Windows is getting enough instrument and effect madness for free to make your head spin — a lot of it previously commercial software. Here’s the latest addition: Beatburner, a looping sampler combined with a wave shaper and enveloped filter. In short, Beatburner takes your loops and makes them into sonic insanity. I’ve been playing with […]

It’s no secret: the once wildly-popular ArKaos VJ software has been looking a bit long in the tooth lately. And upgrades only get you so far: sometimes, as software matures in its life cycle, you have to redo the foundations. That’s what ArKaos has been working on, and the results, renamed GrandVJ, are due out […]

The nicely-growing Digital Tools blog has an excellent interview with visualist Paris Treantafeles, who works with lo-fi 8-bit-style visuals using tools he’s built for GBA and the Linux-powered Gamepark. Interestingly, while a lot of people will dismiss the 8-bit movement as “nostalgic” — implying it’s just 20-somethings pining for their Mario-playing childhoods — Paris’ inspiration […]

Good news: the Korg DS-10, a Nintendo DS musical instrument (synth + drum machine + sequencer) based on Korg’s MS-10, is not going to be limited to Japan, despite what the publisher’s website says. From the DS-10 blog: Hi there! my name is Tomi from AQI Inc.and I’ll be in charge of this product for […]

Everyone and their dog seems to be trying to get into the social Web, but Tonium, the folks who built the pricey but slick-looking Pacemaker mobile DJ player, have an interesting take. They’re combining mobile hardware, mixing and media management and software, and social site in one integrated service. It’s a bit like iTunes, Beatport, […]

St. Patrick’s Day always warms my half-Irish heart. The YouTubers are celebrating by watching user PJ TinWhistler doing his best to bang out Irish Jigs on his Nintendo DS. Give him a few moments to warm up, and it’s actually relatively impressive. (As it happens, the DS gamepad isn’t exactly the most ergonomic musical interface, […]

For an increasing number of artists, data is becoming the raw material for creative work. Most of this has focused on visual media, but in the digital space, you can just as easily use sound. Sometimes the results are aesthetic only; sometimes they tell you something about the numbers being sonified. But either way, sound […]

I usually don’t pick up presets and sound libraries on CDM, but this one deserves an exception. Musicrow has built a preset pack for Arturia’s Moog Modular V. That’s the software emulation of the truly modular Moogs — the ones with patch cords — so this gives you what you don’t get out of the […]

This is the new Steinberg control surface. (See the hands-on video at SonicState.) It’s built to integrate out of the box with Cubase 4, which if you’re a Cubase 4 user should be good. You or I might give it a name like “CubaseControl” or something, but Steinberg has seen fit to call it the […]