Alongside its Pro Tools 10 and HDX unveiling, Avid turned some heads by recently announcing it was replacing its RTAS and TDM formats to a new format called AAX, “Avid Audio eXtension.” Now, your first reaction may not be unbridled enthusiasm, exactly: it seems the last thing users are likely saying is, “yes, please, I’d like a new plug-in format to worry about.” But I wanted to give the engineers at Avid a chance to tell us what they were thinking and why they made the move.

Avid’s product announcements have unfortunately coincided, presumably because of the financial calendar, with unpleasant restructuring and downsizing news, a topic NYC-based audio engineering site SonicScoop takes up. However, I prefer to focus here on the engineering side of what’s happening; we can look at Avid’s business and the changing business landscape another day. (For what it’s worth, I’m not as bleak as SonicScoop about the industry at large – least of all because I think the larger audio market remains healthy, even if Avid has been caught adapting to a new marketplace.)

The picture painted by Avid is one of a smooth transition to AAX. Now, of course, you’d expect them to say that, but I think they do have some specific technical reasons that, even with the change of name, the shift should be friendly to Avid developers. I’ll let them explain, though.

Bobby Lombardi, Senior Pro Tools Product Manager goes into the technical details of what AAX, and what it means for Pro Tools developers and users.

CDM: The main draw appears to be the ability to switch between native and DSP-based processing more easily, correct? From the end user perspective, can you get into specifics on what a user will see and how this will differ from RTAS/TDM?

Bobby: Visually, a user will see that the RTAS/TDM pop-up on the Pro Tools 10 Plug-in header has changed to Native/DSP. The exciting part is what they will hear. In the past, with HD Accel systems using a 24-bit fixed point processing environment, and host-based systems using 32-bit floating point processing, the gain staging could be quite different and produce significantly different results. With the introduction of AAX, sessions that migrate between host-based and DSP-accelerated HDX Pro Tools systems will sound identical.

How much work will it be for developers to migrate from RTAS/TDM to AAX?

Moving from an existing RTAS plug-in to AAX Native is relatively simple. Plus, once a developer has an AAX Native plug-in running, it will take a small amount of development effort to support AAX DSP. In comparison to TDM 56k used with the legacy HD hardware, AAX DSP is much easier to support and developers do not require specialized skills in writing 56k assembly code, so it opens up the opportunity for many developers to create DSP accelerated versions of their plug-ins.

We’ll still see parallel, separate versions of plug-ins for AAX Native and AAX DSP, correct? And some will, as with RTAS, presumably be native-only?

This is really up to the individual developer. Some developers may find it strategic to support one or the other, however Avid’s goal with this new format was to simplify plug-in development and reduce the complexity to support accelerated hardware.

RTAS and TDM are listed as “legacy” formats. Is Avid making any commitment to how long they’ll last?

The RTAS and TDM formats will continue to be supported in the 32-bit versions of Pro Tools but will not be supported once Pro Tools is released as a 64-bit application. The new AAX plug-in format is the bridge to 64-bit plug-ins for the Pro Tools and Media Composer platform.

Avid has expressed a desire to embrace open formats, but why is there still no common, industry-wide plug-in format? (Actually, there may be no good answer to that question, but I feel obligated to ask!)

We absolutely do embrace open platforms because they can open workflows that enhance the user experience. Part of the experience we need to ensure is that it’s stable, integrates well on our control surfaces, and provides a long-term commitment to the customer. For these reasons it’s important that we can design the plug-in architecture. For example, without designing AAX we could never give customers a plug-in environment that supports both DSP accelerated and native Pro Tools systems and ensure they delivered 100% sound parity. We hope that by providing a modernized AAX SDK for plug-in development, developers will find it easier not only to support Avid’s products, but also finding it easier to develop for non-Avid plug-in formats.

Any word on when we’ll see third-party plugs with AAX support?

More developers are coming online each week with their AAX offerings. We had over 25 developers showing over 60 individual AAX plug-ins at the AES tradeshow in NYC last month, and expect to see many more at the upcoming NAMM tradeshow. With the ability to provide all Avid third party developers a optimized development path to DSP-accelerated plug-ins, we do expect to see more DSP-accelerated plug-ins on the new AAX platform than the legacy TDM platform.

