Mark Mosher at Modulate This! has announced the release of Outpost: Airlock, a free collection of sounds for Zebralette and Zebra 2 by u-he.
OUTPOST: AIRLOCK is a soundset made up of patches for U-HE’s free freeware synthesizer Zebralette. The patches will also load into Zebra 2.
This themed soundset picks up where “Sounds from a Distant Outpost” soundset left off (which has been downloaded over 2500 times to date) and again takes place at the fictional dark and distant “outpost”. This outpost exists in the same “signals universe” as my two albums REBOOT and I HEAR YOUR SIGNALS.
The 12 patches in this soundset will help you experience the journey through the airlock which connects the outer ring of the outpost to the first inner chamber. You might hear creatures along the way so stay alert.
Outpost: Airlock is now available to download from Modulate This! at no cost.
An interactive architectural mapping. Fete des Lumieres / Lyon / France / 2010
A mapping by 1024 Architecture, projected on the facade of former Lyrical theater the “Celestins”. The building deformations and figures were controlled by the audience, using a microphone and an audio analysis algorythm.
The official Tenori on iOS app enter the app store the other week but at £12 I was a little hesitant to buy it. After a little thought and a bit of googling I decided it was indeed worth the price.
The cheapest hardware Tenori-On (the TNR-O) is roughly £500 where as the current price of the iPad 2 is £499 (cheapest wifi only model) so considering that both the devices are pretty much exactly the same price (and I already own an iPad) it makes sence to get the iOS version.
Mark Mosher shares some info on the Aalto semi-modular software synth.
Peter Kirn over at Create Digital Music did a post on a new synth by Madrona Labs last month. Even though I wasn’t in the market for a new synth right now I ended up buying this Aalto within an hour or so of downloading the demo so I wanted to pass this along and help promote Madrona’s great work. At $99 this is an incredible value.
You’ve heard the gripes, and heard and seen the somewhat unscientific demos. Now it’s time to examine the over-compression of music with – science! Earl Vickers of STMicroelectronics examines the Loudness Wars in an academic paper, as noted to us by reader photohounds.
Peter at Create Digital Music: Chicago-based hacker and synthesist Matt Heins is working on an open source synth kit. As a co-creator of the MeeBlip open source-synth hardware, I’m biased — I want more open synth hardware! So this is looking like some great company. The instrument is 8-bit, with analog filter circuitry, coded in C.
Percussa has released MIDIBridge2 r31, an update to the application for AudioCubes which generates MIDI notes and control changes that can be sent to any software or hardware supporting MIDI.
Mark Mosher found a very important bug to be fixed in MIDIBridge where the preset file loaded would not properly update the AudioCubes state. This has now been fixed. A big thank you to Mark! Check out his blog and work at modulatethis.com and his recent 9BOX template system for AudioCubes and Ableton Live at http://9box.modulatethis.com/
Besides this bug there are countless other improvements, one of the most visible is the SOLO checkbox which can be used to send the distance info as a MIDI control change only for the selected cube face. This is handy if you want to quickly MIDI-map a cube face to an effect parameter in Ableton Live for example.
The update is available from the the downloads section at Percussa.
Tracks like a zombie, but kicks like a mule – my first taste of yellow.
As Metasonix own video makes hilariously clear, you're never going to play Switched on Bach with the R54. Feed the Supermodule with the appropriate combination of CVs, however, and you can coax deep drums, watery plops, rubber basslines and tortured-animal sounds from this unruly, tube-based VCF/ VCO.
What can a new digital synth be in 2011? How will it work and sound? And given access to so many excellent tools, how can it stand apart?
In place of a press release and some marketing-speak, developer Christopher Penrose (Leisuresonic, Cosmovox) sent us an extended essay explaining his thinking behind his imminent SynthTronica synth for the iPad. Aside from getting into the nitty-gritty technical details, it cuts to the crux of the issue: how to make something personal and new that nonetheless can work for other people, and how that idea can be tailored to a tablet.
SynthTronica for iPad is now available, iTunes link.
More free samples at Waveformless’ Free Sample Friday:
Today's free sample is a single sample of a Tibetan singing bowl. The singing bowl is essentially an inverted bell that is used by Buddhists to accompany meditation or chanting. It can be played either by rolling the padded mallet along the inside rim, or by striking it. The sample I'm providing is of a single strike. It's an extremely long sample that reveals just how this instrument got the name "singing bowl". The note of the strike is an E. 24-bit, 44.1k WAV sample. [6.07 MB]
A little something different this Friday… instead of free samples, today we have 50 free patches for Native Instruments Absynth submitted by reader Alan Stuart. You can download them directly from his website. Thanks, Alan!
# Dustland – Real-time Live performance by Diego Stocco.
"Dustland" is a cinematic sounding improv that I recorded with the Fence Bass. This instrument has a rough and edgy sound since it's all made of metal, so I imagined a piece that could work in a modern Western film, I'm a fan of the genre.
Everything is created in real time, no pre-existing loops, additional tracks or post-efx involved. I built a chain of processors in Live that I control with a pedal board, all rhythmic parts and ambiences are derived from whatever sound/noise comes from the Fence Bass. I hope you'll like it!
This animated short by Theodore Ushev is like a whirlwind tour of Russian constructivist art and is filled with visual references to artists of the era, including Vertov, Stenberg, Rodchenko, Lissitsky and Popova.
