Ekssperimental Sounds Studios analog-style wonders for Reason: hands-on

It’s a portal into a wonderland of retro-inspired gear, all in Reason. Sweden’s own Erik Karl Stephan Söderberg built EKSS as a one-man passion project, building Rack Extensions that ooze personality—that boutique hardware feeling, but all in the box. Come with me down the rabbit hole, including Erik’s fantastic new FreakShift effect and drum step-sequencer.

Pac-Man, Befaco RANDOM8, and more free modules of VCV Rack

Your sequencing gets upgraded — including cameos by Pac-Man and the LOGO turtle. You get even more secret weapons for drum synthesis. You get the hot new RANDOM8 collab from Befaco and Mylar Melodies, cloning their new hardware. There’s just so much goodness in VCV Rack that covering the free stuff has me dizzy. Here’s your June update, with some sound examples.

Peter Kirn - June 18, 2026

With Latent Terrain, crack open AI and explore neural synthesis in Max

“I’m not particularly interested in typing prompts to make stuff, I’m interested in breaking them and dissecting them,” writes Jasper Shuoyang Zheng as he introduces Latent Terrain. Now using an intuitive, elegantly designed open-source Max external and UI, you can play the weird world of neural audio codecs like an instrument, transforming your own sounds into new textures.

Peter Kirn - June 17, 2026

Sequential Prophet-5 gets an official software remake by GForce — tested

Peter Kirn - June 16, 2026

Turn Ableton Push 3 into a single expressive percussive surface, free

Peter Kirn - June 15, 2026

There are already some great uses of Ableton Extensions, and more coming

Peter Kirn - June 12, 2026

Synplant’s new PhenoType tech uses neural nets for more alien patches

Peter Kirn - June 10, 2026

Unfiltered Audio Battalion drum synth, FX in VCV Rack are a revelation

Peter Kirn - June 9, 2026

Chaotic vocals, polyrhythmic grooves — meet the every something plugins

Peter Kirn - June 3, 2026