Thanks, Bobby. And for one other take, I happened to get to talk to Universal Audio about their transition. UA, given that they have their own DSP platform and support Avid’s rival packages, certainly aren’t dependent in their business on the Avid ecosystem (though you can be sure it makes a big part of their market). Anyway, here’s what they say; I’m guessing other third parties would say something similar, but if you’re a third party reading and wish to comment, please do so, and don’t let the fact that I only have UA here dissuade you.

Lev Perrey, Universal Audio Director of Product Development, responds to CDM:

Universal Audio intends to support AAX Native in conjunction with UAD-2 DSP accelerators ­ exactly like we have just completed with RTAS support in UAD Powered Plug-ins v6. There is no announcement as of yet as to when the transition to AAX will be complete but we are actively developing and committed to the Pro Tools platform. Pro Tools 10 does support RTAS and initial testing with UAD plug-ins shows it to work just like Pro Tools 9.

As for the significance question, for UA moving to AAX Native should be similar to our recent migration to RTAS ­ although it will be easier for us now moving to AAX since we have fully invested in direct Pro Tools development and better understand the Avid SDK.

We’ll continue to follow this story. Thanks to Avid for getting us more details; I know it’s appreciated.

More info:
AAX Audio Plug-ins @ Avid

Apple’s GarageBand music creation and amp simulation on iPad is now also on the company’s handhelds, with iPhone (3GS, 4, 4S) and iPod touch (3rd-generation and better) support. You only have to buy GarageBand once; the app runs on all those platforms, so if you had the iPad version and also own a compatible device, you can automagically add it.

The iPad is definitely the roomier device, so what can you do with the handheld?

• Touch Instruments (pictured here) let you quickly tap out musical ideas.
• Amp and stompbox models work. As I’ve said in the past, that makes the handhelds into usable practice amps or pocket-ready effects boxes.
• Lay down multiple tracks (recording external audio one at a time), and edit in a simplified GarageBand track editor.
• You can still exchange files – up to eight tracks of recorded or generated music – with GarageBand and Logic on your Mac. That makes this a usable pocket sketchpad.

In short, not only does your Mac have little to fear, the notion is that these handheld apps could actually give you added incentive to do production back on the desktop.

Also in this update are features that will be useful to the iPad version, too, but are clearly intended to make the palm-top edition more usable. “Smart Instruments” let you play along with chords – ideal if you can’t quite twist your fingers into strumming positions on your phone. And there’s a historical musical precedent for this, too: think autoharps and frets and capos, musical innovations intended to make playing an idea easier.

If you want a bit more sophistication, the instruments expand to provide features like glissando, Leslie simulation, tuners, and so on.

Our friend Jim Dalrymple of Apple-focused tech site The Loop spots other enhancements. If you discovered the previous version frustratingly didn’t let you change keys without transposing audio, or didn’t let you set 3/4 or 6/8 time signatures (“do I hear a waltz?”), those holes have been patched – useful in the iPad version, too. Also, you can export to AAC or uncompressed AIFF even without going via GarageBand or Logic, a helpful issue.

US$4.99 new, or free update for existing customers. (Fear not for starving programmers. It turns out that this “Apple” company also makes those “iPhone” and “Mac” things, too.)

But this is all feature talk. What’s impressive to me is the way Apple has boiled down the interface of GarageBand into a smaller space. What’s left is only what is strictly necessary – complete with some photo-realistic imagery, yes, true to Apple’s notion of polish and texture. It makes a stunningly clear and obvious interface design, and that to me is inspiring: not as something I hope other developers will copy, but the kind of clarity I hope they’ll find in their own voice. After all, GarageBand for iOS shares DNA with Logic, not just mobile apps, and therefore a far more complex heritage.

Playing the glass surface of your phone as a musical instrument is likely to be relatively limited – compare a tangible instrument, which feels fun to play. But as a sketchpad, and as a pocket reduction of other things, this has appeal.

Images courtesy Apple. (Check out high-resolution versions.)

Apple App Store Link

Instruments like the Theremin may be trying to shake off their association with fear, dread, and the unnatural. But the synthesizer has no such concern: after all, the Moog is pretty much a rock star, literally. So, for anyone fiddling around with the Animoog – hopefully including iPad owners who are newer to synthesis – you can now grab a bunch of presets to provide the perfect sonic accompaniment to this Halloween. The sounds are the work of synthesist/sound designers Drew Neumann and Kevin Lamb.

