The Tracker fire sale Polyend is hosting on Reverb may have led some to believe the OG, full-sized Tracker is at the end of its life. Not so, says Polyend – and they’ve got a hefty firmware update to prove it.

The new Push represents a technical leap forward for Ableton, both in terms of its upgradeable, Intel-based standalone architecture and its new pad sensor tech. I got a chance to speak to the folks at Ableton about some of those details, and how the hardware evolved. We also have some early answers for those curious about connecting gear or developing in Max for Live.

Arturia is bringing improvements to every conceivable area of their flagship soft synth. Pigments started off demonstrating Arturia could do more than emulate the past; now it’s starting to look like the polysynth to beat.

The latest book from Cycling ’74 promises to make deep rabbit holes navigable. Its mission: to boldly reveal the algorithms that are typically black boxes, in sound processing and synthesis and computer composition.

Distortion? Already interested. But Dist COLDFIRE goes further, even compared to other recent tools with dual-distortion and modulation. Deep inside, you get a multi-effects toybox with tools for a range of coloration.

It’s incredible this package is free – a full set of fifteen carefully crafted, native-feeling add-ons for Ableton Live that add everything from bread-and-butter modulation to dub-style effects. It’s a chance to dial in human expression and bring those sessions to life, all driven by probability.

The free browser-based patching environment for visuals cables.gl has one hot summer update. New ray casting and the power to walk around and walk into walls.

The most powerful impact anyone can have in music is not just to find their own voice but to help others find theirs. It means that song echoing across the hills. And across hardware and software, few have shared passion and understanding of DIY musical expression quite like Darwin Grosse.

It’s the perfect follow-up to 1010’s ultra-compact blackbox sampler and bluebox mixer. Now nanobox adds pint-sized synthesis to the range, with ultra-portable granular and wavetable synths – and we’ve got a first review from resident 1010 expert Andreas Roman.

For the year 2022, it’s remarkable how much visual generation is still based on decades-old algorithms. But here’s one to watch – voraciously experimental media artist Robert Henke is into noise as his next jam. That makes it a perfect time to revisit some of the ubiquitous stuff that came before.