Hacker extraorindaire Gijs Gieskes has turned your local web browser into an insane, glitched-out audiovisual instrument. He writes: Here is a new project, it involves using webcrawlers to make live visuals with music. <http://gieskes.nl/browserjockey/>. works quite o.k. The music is some of my old recordings on mini disc’s i still had.. mostly 2000 till 2003 […]

“Evacuate City-17 at once — if not sooner.” It’s started. Once the domain of big-budget productions, cheap computers (and even open-source tools) now offer more than enough power to enable indie productions to imagine special effects. The remaining gaps: talent and skill. That’s why people actually shouldn’t be surprised that it’s possible to make a […]

Open and DIY doesn’t have to mean you don’t get a finished product. It just means the product can continue to change once you’ve got it – which is the beauty of three new tools coming to the music tech world. Photo: Bug Labs. You buy a box. You unwrap the box. You plug it […]

Plushy soft replicas of beloved synths have become something of a meme. Via our friend atariboy of Plasq fame, here’s the latest addition to the cuddly vintage instrument category on Etsy. Think about what this means, if you will: it’s a synthesizer you can curl up with while you sleep. Now that’s love. (I know […]

As your options multiply, I think there are few excuses in 2009 not to develop using portable, free and open source, multi-platform, mobile-ready platforms — period. We talk a lot about the Java side of the pond, or even C/C++, but the other reality is you have options for just about any job using just […]

David Merrill, working with Jeevan Kalanithi and (for the audio engine) Josh Kopin, wowed audiences at the TED conference with his Siftables interactive blocks. These strike me as what the Audiocubes have tried, sometimes unsuccessfully, to be — physical objects that react to the proximity of other objects, allowing you to manipulate music and media […]

Jesse Terry of Ableton has some detailed answers to questions about the upcoming APC40. It’s a good chance to clear up some confusion (even some confusion of my own). I actually have some other pretty specific questions – how Max for Live will work with the APC and how it integrates with other hardware and […]

Photo CC Brian Talbot. Here in the US, Congressional Democrats have reversed not one but both bad decisions on the role of the arts in the economic stimulus package. Provisions that would have blocked any stimulus funds from reaching arts centers, museums, and theaters have been dropped. (Golf courses and casinos are still in the […]

Before you correct me, this is actually a Commodore B128. But it’s one of the oddities you’ll see at the Personal Computer Museum. What if all the technology you loved, everything that ran on electricity, came to life and played one epic musical performance? That’s about as best as I can sum up the “Emergence” […]

Akai was one of the music manufacturers that stole the show at this year’s NAMM trade conference. The simple reason: the APC is a rare combination of a whole mess of colored buttons with a whole bunch of faders and knobs. Now, the APC’s big selling point is its out-of-box experience with Ableton Live. Contrary […]