And as if the app, currently on sale for $.99, weren’t already a steal for people who already have the iPad, the presets are free. Just move quickly: the price jumps to US$29.99 on November 18.

An email registration is required.
Halloween Sound Set Download
Animoog product page

Of course, what would also be a lot of fun would be some sort of proximity sensor for your app, for use at a party… okay, we have a few hours left if anyone can wire up the Arduino hardware link on Android or the camera on the iPhone or the motion sensor or … something. Go!

Got other Halloweeny news for us? Let us know!

Installation instructions from Moog (by popular demand):

1. Download the Halloween Sound Set and un-zip the file.
2. Connect your iPad (with Animoog installed) to your computer.
3. Launch iTunes and select the iPad in the devices list.
4. Select the “Apps” tab for the iPad.
5. Scroll down to “Animoog File Sharing,” and click “Add.”
6. Select all the files in the Animoog Halloween folder you just un-zipped.
7. Launch Animoog and select “Import Presets” from the settings tab.

That also demonstrates how you could share other presets.

Cycling ’74′s Max 6 is now available. See our previous previews:
For Home-brewing Music Tools Graphically, Perhaps the Biggest Single Update Yet [Create Digital Music]
In Max 6, Big Banner 3D + Animation Features for Jitter, Alongside Usability Improvements [Create Digital Motion]

Along with the release comes an updated site, which does a really nice job of presenting different applications, from sound to physical computing to visuals and show control:
http://cycling74.com/products/max/

Pricing details:
US$399 retail (Max 6, now includes Jitter at last)
US$199 Max 6 upgrade
US$249 discounted bundle of Max 6 upgrade + Gen
Academic discounts, including a new annual subscription plan for institutions

Those academic plans finally cover a year instead of 9 months, just in case you want to patch through your summer break.

Gen is the set of low-level objects that allow you to create more sophisticated tools from scratch without coding externals. I’m a little sad to see it priced separately, even if it makes sense from a business perspective, in that users of Gen won’t be able to easily distribute their work to the rest of the user base. Scratch that – yes, they will; they just won’t be able to edit them. So that’s a good compromise! See the upgrade FAQ.

That said, for anyone thinking gen~ is comparable to Reaktor’s Core, here’s a good explanation:
Comparing gen and Reaktor core level [Cycling '74 forums]

(It certainly is in terms of goals, but the way it behaves is very different.)

Max for Live users…

So, what if you’re using Max for Live? Now that Max 6 is available, Max for Live incorporates the new release – if you have a separate license for Max 6. That should be especially useful to Jitter users, who will get all the new Max 6 stuff and a full-featured copy of Jitter that’s otherwise lacking in Max for Live alone.

If you have only Max for Live and not a separate copy of Max, for now, you’ll continue to use Max 5, until an updated Max for Live is available. (When that happens, we’ll be sure to carry the news.)

Of course, dropping in Max 6 may cause compatibility problems, so France-based Julien Bayle has a tip at top on how to switch between your licensed copies of Max 5 and Max 6:

Switching Max5/Max6 inside Ableton Live (max002) [Design the Media; see video, top]

Of course, the good news here is, if you want to use the new Max with Max for Live, you can.

Image-Line are quick to attach lots of disclaimers about when the work will be ready, but a teaser video demonstrates they have builds of their FL Studio Mobile software running on Android devices. It looks like a particularly good match for tablets, and is the latest indication that their may finally be a horse race in tablets for music. (Insert more disclaimers here.)

The phrase “low latency” is likely to make prick up some ears. No computer is “zero latency”; digital systems introduce some delay from recording to playback. The quality of the user experience, therefore, is having things happen without too much latency, whether it’s when sounds from a microphone or line input are processed or when a touch event or MIDI input results in a sound. iOS at least puts that latency in the acceptable range. Android devices, meanwhile, have earned complaints. Some of these issues appear to have to do with the way the platform itself works, in scheduling and the hardware abstraction layer, whereas other challenges arise from the variety (and, let’s face it, inconsistent quality) of Android’s various devices.

