The just-before-the-holiday-break software updates just keep coming. Next: the evergreen, lifetime-free-updates latest release of the DAW the developer calls FL Studio, and everyone else calls “Fruity Loops.”

You’ve got plenty of off-the-shelf controllers – but what if you want something that’s unique to you? OpenDeck is an affordable, young, Arduino hardware-compatible controller platform for DIYers, and it’s starting to produce some jaw-dropping results.

Arturia made their name emulating classic synths, and then made their name again in hardware synths and handy hardware accessories. But they’re back with an original synthesizer in software. It’s called Pigments, and it mixes vintage and new together. You know, like colors.

We’re coasting to the end of 2018, but Bitwig has managed to squeeze in Studio 2.5, with feature the company says were inspired by or directly requested by users.

You want to play with your music toys together, and instead you wind up unplugging and repatching MIDI. That’s no fun. We wanted to solve this problem for ourselves, without having to trade high performance for low cost or simplicity. The result is MeeBlip cubit.

Musicians don’t just endure technology when it breaks. They embrace the broken. So it’s fitting that Holly Herndon’s team have produced a demonic spawn of machine learning algorithms – and that the results are wonderful.

Kids today. First, they want synth modules with the power of computers but the faceplate of vintage hardware – and get just that. Next, they take for granted the flexibility of patching that virtual systems in software have. Well, enter TUNNELS: “infinite multiple” for your Eurorack.

No studio monitors or headphones are entirely flat. Sonarworks Reference calibrate any studio monitors or headphones with any source. Here’s an explanation of how that works and what the results are like – even if you’re not someone who’s considered calibration before.

Latlaus Sky’s Pythian Drift is a gorgeous ambient concept album, the kind that’s easy to get lost in. The set-up: a probe discovered on Neptune in the 26th Century will communicate with just one woman back on Earth.

From countries across Europe to the USA, migration is at the center of Western politics at the moment. But that raises a question: why aren’t more people who make music, music instruments, and music tech louder about these issues?