OXI ONE MKII is inbound, with preorders about to start. OXI Instruments is taking their packed grid sequencer and adding more of everything, while keeping the compact size. (Missed opportunity not to call this the “one two,” though!)

Hey, kids, look, it’s the Easter Bunny! And listen to the way the beast helps your beautiful song to evolve! Okay, if the folks at Caelum Audio wanted to sell us on their new DynaBit plugin, this isn’t the worst way – especially as even this holiday freebie has some powerful features. They’ve got some other free downloads, too.

Benn Jordan’s latest video proposes a way to fight back when generative AI music services rip off music for their data sets. It’s not ready for prime time yet, but it does offer a window into the wild, wonderful world of adversarial noise poisoning attacks.

Live Mac visual app VDMX6 is now shipping some of the new hotness the developers promised with the transition to Metal for rendering. Apple’s frameworks unlock a ton of visual tricks, from tracking video to color scopes to background removal.

Musician, teacher, and founder of Gaza Birds Singing, Ahmed Abuamsha is collectively our colleague in the international music world as much as he is a voice for his family and community: Ahmed Muin needs support now just to manage drinking water. “What can I do?” Here are some answers.

Manila’s ELEPHANT (aka thatelephantparty) has a collection of curated culture that deserves echoing here. All that, and let’s also spotlight some meaningful music that you almost certainly haven’t heard.

Universal Audio’s Spark subscription (native plug-ins) is on sale for 99 cents for 3 months for new customers through the end of the day Monday the 31st. That seems a good time to check in on the subscription offering, which is on my short list of subscriptions I’d consider. (If you prefer perpetual licenses, though, I’ve got some quick picks on their sale there, too.)

When reality slaps you, slap back. Poly_Chain, aka Kyiv-born multi-talent Sasha Zakrevska, has a pure-fire mix of “bumpy electro” and adrenaline-driving broken beats, a lot of it unreleased (though some of it you can and should buy.) The Choreography and Merriment departments say you’re welcome.

The new Berlin is… London? Today is the opening of SchneidersKeller, the new Denmark Street outpost of the legendary SchneidersLaden, appropriately situated in the basement of Rough Trade. (It broke my hipster dosimeter!) And you’ll like the shopkeepers: the store is opened by our friends Edd Butterworth (London Modular, Sonic State) and Jean-Marcel Fricke (son of Manfred, MFB Berlin).

It’s a great week for free and open-source media tools. Hot on the heals of GIMP 3.0 final, we get Blender 4.4. It’s labeled as focusing on stability, but the Blender contributors have packed a bunch of major animation, video, and UI features in there, too. Now, we can say this is the tool used in Oscar-winning films (Flow).