However, there are signs that developers might make this situation more manageable. We hear there are changes in Android’s Ice Cream Sandwich release that could impact both the way native access to the audio system and scheduling work; it’s too soon to evaluate those changes, because the OS isn’t done yet. But that leads to the other important development: Android developers are beginning to test performance across devices for some harder numbers. Those kinds of tests could benefit from easy software distribution and the (relatively) open source nature of the operating system — or at least, to be fair, from freely distributing genuinely free-software apps for testing. It’s also worth saying that not all applications require low latency, or, indeed, concern themselves with input-to-output latency. (Not all apps use an audio input.)

It’s not yet clear what Image-Line’s own “low latency” engine is about, but it’ll be interesting to watch. First promised in June, at least, it seems Image-Line is making some headway. More details:
http://www.image-line.com/documents/android.html

I’m still far, far from being able to recommend purchasing an Android device for use with music – iOS wins handily. But developers naturally want to look ahead, beyond the present situation to what might be possible in the near future, especially since they’re the ones making the apps. And there, the picture is worth examination.

If you just want to fire up Renoise, the modern tracker/music production app, and not worry about the fact that its innards are hackable, you can. But for a reason why you might at least want to explore customization of this music tool, give the video above a look. It starts sleepy and slow … and then, part of the way through, as creator Dac Chartrand starts demoing the tool, something really special happens. (Anyway, that’s what I think. See if you agree.)

Dac explains his work, completed at the recent Montreal Music Hackday:

My Renoise hack was Grid Pie. One of the new trends in our community is the concept of a meta-interface. In essence, programmers use the Lua API to transform Renoise into something else, hide the Renoise window, and work with hardware interfaces connected to their own scripts. Three current examples: MPE, Step Sequencer Lauflicht and Duplex. Grid Pie is “yet another meta interface.” It turns Renoise into a live performance audio recombination machine. Still in alpha, but people were into the demo I gave. I got a lot of handshakes and positive feedback.

It’s an alpha, so your mileage may vary, but I’ll bet this whets some appetites for people who hadn’t yet realized the power of the Renoise API.

http://wiki.musichackday.org/index.php?title=Grid_Pie

Ed.: Hacking Web databases to search sounds, remixing tools to automatically create dub tunes, cameras to sequence and analyze images in new ways, Montréal hackers have been busy. Trevor Knight writes from the event with full coverage from Canada, latest outpost of this global music coding phenomenon:

Music Hack Day made its first appearance in Canada at the end of September, painting the event with a Montréal flavour, complete with bilingualism, Montréal-style bagels, and even an appearance of Stephen Harper in a hack. Over the Saturday-Sunday event, musicians, programmers, and hackers scramble to create any sort of new music project.

With the help of dozens of laptops, gallons of coffee, several APIs and staff from such companies as The Echonest, Soundcloud, and Grooveshark, the assembled hackers churned out and presented 24 hacks in 24 hours.

Bruno Angeles took home first prize for his hack, FaCeQuencer, which uses computer vision and a webcam to control a squencer/looper and at the same time, outfit the user appropriately to the style of music.

Free Assembly, the hack from Graham Boyes, took second prize and recreates a target sound using a database of samples. It uses The Echonest Remix API for the analysis and finds target sounds sourced using Freesound.org’s API. The power of this hack was clear when Graham demonstrated using a drum and bass track as the target sound and a recording of a dog playing in water as the sample.

With a heavy presence of students and researchers from the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Music Media Technology (CIRMMT) and McGill University, several of the hacks incorporated data-mining. For example, David Weigl, Hannah Robertson, and Andrew Hankinson created wuzhear, a venue-based database of historical concerts in Montreal from the Montreal Jazz Festival website and last.fm’s API, including set information and playable with a Grooveshark widget.

The Wub Machine 2.0, from Peter Sobot, automatically creates Dub or Electrohouse remixes of an audio sample, while The Beatbox Machine allows one to record beatboxing and return a drum sequence replaced with actual drum samples.

For a complete list of hacks, check out http://wiki.musichackday.org/index.php?title=Montreal_2011_Hacks

Now that Canada has tasted the sweet Music Hack Day nectar, there’s already buzz for a hack day in Toronto.

