Our sources tell us some of you have run out to buy Mac OS X Leopard on its debut evening. If so, do be sure to tell us what’s working or what’s breaking. Our initial reports have told us just about all software should be compatible, including plug-ins. Hardware should work too, generally, though we’ve […]

This week on VJ-U, Benton-C Bainbridge interviewed Ray Sweeten, an audio and visual artist who pushes the creative limits of the oscilloscope, creating gorgeous, abstract forms with intense waves of sound. Watch VJ-U episode dvadeset i dva: Applications in cross-modal media

Digidesign has gradually helped Pro Tools users unchain themselves from the bulky interfaces the software once required. (Anyone remember the days of hooking up an entire expansion card chassis to a laptop, back in the day? Yipes!) But until recently, you still needed an Mbox to lug along. The Mbox2 Micro has a novel twist: […]

Ranjit Bhatnagar, aka Moon Milk Labs, sends this crazy video of his robotic Theremin playing away on Patsy. (After the jump, Theremins playing Crazy, the song.) See also the Moonmilk YouTube page for more. Yes, the robot struggles a bit with the Theremin … but then again, so do I. We’ll be getting up close […]

It was inevitable. With the likes of Radiohead doing “donationware”, DRM-free MP3 downloads, someone was bound to follow. (And, in fairness, Radiohead were by no means the first — this is something various artists have been talking about or doing for years. Updated: for some examples of other free albums through music history, see comments […]

For all of you who are considering participating in this weekend’s Circuit Bending Challenge, I thought I’d offer a few tips on getting started and some creative/low-budget ideas. Finding that special device What makes a device bendable? Two words: cheap construction. Most toy musical instruments are made very cheaply and operate on somewhat simple principles […]

We’re aware that we have a site outage on the domains createdigitalmotion.com and createdigitalnoise.com. Thanks for everybody who’s noticing, it really does make us feel loved. We’ve had ongoing performance and reliability issues from the host (site5) on which those domains are located. We’re working now on migrating them off that former host (cdmusic itself […]

So, you thought only Americans would be the target of anti-piracy crackdowns? Think again. Shortly after the raid of popular music torrent swap site oink.cd, British authorities now say they’re looking for a legislative anti-piracy remedy. They’ve got the backing, not surprisingly, of the British record industry, and it seems continental European nations might follow. […]

The classic SM58 vocal mic has stood up to abuse before, but the Scandinavian-based Studio TV takes it to a new level. Photo of another well-used SM58 by Trendwhore, via Flickr. Us Americans are wimps. Scandinavians know how to test music gear. As a metal soundtrack pounds away in the background, a Shure SM58 gets […]

Pirates, caught by pigs? Pigs, walking the plank? Sorry, this is so metaphor-laden I’m stumped. Photo by frogmuseum, via Flickr. PS, the fact that I’ve made this torrent site look so darned cute is not me advocating piracy. It was either that or a dirty pig snout. Several readers have written in to say that […]