Cheap handheld gaming consoles now often pack surprising processing power. But many risk ending up as e-waste. A new open-source project is turning them into powerful Linux music workstations, instead, complete with the ability to run plug-ins—and original games, too. Oh, and the…

This is why you get intimate with code, line by line. Artemiy at Sinevibes obsessed over details, breaking a filter model by rewiring its internal connections -- and now, with v3, giving it precise modulation in a wide variety of shapes. Now, like kids kicking over a sandcastle,…

XEN FX LAB is a follow-up to a software hit (and hardware, before that), adding a modeled spring reverb, strike for "knocking" the virtual tank, and a dub button for adding dub-style throws, plus significant performance optimizations all round. And yeah, it's time for more wild d…

Mouthwashing, the underground psychological horror adventure, helped a slew of new fans discover the joys of Imogen Heap. Now Imogen and the game are back on all current consoles. No excuses: it’s Halloween weekend, and what other title offers “Descend into Madness” as one of its…

As a firm believer in technosolutionism, I am here to tell you, authoritatively, that you need a disembodied glowing hand that creeps around your house and plays spooky music. Not want. Need. Those who do not buy this disembodied hand will surely be left behind, or at least it wi…

What do you get the music synth user who's got everything? Here's what: mutation and generation options that actually lead you into more tweaking, not away from it. Plus goodies from the original Massive and PPG, and some of our favorite NI effects. Massive XL feels like the sequ…

This month, Absynth got two updates that refine its UI and editing navigation, freeing you up to shape your sound. Product designer Hannah Lockwood and Absynth creator Brian Clevinger join us to talk about the work they did on that. I already knew Hannah and Brian were really pas…

The exquisite collaboration of Lawrence Sammour, Sary Moussa, and Abed Kobeissy, Bethlehem, is released this month. And it has become a rich sanctuary, a shared space that refuses erasure or fragmentation. It also refuses to obey the boundaries of colonialism and occupation, weav…

GForce has updated their site, branding, and pricing (now with both lifetime licenses and subscription options). And there are two freebies, time-limited through the end of November: a Mellotron M400 instrument, and the one I suspect most readers will be into, GForce's take on th…

Straight outta Katowice, our friends at D16 Audio Group are celebrating 20 years with an all-new stereo delay: Echolite. And don't let the "lite" in the name deceive you: this all-new giveaway has some power beneath its simple UI. The post Free Friday: D16 is turning 20 and they’…

Roland has one more announcement -- a 1.5 update for its flagship TR-1000 drum machine. That includes note sequencing, a must-requested keyboard mode for playing bass and melodic parts on the gear, the ability to swap patterns and kits with effects on without a hitch, and a lot o…

It's the size of a standard guitar pedal. It needs no power It's... covered in jacks. It's Mulch Box, the first hardware from Go Outside, and it's a stunningly simple idea for signal routing any of your gear, minijack and full-sized jack alike. The post The world is your modular:…

It's not just some extra keys or minor feature tweaks. Arturia's MiniFreak 49 has evolved the range into a synthesizer you can freely explore just by playing, not programming. It's a fusion of tactile experience and sound, right when we need that. Here's a full hands-on test. The…

The kawaii look of the mini Rolands in the Boutique series has returned. There's one vintage remake -- the JUPITER-08, this time with full polyphony and then some (up to 32 voices). And there's something new: the n/vision wavetable synth. The post Baby Roland is back: Boutique JU…

20-year-old Palestinian producer Abed Eyad is making beats from the rubble, surviving amidst genocide. He talks to us about what that's like, what drives his productions, and how to support his music. The post Abed Eyad is making beats in Gaza: interview, call for support appeare…

The myth of Drexciya is getting its moment at the Toronto Biennial, as retold by Underground Resistance. That's free through December 20th if you're in Ontario, but let's kick off a watery weekend with the accompanying playlist, too, courtesy UR and Sumberge label manager Corneli…

teenage engineering, the company that made news for slipping in an interview that it isn’t making new synths (maybe), might also make news for making its synths do new things. There’s an official (not hacked!) firmware update for the op-xy flagship, and it adds a new drum synth,…

No, we do not all want to be reduced to brains in a jar. Music has always been about gesture, whether embodied in the breath or touch. So now is the perfect time for the LinnStrument, the human-scaled expressive grid from Roger Linn. Roger writes to point us to some of the latest…

Okay, class: today's reading includes a short but inspiring passage by Estevan Carlos Benson, who has lately been suggesting we treat our musical listening biome in the same way that we do our gut. Along the way, we get birdsongs and whistle bottles from Ecuador millennia ago and…

Cycling '74 has a surprisingly packed Max 9.2 update out now, with improvements and additions for Jitter, the Web, V8 (JavaScript), buffers, video on Windows, Gen, and the Ableton abl collection. It's a slew of nice stuff for patchers. The post Max 9.2: V8 FFTs, better Windows su…