Dac Chartrand (Renoise) writes with more details. Dac has his own set of hacks, but I’m excited enough about it that I’ll put that in a separate post -PK:

Other "Renoisers" were on site, but used the 24 hour session to try new ideas, but not present them. For example Steve Sinclair (Radarsat1) tried to port Mark Zadel’s Different Strokes to Android. Different Strokes resembles a freehand drawing application. The drawn strokes create animated figures whose motion is mapped to sample playback. The musician performs by assembling networks of strokes live, generating audio patterns. Steve got drawing and particles working but not enough time to hook into the Android audio subsystem, so he didn’t bother presenting.

Longtime CDM readers Studioimaginaire were also on site hacking away at their multi-touch table. They were there the full two days but also didn’t bother presenting. I tried to talk them into it several times, saying that the crowd would obviously vote for them just on cool factor alone and that they would walk away with a prize, but they stuck to their principles. Something to be said about the vibe of the event. Hackers were there to have fun.

David Viens of Plogue made am appearance for the demo session Sunday afternoon.

Good times had by all.

Why DIY, anyway? As we prepare for a special Handmade Music afternoon hosted by Amsterdam’s STEIM research center, my co-curator Takuro Mizuta Lippit (dj sniff) asked me to answer that question. Here’s what I wrote for STEIM’s international Patterns and Pleasure festival.

“Do it yourself.”

In the world reshaped by recording, in which music is ubiqiutously available on demand and even bare-bones DJing qualifies as “live” entertainment, the act of just making music surely qualifies as “DIY.” Add the fact that distribution, promotion, and booking of music often falls increasingly on the artists themselves, and it’s hard to see any part of music that isn’t DIY.

So, given all that, what would drive artists to make or modify their own musical tools? One might as well ask why make music in the first place. (Because you can? Because it’s fun? Because it’s the most satisfying way to realize an idea or feeling — often the two together?) I believe some of the separation between “music” and “tools” or “gear” or “technology” is arbitrary. That independence is itself a recording-centric notion, in which musical content as artifact is imagined as independent from how it was made. During the process of production or performance, they’re inseparable. The evolution of musical practice, meanwhile, is intertwined with the technology of playing and representing music. Musical instruments in archaeological records appear alongside the first human tools. Those instruments, like the musical materials themselves, are vessels for expression of human thought. We can make our body an instrument, via percussion or voice, but as with so many other elements of our human life, we extend that body through invention.

When you play an instrument, whether a flute or an interactive music software patch, what you express is mediated both through musical language and the tool. I know as a child, it was what first drew me to music: I could press my fingers to the keys and hear something very much other than what I could produce myself. It’s easy to see the connection to the synthesizer and the computer.

When you want to realize (or discover) new musical and sonic ideas, then, it’s necessary to become involved with the way in which those sounds are produced. As composers for acoustic instruments and voice, you dive into the realms of harmony and rhythm, but also the mechanisms of the instruments and standard and extended techniques. Working with the computer, you employ interfaces — whether simulated knobs or code or graphical representation — to realize your ideas. With electronics, wires and resistors and diodes become compositional. With both, the container you fashion, the handcrafted cases or user interfaces, becomes part of the musical identity you design.

There is no such thing as an instrument built from scratch. To quote Isaac Newton (in words adapted by countless electrical engineers and computer scientists), “if I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” We inherit a great body of knowledge and tooling. Whether a commercial DAW or a modular development environment or the circuit that makes a filter, we connect with the ideas, imagination, and expertise of generations of engineer-artists. Notably, we lost Max Mathews this year, whose lasting legacy, even more than breakthroughs in computer synthesis, may be his influence on decades of students and colleagues in chasing the limitless potential he saw in digital sound. Thought is the greatest technology there is.

I think we can easily become overly worried about the rise of digital tech. Computers and electronics are here, and for all their dangers — misuse and toxic waste being foremost among them — they are fundamentally a compilation of human ideas. If you like people, you’ll like computers and circuits when you get to know them. We can also become overly concerned with “new”; the great implication of the maturity of electronic sound technology to me is that we can begin to go from novelty to repeatability and expertise. That’s not to discount discovery; it’s simply that discovery can’t exist in a void. At the same time, in our appetite for mastery, we can devalue the novice. I’m excited by seeing projects that don’t quite work yet, that are only at the stage of technical demo or proof of concept, because to me it’s seeing the first steps on a path that could lead a musician into years of practice and refinement. It’s seeing the chicken popping out of the egg. Potential is stimulating when you believe it has a future.

