We get a little ahead of the curve here, with drool-laden coverage of gear that doesn’t actually exist yet. Here’s what’s now shipping:
Creamware is back with the second of their mini-hardware synths emulated retro classics. This time, it’s I love the 80s: a Prophet 5 emulation they’re calling the Pro-12; see press release on Harmony Central. We’ve heard good stuff from people who got their Minimoog ASB — sorry, “Minimax” — and this looks like a nice, compact, affordable box, too.
Native Instruments is shipping, well, a lot of stuff. The most anticipated of these, Guitar Rig 2 (shown above in a still from their new demo movie, should be hitting stores now, so get ready to rock your computer stompbox. Also shipping is that load of software NI promised us round about AES convention time. It’s I love the 90s time at NI, with a DVD-sized General MIDI library called Bandstand. Traktor DJ 3 just showed up at my doorstep, and B4 II should be hitting. And if all of this Native software is overwhelming you and you just can’t choose, Native has plenty of bundles for you, too.