Resonators are a breed that could use some new life. Let’s not even talk about Ableton Live – use one of the presets in the built-in effect in that software, and any producers are likely to perk up their ears – and turn up their nose. But that’s why it’s nice to see the latest […]

This shouldn’t work. A video full of lasers, mountain ranges inexplicably floating through space, and endless shots of cats should seem a cloying, annoying play for eyeballs. And yet … Can’t … take my eyes … away … somehow. (And I’m a dog person, darnit.) Thank Immo König. The solo director / motion graphics house […]

A dedicated hardware synth just for vintage string sounds is about the last thing you’d expect to make headlines at Europe’s biggest music trade show. But an even bigger surprise: Waldorf’s new Streichfett is pretty delicious. The pun isn’t directly translatable. German speakers use the same word for “bowing” as spreading (as with a knife), […]

“Bastl” is Czech slang that’s roughly equivalent to the maker culture or DIY. And now, from the makers of the glitchy, odd, and wonderful world of Standuino, comes a new granular sampler, a follow-up to a terrific earlier kit. The Bastl crew are showing off the microGranny 2.0 among lots of other new gear here […]

This is what a Monolake live set sounded like in 1999. And in the days before Ableton Live was a finished product, running patterns was a job for self-built software in Max. Robert describes the music thusly: This is a live recording, captured at Ego club in Düsseldorf, June 5 1999. The music has been […]

There is something phenomenal happening in music technology right now. We usually write about the developments in the tools themselves. But if you want to see new things happening, it’s often more about the spread of knowledge around those tools. Watching it evolve is astounding. Focus only on the tools, and the landscape hasn’t changed […]

Dirty, low-fidelity digital sound comes to your shiny, high-fidelity digital device. Yes, WebSID is a beautifully-grungy emulation of the legendary SID synthesis in the Commodore 64. Because it runs in a Web browser, it’s also stupidly-simple to use. On computers, the keys are cleverly mapped to your keyboard, so you can jam by typing. On […]

So much of the world of tool-making for musicians remains the work of impassioned individual developers, making a labor of love. Sinevibes is a perfect example of this kind of fine-crafted software, combining ingenious interface ideas with rich, musical sonic invention. As Ukraine erupted into chaos in recent weeks, I watched the updates from Kiev-based […]

Now we know how an MPC would behave if it were engineered on planet Vulcan. If you’re tired of conventional slicers and step sequencers, Sector turns audio into glitchy, stuttering, elaborate electronic patterns. Sound is fractured into a massive circle, resembling nothing if not some sort of archaic astronomical calendar, as arcing lines connect one […]

There’s not a word yet for visuals as event. We know it when we see it. And we know it in other media. With music, there’s no question when something becomes performative, when the human element is something you can’t subtract. But in electronic visuals, in light and image, the awareness of what is emerging […]