Here, designing one’s own instruments is much like learning to play an instrument. You repeat the ideas of others, just as you repeat the sounds of others when you learn a musical scale. You make sounds that, at first, are, well, awful, but that then grow up. Whether arguably innovative or not, you make discoveries that are inherently personal. And the degree of that progression is dependent in large part on learning from others, playing with them and sharing their experience. As people share that experience, in the end there are breakthroughs to the genuinely new. Collective progress is what allows those individual eurekas.

With economies from Amsterdam to New Amsterdam slowing, with growing unfilled demand for the ability to actually make stuff and not just push abstract numbers around, and with technical problems that demand solutions literally to ensure our survival, all those strange noises we make take on a new meaning. Tools and technology enabled our civilization; now we need them to make humanity sustainable. Silly sounds and musicians’ racket and din may seem distant from that. But we can sing this necessity as a song. We can celebrate the spirit of experimentation by making things that make immediate noise. A bridge or a jet plane isn’t a great place for experimentation or on-the-job learning; music is the perfect playground because errors are always okay. If any community could help encourage free innovation in our culture, music is a strong candidate; today’s young synth builder could be tomorrow photo-voltaic breakthrough. And even if not, we’ll make a wonderful noise.

“Open source” and the “Web” are significant tools to make sharing expertise easier, but at the fundamental level, it’s simply “sharing” that matters. And this is where music’s makers and inventors are helping resurrect the principles of music as community. We have to share ideas and sounds to be able to move forward.

We do it ourselves, together.

You’ve seen “pay what you want” pricing for self-released albums on Bandcamp, and independent donationware software. But you certainly haven’t seen it in a major proprietary application like Reason 6. That’s what Swedish developer Propellerhead is doing with their Reason 6 upgrade, with name-your-own-price starting at EUR/USD 1.00, through the end of October. (One, not one hundred. Really. Apologies for embedding what’s essentially an advertisement below, but the video explains it.)

Edit: Readers observe that Reason 2.5 was a free upgrade, which is arguably just as notable as a pay-what-you-will upgrade here.

Now, this isn’t for everyone: it’s the upgrade, not the full product, and it’s only for people who own a copy of Reason and a copy of Record. In effect, what the upgrade does is reward early adopters who purchased Reason and Record Duo or bought Record separately on top of an existing copy of Reason. My feeling was certainly that the two products should have been offered together from the start. Many Reason users complained that they weren’t getting all the new audio recording features (only a sampling feature). And I noted in a review of Record for Macworld that Record didn’t come with everything unless you also bought Reason. The bundling of Reason and Record functionality into a single product called “Reason” to me makes perfect sense, and the deal here reflects that.

For that reason, I wouldn’t go as far as asking, as Jo-Ann at Shocklee does, if this is the future of music software pricing. But it is a big deal, and it proves that more significant names in music software can take some risks. It’s also a nice bargain: remember that Reason 6′s price, reflecting the incorporation of both programs, is effectively what you paid for Reason + Record duo, and that even if you have both, you still get some nice, new effects. (I’ve been playing with them for a few weeks, so expect a write-up on that soon, once I actually sit down and make some real music with them.)

But for me, the bottom line is, it’s nice to see a good idea trump caution in the accounting department.

http://www.propellerheads.se/paywhatyouwant/

Ableton Live fans hungry for sounds, what a good half-year it’s been. AfroDJMac alone has been busy putting together delicious-sounding, versatile racks of virtual Ableton-ready gear. After six months of contributing free downloads and videos – and discovering the use of this kind of generosity as a tool for exposure – he’s come up with some 26 such racks. You can grab them all, but I asked the artist to choose his six favorites out of the bunch:

1. Nintendo Rack- Maybe it’s just nostalgia, but these sounds have so much personality, I love them This rack has been the most popular and has been downloaded more than twice as many times as any other (I blame the CDM feature
Free Weekly Ableton Live Rack #6- “AfroDJMac Nintendo Rack”

