What, Nintendo, a video game company? Naw, CDM continues to gather more and more evidence that what Nintendo really wants to be is interactive performance artists. IGN reports last month Nintendo even staged a live interactive exhibit and music performance in Japan to launch the upcoming Nintendo DS game ElectroPlankton. (Articles, photos, and videos at […]

Color me lazy. I'm perfectly willing to settle for a software solution that lets you hook up PS2 controllers via USB to music, like PSmaX. Not Jeff Hoefs: he had to use Nintendo PowerGloves, PowerPads (mats), and Uforce controllers (infrared), which meant digging into a little DIY serial-to-MIDI conversion and assembly code (see MAKE:Blog for […]

Convincing people to embrace new control methods is hard. Just ask Nintendo. Sure, here at CDM we talk about making music with a graphic tablet input, sock puppets — you love that. But the gaming market is conservative; many still don't get the inclusion of a stylus on the Nintendo DS. And that, friends, has […]

The Nintendo DS is already a model for thinking creatively about handheld interaction, but a game slated for Japanese release called Electroplankton looks to be the most creative yet. It's hard to say exactly what it is — maybe just as confusing even if you do read Japanese — but it appears to be an […]

Triforce is a soft synth from Tweakbench for producing classic Nintendo Entertainment System-style sounds. No gimmicks here: square, triangle, noise oscillator, go to town. The simplicity is beautiful, and the price is free. We've mentioned the superb stuff from Tweakbench before, but this deserves special mention. (via Brad Sucks and Future Boy) Sorry, Macsters: Tweakbench […]

Band Brothers, a Japanese launch title for the new Nintendo DS, looks like just another music game. Press the button for your 'instrument' at the right time, a la a game of Simon, and try to keep in rhythm. What makes Band Brothers unique is its wireless multiplayer, which allows your DS-owning friends (all your […]

It’s snooker champion Steve Davis! It’s a red-hot Eurorack performance! It’s Gaz from SonicState! It’s a new modular label! And it’s even got the BBC’s attention!

WaveTracker is a fun, free tracker for Windows that features wavetable editing, more than 100 instrument macros, and visualization for a glitchy good time. And that brings up the many other free trackers you might try out these days…

There’s no substitute for modular synthesis, patch cords and all. And there’s nothing quite like a classic Nintendo Entertainment System. So? Combine them.

Those Switch Pro, PlayStation4, PlayStation5, and Xbox Xs controllers are just sitting there, waiting to be used as a music input, right? Enter Gamepad Control, the latest Max for Live invention.