If you feel at sea in a starless night, Ancient Future might summon charts from the ancestors, fragmented through samples and voltages, a hauntology of modular deconstruction. Bana Haffar, co-founder of Modular on the Spot in LA and Beirut Synthesizer Center in Lebanon, has an es…

What do you do when software is feeling a little, well, disposable? Hardware, for one. Universal Audio has updated its Volt line of USB audio interfaces with built-in processing for preamp tone and dynamics, and on the higher-end models, "smart" displays and extras like ADAT inpu…

Beads, the granular "texture synthesizer" that was Emilie Gillet's follow-up to the legendary Clouds, is now fully open source. That completes the final missing piece in open-source code and free licensing for Mutable Instruments' iconic and influential range of Eurorack modules.…

teenage engineering CEO Jesper Kouthoofd made waves when he casually mentioned he’d told the company he founded to quit making synthesizers. Whatever is coming from the Stockholm company, the jokes they inspire show no signs of abating and -- this seems an opportunity. The post t…

The patterning on butterfly wings is constructed of tiny blade-like scales (lamellar), with color structured into complex messaging and variation. That’s precisely the sonic feeling of Amalgamate, the latest from Shanghai-based artist 33EMYBW. We got to talk to 33 about alienatio…

The granular engine in Baby Audio's HyperWarp can bend time along graphical paths you create with curved and stepped drawing tools. The result: glitches, timbres, and grooves, rhythmic chops, sweeping pitch shifts, rich coloration, and stasis-leak madness when you want it. I've g…

It's time to dig into the archives. I'd seen this before, but it hits differently now. Herbie Hancock jams out in the studio with Quincy Jones in a 1984 film. It's notable for what Herbie says with his music, with his approach to the machines, and with how he thinks about humans.…

Madrona Labs' patchable West Coast synth is one of the most playable, exploration-friendly, unique instruments around -- a piece of software to last. And it comes with a reverb companion, now on Linux, too as a free demo you can beta-test. The big news: Aalto 2 is coming this fal…

Technology keeps asking us to speed up. Pd is happy to let you slow down: tinker, patch, make mistakes, obsess over a number or signal routing, and do it all visually. The free and open source software is getting a nice 0.57 update with new features, relevant to Pd and tools like…

The Novation Launchpad grid has its original lineage in Ableton Live integration. But it's now come to the land of Fruity Loops. FLpad is available in both a standard, velocity-sensitive model and an FLpad mini. For a user base known for shortcuts and speedrunning, can finger-dru…

Far from the cold, hard edges and cookie-cutter music, Anastasia Kristensen is exploring anthropomorphic sound -- and digging up "weird, small nests" of music. It's just the kind of hopeful conversation we need right now. Enter this year's Bestarium Sombre -- and, if you're lucky…

It's time to resurrect 1Uesday, because the single-height 1U Eurorack format is heating up again. We've got some cheap and cheery Koma Elektronik tools -- including some lovely leftfield stuff -- plus a new range from Doepfer. If you've got the case for it, you can put it to good…

We're awash with emulations at the moment, but this one is on another level. The chip that powered everything from Yamaha’s little-known CX5M computer to the best 80s FM synths and video game masterpieces gets a long-awaited (unofficial) rendition on your computer, and it's just…

Oliver Torr is disrupting your sound waves, mangling your Ableton Live tempo (alongside the awesome duo MIRA新伝統), and assembling drum kits out of AI-surfed YouTube chaos. The Glazmo Network founder has been doing deep research into "sonic mythologies," and that includes two tools…

A DECtalk Express stands in for Monty Python actor Michael Palin, with an Intex Talker (Votrax SC-01A) voicing the role of John Cleese. Retro speech synthesis just sounds better. Not more intelligible, necessarily, but absolutely better. And it’s hilarious. Eat your heart out, Tr…

It's a painful year for techno's originators and Detroit. News is spreading today that Sean Tate, aka The Butcher and an iconic techno originator, has died. The post Techno original Sean Tate, aka The Butcher, has died appeared first on CDM Create Digital Music.

Take a break from the surveillance nightmare around us for computer vision that's local, not online, and doing creative, artistic things, instead. Resolume 7.28 adds some powerful Wire nodes and new effects and blends, all powered by vision. Yep, Resolume's removing your backgrou…

Music gearmaker Elektron last week announced it would not allow sharing hacks and modifications for its devices on its official Elektronauts forum or social media channels. In a statement, the company says a sudden surge in firmware hacking, apparently driven at least in part by…

New sound technologies? Sure, okay, I guess. But haunted dolls of the 1890s as made by Thomas Edison? Oh, now you’ve got my attention. So in case you haven’t discovered this before, Tempest Instruments, a “small team” led by TV/film and video game composer Alex Davis, has been co…

In 1976, Suzanne Ciani reported back to the USA’s National Endowment for the Arts with a report on her compositions, in the form of a modular cookbook. Now you can read her notes and follow along using entirely free software, complete with sound examples. I love overusing the coo…