2. Vocal Rack and Dub Delay- I first got a good taste of Ableton’s capabilities when I mapped out a more primitive version of this rack to my midi controller. I don’t think I’ve looked at another DAW since.
Free Weekly Ableton Live Rack #12: Vocal Rack and Dub Delay the AfroDJMac Way

3. Super Glitch Machine- I like when things sound broken!
Ableton Rack #23: Super Glitch Machine (part 1)

4. Laptop Feedback Rack- This was the first one I ever released, having no idea if anyone would even care, and to my surprise they did. I really like how this sound starts out pad-like, but decays after a few seconds into something a bit more glitchy and spacey.
Free Weekly Ableton Live Rack #1- “AfroDjMac Laptop Feedback”

5. Broken Bells Rack- Made from xylophone samples playing forwards and backwards simultaneously, in my opinion there is a lot of character in this one. To my surprise however, it has been out-downloaded by most of my other racks.
Free Weekly Ableton Live Rack #10: AfroDJMac Broken Bells Rack

6. AfroDJMac’s Drum Racks- I like this one because it gives a peak into how I treat my drums in my live performances. I got a couple of really nice emails from people expressing how it inspired them, and that to me is the ultimate compliment.
AfroDJMac’s Drum Tracks [Free Weekly Ableton Live Rack #16]

And, to celebrate the half-year anniversary, he’s got a new rack out, as well. Tom of the Waveformless Blog provides samples of the Ensoniq SQ-80 – hardly something we get too much of. Here, you get bits of “the “Hush” preset, as well as a sample of the synth powering down,” all mapped into a sampler. Video below:

Download and more information:
Ableton Live Rack #26: SQ-80 Hush [6 Months of Racks!] [afrodjmac.com]

And all of the free racks:
http://afrodjmac.com/category/free-ableton-instruments/

There have actually been a number of other free downloads this month for Ableton; more on that next week.

Native Instruments reveals some big news for Maschine that’s … well, smaller. A new package has smaller hardware and lower price, with the same full-sized software. And an iOS version lets you use Maschine on iPad or iPhone.

As their drum machine / drum sampler / groove workstation with plug-in hosting and doubling as plug-in matures, and becomes a focus of NI’s production and performance side, things are starting to heat up. And yes, this news comes just as we learn more about an upcoming analog drum machine. It’s a Labor Day full of drum machines.

Shrunken Maschine: Maschine Mikro is, for me, the best news. It’s cheaper than the full Maschine package. It’s smaller and lighter, with a more compact controller. You might expect NI trimmed down the samples set – nope, it’s the same 6 GB ibrary. Or maybe they added a “lite” version of the software – nope, it’s the same, full Maschine version. And you still get full-sized pads. The Maschine pads are some of my favorite currently on the market – controller or otherwise – so that’s quite nice, indeed. You do sacrifice some hands-on control: the Mikro lacks the big, beautiful screens on the full Maschine, and the additional knobs and triggers. The eight macro knobs on the full Maschine are pretty handy, as are dedicated group buttons.

So, why would I think Mikro’s a good idea? Simple: when you’re on the road, or performing live onstage in cramped spaces, the Mikro looks like a winner, and all with the same software and at a lower price. For studio use, the full Maschine is still your best choice. But I’m personally going to switch out to the Mikro, especially because – like many people, I suspect – it’ll ultimately be combined with another controller in my workflow. You can have a closer look at our two product shots from NI and decide for yourself. (Yes, there’s a Maschine Bag, and yes, I was just talking to King Britt about his on-the-go luggage setup with his Maschine, but I’m still partial to smaller and lighter!)

Finger drumming video: NI has also released a promo vid of finger-drumming virtuoso Jeremy Ellis tearing apart their new hardware. It’s supposed to make you want to buy a Mikro, or something, except it may make you feel somewhat … inadequate … with your own finger drumming, instead.

Really Shrunken Maschine: If the Mikro isn’t small enough – say, you’re on the East Coast “Chinatown” Fung Wah bus and don’t really have room for your knees – NI also has a Maschine coming for iOS in October. It seems eminently practical:

• four tracks
• sampling (perhaps the most fun part of having this be mobile)
• “high-quality” effects (no reason that couldn’t just be ported from desktop)
• instrument and drum sounds from the standard Maschine library
• bring back your sketches into the full Maschine and edit them there

I’m only sorry it’s called iMaschine. Oh, well.

