Now in its final hours on Kickstarter, Time Machine is a unique and essential Eurorack rendition of the classic multi-tap delay. And it’s also the project of a growing group of queer inventors, from the co-creator of the original Dark Sky – meaning Olivia is now returning to Kickstarter after 12 years.

We talk about the Mac, but ultimately the Mac was a vehicle for GUIs – icons, mice, scrolling, toolboxes, painting. We talk about the iPhone, but the iPhone turned out to be about mobile photography and apps and touch. Get too hung up on the (very pricey) initial hardware, and you might miss some of the potential of what Apple is doing with what they call spatial computing. And you’ll also miss how some of these threads in interaction design started – as with those other examples – long before Apple.

VCV Rack, the free and open-source host, has added a new illustrated manual for all its free modules. (Free docs, free host, free modules – got it?) It’s a great intro or refresher — those pictures illustrate a lot of concepts that can elude even advanced synthesists. That makes this worth a look whether you’ve got a hardware Eurorack rig or are just getting started in software.

Drift is a friendly, MPE-ready, hardware-inspired synth that’s now included in Live 11.3. Since anyone with Live 11 – even Live Lite users – will get it free, let’s go straight to the source to understand the instrument. We took the chance to talk to Marc Resibois, the instrument’s creator, about how Drift was developed – and get his tips on sound creation and some of the sound features you might otherwise miss.

Okay, forget the vaporware “metaverse” business. You can open a browser tab and use this right now (in beta). Create, build, remix, and code 3D rooms for any kind of fun you imagine. While the big tech platform internet is unraveling, we can all play with stuff like this instead. And it’s kid-friendly – and a way for kids to learn to code (human coding, not AI).

Skating, like music, can be an escape and a DIY means to healing. “No ComplY” is a new compilation from Arabic- and African- region artists benefiting children in Gaza. They’ve just lost their skate park, but there’s hope – and a call for your help.

The pandemic apparently brought together modular house Make Noise, instrument maker Jeff Snyder, and soundhack creator Tom Erbe. Spectral analysis/resynthesis, once just an esoteric software process, is now in a beautiful module. Get your hands on some new sounds.

New gear is great, but how about new life from your existing gear? Arturia’s pint-sized wundersynth just got a huge update: load your own custom user samples, and work with a sampling or one of three different granular engines and random per-key modulation. It’s really about the most fun little synth around.

It’s the other West Coast – but one that until recently got far less play in the broader modular world. Now, the folks at Random*Source are shipping years of work (including the involvement of creator Serge Tcherepnin himself) in a Eurorack module. It’s called the GTO, and behind a simple panel lurks a wild amount of possibilities. Real Serge in Euro. GTFO.

It’s 404 Day – in the more-overlooked of the Roland-themed faux holidays! And what way better to celebrate than with some sound tips from CDM editor-at-large David Abravanel. They add to the evidence that the SP-404MKII is capable of way more than lo-fi beats, just in case you weren’t already among the converted.