On Friendship Survival Guide, constructed from an archive of loops and sound exchanges, it's as if Jóhann Jóhannsson is alive again. Adam Wiltzie, co-founder of Stars of the Lid and part of A Winged Victory for the Sullen, talks to us about the process, and about the perfect and…

Based on the legendary TB-303, the x0xb0x was an underground legend all its own, one that helped popularize the open-source hardware movement. And now it's back, in a digital emulation of the original hardware, from x0xb0x's original creator. The post x0xb0x, the synth that launc…

MOTU's DP doesn't get a lot of hype -- it just quietly remains a favorite for everything from scoring to post-production. DP12 has deep Dolby Atmos support, an Arrangement Strip, and lots of other welcome additions to this Mac and Windows DAW. The post MOTU DP12 arrives, adding D…

Elgato's Stream Deck, a push-button desktop controller with interactive color keys and software shortcuts, has quietly become an ideal DAW accessory. Take, for example, this thoughtfully designed addition from Granite Coast Studio for the inimitable Cockos Reaper. The post Elgato…

It's Stem Ripper, and its expansion module accomplice, "With Mixer." Patch it up quick, record individual stems, and perform stereo mixing with aux sends, panning, and even external USB MIDI control. And fit it all in 6HP + 8HP, with clever Eurorack modules from ALM/Busy Circuits…

The best 909 Day reveal yesterday was this: on Saturday, Kevin Saunderson, techno originator and one of the Belleville Three, teaches a free workshop on the 909 with Roland (with Dustin Good). You can tune in online, and until tomorrow, there are in-person slots in Detroit, at Wa…

Dirtywave M8 is already superb as hardware, whether you run their pre-made device or build your own "headless" rig. Now, it has its own official iOS app for iPhone and iPad, too, and it looks hot. The post Dirtywave M8 has an official iOS app — a great addition to mobile tracker…

Now this is how to do generative melodies. Add expression. Get control with your hands. Make melodies accessible -- including if you're blind and visually impaired. Sting, the beloved maker of acid melodies and other patterns, is confined to Max for Live no more: now, it's availa…

Ardour 9.8 continues the rapid, detailed development of this free and open-source DAW, with improved session recovery and clip recording, expanded support for controllers and hardware, and an arpeggiator MIDI tool. The 9.8 update also adds scales and keys, but with a twist: unlik…

You're just relaxing by a peaceful campfire. You hear voices in the distance. Then, like a really chatty zombie invasion... they come. And keep coming. It's a 3D user interface for BlueSky, but it says something poetic -- and hilarious -- about the absurdity of social media. The…

"U Get Me"? Yes. Out today, Friday, Loraine James' newest LP It’s Nothing Personal. is the kind of massive, glitchy percussive syncopation I would want to use to break in an excellent, brand new pair of trainers. Then comes deep bass, explosive rhythm, and heart-skipping vocals.…

It Will Take Forever moves through emotions in swells, as if pulling us through feelings. Composed and played live on modular synths from 2023 to 2025 in Beirut, Jad Atoui's work almost sings grief through those electronics, in a world being ripped apart. Behind it, club-sized su…

It's been a long time coming. Audacity, the ubiquitous open-source audio editor now owned by Muse Group, reaches version 4 with a reworked UI and enhanced usability. Here's a look at what's new and a first run. And there is one fork to consider, too. The post Audacity 4, free and…

No, this is not one of the slew of weird new DAWs people just vibe-coded. Lost Robot spent 20,000 hours on this over several years, making a free, graphical DAW in secret. And from deep, sample-accurate performance to a wild, glowing Star Trek-but-it’s-real UI, this is first cont…

Boxcar averagers, used in vintage nuclear test equipment, inspired the latest creation from AI Synthesis. What you get is the AI250 BXR: it's an oscillator, a voltage generator, and an audio mangler all in one. And it's a pathway into DIY modules, even on tight budgets. The post…

What a strange and wonderful bird this is: the Forever Grouse from MONAD comes with its own loudspeaker, banana plugs for patching, and solar panels for power. But maybe you'd rather watch a film about a heron. Or music with some hot dogs. Or set fire to electronics under an inte…

Elastic Melody was already a go-to melody generator for Mac, iPad, and iPhone, with an internal synth engine inspired by the brilliant Dave Smith Evolver and the ability to output to other apps or hardware gear. Now it gains new Pitch and Filter Drive modes, so it can also be you…

Following the success of Time Machine, Olivia Artz has a new idea for playing with temporality in Eurorack modular. Patience is a "lowest" frequency oscillator, setting duration in seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, years ... or decades. It's just launched on Kickstarter. The…

Benji B did this interview in 2017, but it's even more essential in 2026: Mike Banks talks about the meaning behind techno music, with legendary tracks mixed right in. And let's go around the corner to hear from Wajeed and the Underground Music Academy from this summer. The post…

Geert Bevin's terrific MIDI Tape Recorder precisely captures MIDI performances, including MPE, verbatim -- not the slightest variation in sound. v2.0 adds a host of new features, plus a standalone version alongside the existing AUv3 plug-in. It's low-level, direct CoreMIDI captur…