Komplete integration: As a footnote to this other news, NI notes that Maschine and Maschine Mikro each now support sound browsing and parameter mapping for instruments and effects in Komplete/Komplete Ultimate – the kind of tactile control originally in Kore, now entirely focused on Maschine.

Bottom line: For lovers of this workstation, it sounds to me like Maschine for iOS on the bus, Maschine software on your MacBook on the plane, Mikro in the hotel room, standard Maschine in the studio.

Maschine product page
Maschine Mikro

If you’re in the LA area, I’m teaching a reasonably beginner-friendly workshop in making musical tools with visual interfaces, using entirely free software (Processing and Pd, on Mac, Windows, Linux, and if you like, Android). It’s this coming Thursday night, September 8 – the perfect way to get back to school! (For me, too…)

I’ll also be sharing some resources as I put them together for that workshop, so wherever you are, keep an eye on CDM soon.

The workshop is US$60, but you’ll leave with the skills you need to make your own music tools and audiovisual creations free, as well as the ability to use JACK to route those straight into hosts like Ableton Live.

We’ll follow up Thursday night’s workshop with a free Pd community patching circle on Sunday (for making patches; it’s a get-together, not a class).

Also, I’ll be at the TRASH_AUDIO-sponsored Synth Meet Saturday afternoon. Hope to see you folks in Southern California at one of these events there.

Full details of the workshop – and please do feel free to post / disseminate / share with people in the area:

Image and Music: Make Your Own Musical Tools, Free, with Processing and Pd
PETER KIRN (createdigitalmusic.com)

Thursday, September 8
7-10pm
US$60 (discounts for members)
Limited space

Sign up in the CrashSpace store

Make your own instrument, sequencer, or effect, then give it a visual interface – not just fake knobs and buttons, but via any picture you desire. Now you can, with two integrated tools, entirely for free. Learn how:

Using Processing, the artist-friendly rapid code “sketching” environment, and Pure Data (Pd), the visual patching tool, we’ll discover how to create custom music creations entirely in free software. Starting with simple projects, you’ll learn how to get up and running to create your own tools, see some of the basics of how to make visual interfaces in Processing and construct musical tools with Pd, as well as how to route audio from these into software you already use like Ableton Live.

Via the new free libpd library for Processing, developed by Peter Kirn and Peter Brinkmann, you can use Pd patches right inside Processing. You create your musical creations – sequencers, drum machines, synths, effects, and so on – using the graphical environment Pd, which uses patch cords to represent the flow of signal through your sonic rigs. (A library of useful building blocks means you can construct all kinds of powerful tools even without much Pd knowledge.) Then, in Processing, you can create graphical interfaces via lightweight code, which can even run on your desktop or even mobile phones and tablets powered by Android. We’ll experiment with some simple two-dimensional and three-dimensional generative graphics for visualizing and playing our instruments, and some useful tools (a synth, a drum machine, a pattern maker, an effect you can use with a mic).

What you’ll need to know: Some basic knowledge of either Pd or Processing – ideally a little of both – is recommended, but not required. If you haven’t worked with them before, you’ll get a crash course in how they work and some sample code and patches. If you have, you’ll learn how to use them in some new ways and pick up some additional tips.

What you’ll need to bring: Definitely bring your computer so you can follow along! This is a hands-on workshop! Mac or Linux recommended. Windows users will be able to at least use Pd and Processing via OSC, and we hope a libpd for Processing build is ready (volunteers accustomed to building Windows software welcome!) We’ll install the software, but if you want to install Pd and Processing ahead of time, go for it.

If you’ve got any questions about the workshop, feel free to ask in comments and I’ll answer.

Sunday, September 11, noon – whenever
Patching Circle, for Pd, Max, AudioMulch, and other patchers
Free, open community patching – bring your project

And Saturday afternoon and Sunday night, while I’m not directly involved, the Synth Meet

Hope to see you at the workshop, in particular!

See you in Los Angeles…

CrashSpace
10526 Venice Boulevard, Culver City, CA
(right on the 3, 33, and 733 buses)