Konkreet Labs Performer iPad app and […]

150 Indie Labels Lose Stock as London Warehouse Burns; Details Emerging, Reports, and Benefits

As has been widely reported, the UK’s largest independent entertainment distributor, PIAS, suffered the complete loss of stock in an enormous warehouse in North London amidst rioting in the neighborhood. Impacted is stock not only in music, but independent film, too. The warehouse is owned by Sony DADC, but the impacted stock is owned by […]

In Detroit’s Ruins, A Look at an Electronic Music Revolution, by Resident Advisor

Against Detroit’s “industrial exoskeleton,” Resident Advisor has a new documentary short film examining Detroit’s musical revival, an electronic cultural phenomenon that brought healing and new life to a city whose economic livelihood had imploded. The film is beautifully shot, and wisely starts with Motown and its connections to the auto industry, not simply with an […]

Eye, Ear, Body Candy: The Pulsing, Geometric AV Worlds of numbercult

Sometimes, to quote Depeche Mode, words are very unnecessary. Instead, lose yourself for a few minutes in the vibrating mathemagical lands of numbercult, audiovisual immersions in which sound and geometry fuse in a strange, abstract dance. Their most recent creation, found via Richard Devine’s prolific Facebook wall and posted earlier this summer, explores an actual […]

Snapshots of Artists, Ableton Live in Performance: Cosmo D on Cello, Erin Barra with Voice + Keys

Cosmo D, in for a demonstration of cello with Ableton. The computer as bandmate is nothing new. It’s just more stable, more powerful, and friendlier than it has been ever before — and that, coupled with growing familiarity, has been making it more commonplace with artists. So just how are artists working with computers onstage […]

What Visual Software Readers Use: Some Clear Favorites, Plenty of Diversity, in Census Results

Two clear frontrunner apps, among a number of superb, popular choices, are pictured here. At top, Resolume Avenue in action, in a photo (CC-BY-SA) Colombia-based artist Otto Nassar. At bottom, Deborah Johnson looks on as Modul8 glows onscreen, in a photo by Jaymis Loveday for CDM. (See that interview on her work with Sufjan Stevens […]

Amon Tobin's ISAM, Behind the Scenes; Ask Your Questions

By now, you’ve likely heard about the eye-popping, three-dimensional architectural live visuals for Amon Tobin’s immersively-transmedia tour ISAM LIVE. It’s clearly a new high water mark in live audiovisual experience. So, how were the visuals done, and who did them? Derivative, the developers and visual collective behind the Touch Designer software that powered the show, […]

Amon Tobin’s ISAM, Behind the Scenes; Ask Your Questions

By now, you’ve likely heard about the eye-popping, three-dimensional architectural live visuals for Amon Tobin’s immersively-transmedia tour ISAM LIVE. It’s clearly a new high water mark in live audiovisual experience. So, how were the visuals done, and who did them? Derivative, the developers and visual collective behind the Touch Designer software that powered the show, […]

It Comes in Colors: An RGB Grid Controller from Livid, RGB Grid Roundup

Lovers of the grid for music control now get to reenact the scene in MGM’s The Wizard of Oz, stepping out of the world of black and white into one of color. The OhmRGB, the latest controller from Austin, Texas-based controller and custom hardware shop Livid Instruments, adds multicolor LEDs behind its array of controls. […]

loopdiver, Dance + Technology Performance by Troika Ranch, in Full-Length PBS Documentary

Watch the full episode. See more loopdiver: The Journey of a Dance. In a recent documentary, US public-supported broadcaster PBS profiles Troika Ranch, the landmark New York dance company that fuses technology and movement. The collaboration of Dawn Stoppiello and Mark Coniglio, Troika has long been influential in finding ways of working with media. Coniglio’s […]