# Beep-it! – Michael Una's Beep-it! device, an optical theremin.
It outputs a square wave whose pitch is controlled by the amount of light striking a photoresistor. You control the pitch by casting shadows over the light sensor, or by pointing it towards/away from a light source. Flashing lights induce an interesting oscillating effect. A single momentary button turns Beep-it on or off.
There is an 1/4″ output jack for connecting to audio equipment like amplifiers, guitar pedals, recording, etc.
I’ve been a bit “heads down” working on all sorts of fun music projects over the last month and half and of course learning lots of new things along the way. As I work away, I always take a moment to shoot photos.
Short: MIDI-controlled 8-bit digital synthesizer and audio sampler
Long: Device generates several different sounds based on incoming MIDI Note On/Off, Pitch Wheel and Control Change messages. Default waveforms are Sine and Square. An audio sampling function is available to record custom waveform samples that can then be played-back similarly to Sine and Square waveforms (think Impulse Tracker or Scream Tracker or any other tracker from 1997). Audio input is switchable between on-board microphone and external 4-conductor headset jack.
Free sample pack by dubstep forum user Project EX:
A small collection of kicks, recorded and collected by me. No processing on the kicks, just normalized. Will try to make some more samples at some point. Will get it on the sample swap when it's back up.
Mark Mosher has launched the 9 Box Method micro site, an on-line guide and library for Mark’s “9 Box” methodology.
What is the “9 Box” Method? A system developed by electronic music artist and synthesist Mark Mosher that allows for performance, improvisation, and spontaneous tribal jams with music, sound, and light.
9 Box offers a consistent and transportable method that overlays commercially available components such as Ableton Live, and Percussa AudioCubes. It’s also a set of templates and patches that will allow players to spend more time making music and sound than configuring hardware and software.
The first edition of 9 Box will be based on 6 Percussa AudioCubes. After that I’ll be working on a Novation Launchpad editon.
Touchscreens? Good, old-fashioned faders, knobs, and pads? Why not just use what suits the job – especially when you can choose both on the cheap?
Nay-Seven shares some of his latest work with Usine, the brilliant, modular and touch-centric tool for Windows. It’s a futuristic rig that’s also down-to-earth. Touchscreen monitors can be had for around US$300 street, and the Akai LPD8 and Korg nanoKONTROL controllers each figure under a hundred bucks. Usine, the software, is a bargain for its depth at EUR120, and free and educational versions are available.
Nay-Seven: Here a work where i use the sequencer of Usine not to sequence audio or midi but patches : patches appear only when i need them , easy way to have only the controls you need on the screen, i also associate here works with faders and pads via personal patches for lpd8 and nano kontrol and the use of a touchscreen . Made with Usine ( sensomusic.com ) thanks also to Michael Ourednik for his great vst Argotlunar
Here is my 365 days project. Every day I will compose/produce and upload here one drum break in CD quality format. It's simple – use it the way you want it. all files are copyrights free. This is not commercial project but if you like my work click donate button. have fun !
They had fame, reams of money, and fans willing to do wild, unmentionable things just to breathe the same air — but in 1971, LIFE illustrated a different side of rock stars: Just like most of us mere mortals, they came from humble backgrounds, with moms and dads who bragged and worried about them every day. Assigned to take portraits of the artists at home with their sweetly square folks, photographer John Olson traveled everywhere from the suburbs of London to Brooklyn to the San Francisco Bay Area, capturing in his work the love that bridged any cultural divide that may have existed between his subjects. Now, as a special treat for Mother's Day, LIFE.com brings back Olson's nostalgia-inducing photos — check out the awesome '70s decor! — and talks with the photographer himself about his memories of those shoots.
Includes pictures of Frank Zappa, The Jackson Five, Joe Cocker, and more.
It's the weekend! To celebrate, here are 12 snare drum samples that have been distorted in various ways. Some of the distortion on these is so extreme that the transients are pretty much totally sheered off, so if a particular snare doesn't have the oomph you want, try layering it behind an undistorted snare. 12 stereo samples, 24-bits, 1.3 MB.
Writing about and reviewing products is a subject that is brought up in forums and reader correspondence, and it generally follows the same story. Someone has read a magazine, got annoyed because 98% of the products got at least 8/10 ratings and/or a fancy award. Conclusion – the reviewers are in the pockets or the advertisers or simply bribed.
After working in the publishing business as a daily job for many years, I have to say that – sadly – I still haven't met a music technology journalist who drives a BMW or bloating around in a Hummer.
Writers in this genre are not bought, nor incompetent.
Carl brings up some excellent points in this article.
I generally don’t post any reviews of products I really don’t like. I just can’t be bothered to spend time on something really bad… Seems Tom at Waveformless is a different kind of reviewer… (not really of course, just pulling your leg, Tom)
On December 17th, 2010 I released the Sounds from a Distant Outpost FREE Live Pack.
Now, a little over a month later there have been over 1,000 downloads from http://www.outpostexperiment.com/!
The most exciting thing for me is that a two people have REALLY dug into the 12 instruments in the Live Pack and have taken the time to compose tracks using ONLY instruments from this pack.
I’ve attached their two songs plus a third I created below. It’s pretty fantastic that while we didn’t directly collaborate all the works are quite different yet sound they all sound like they are telling stories from the same universe.
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