December, 2004 archive

The 70’s were a rich time for pop music. Heavy metal, disco, punk rock, and electronica all emerged in the decade. It was a time of extreme variety, when Boston had a hit with Long Time, the Cars with Let the Good Times Roll, King Harvest with Dancing in the Moonlight, Chic hit it with […]

Bixonic recently released the Bixonic Expandora EXP-2000R, a reissue of the earlier EXP-2000.
The Expandora has more going for it than a great name. It’s established a reputation as a great source for a variety of distorted sounds. It’s been used by Bush, Megadeth, ZZ Top, Bootsy Collins and other artists.
The EXP-2000R retains the look of […]

Diamond has introduced the Fireburst fuzz pedal. The Fireburst combines thick saturated fuzz with amazing amounts of low-end. A footswitch-able mid-boost eq and pre/post gain circuit turns the Fireburst into a tightly focused distortion pedal.
The fuzz and distortion gain and mid-boost eq circuits are all discrete components, while Diamond uses an audiophile grade opamp for […]

Pro Tone has expanded its line with the Brahma 2-stage op-amp distortion unit.
The Brahma provides an extra boost to your signal creating 2 stages of overdrive. The heart of the Brahma is a high end audio Op-Amp from Analog Devices designed to not color your tone or get noisy when the unit is cranked.
The Brahma […]

Voxengo has updated Analogflux, a suite of PC VST audio processing plug-ins designed to deliver the sounds of the analog days. In the core of these processors, Voxengo has used convolution processing to match the response of the original analog gear. This suite consists of TapeBus, Delay, Impulse, Insert and Chorus plug-ins.
This version update fixes […]

The Edirol PCR1 is an interesting addition to the world of USB MIDI controllers. It is one of a new breed of controllers optimized for mobile music making.
The PCR1 is designed to be very lightweight, and features a supermodel-thin profile. It includes a basic set of MIDI controllers, standard-width piano keys and audio I/O.
With the […]

Synful has announced the availability of Synful Orchestra, a VST/DXi Virtual Software Plugin Synthesizer that achieves exceptional realism and expressivity. Synful Orchestra is based on Synful’s patented Reconstructive Phrase Modeling (RPM) technology.
Synful RPM Technology
Synful Orchestra and RPM are the result of eight years of intensive research. According to Synful CEO, Eric Lindemann, “We have long […]

CreamWare has introduced a new sonic restoration package, REstore, for the SCOPE DSP platform.
REstore is based on the new osirisXP plug-in for the SCOPE platform. It includes a DeClicker, a DeCrackler, and a DeNoiser and provides high-end quality as expected by the audiophiles. REstore directly compares to the best solutions available on the professional market.
osirisXP […]

Drum Spirit is the name of a new release from Sonic Vision, a South African producer of CD sample libraries. The CD is an interesting collection of traditional drum loops, percussive vocal hits and loops, and vocal phrases.
The release features master African percussionist Mabi Gabriel Thobejane, who has traveled the world and toured with Sakhile, […]

IGG Software has introduced Playpod, new podcast software for the Macintosh.
Playpod is an easy-to-use podcast client that lets you browse podcasts, download them and move them automatically to an iPod. PlayPod also has a simple built-in RSS news readers, because Podcast feeds come in XML format and often contain meta-information about the actual media file. […]

Native Instruments has announced that demo versions of XPress Keyboards are now available.
XPress Keyboards is a new series of software instruments combining the sound of three famous vintage keyboards with maximum ease of use and affordability. It includes the B4 XPress vintage organ, the PRO-53 XPress virtual analog synthesizer and the FM7 XPress digital FM […]

One of the most unique releases of 2004 for vintage synth fans is GMedia’s Vintage Synth Trumps, a card game that features 52 classic synths.
GMedia calls Vintage Synth Trumps a deadly serious card game for vintage synth enthusiasts. The deck featuring 52 classic instruments and lets you test your knowledge and settle those arguments once […]

Electrix, best known for their colorful line of analog/digital rack effects, is coming back.
The company shut down several years ago. Since then, several of its products, including the Electrix Repeater, Warpfactory and FilterFactory, have become hot items on eBay.
Per the Electrix site:
We’re excited to announce the re-launch of your favorite effects and sampler mods, and […]

VirSyn has released Cantor 1.5, a completely revised version of their vocal synthesis application.
The upgrade makes it much easier to produce intelligible vocal lines. This is achieved with an improved filter model and a new kind of rule-based phoneme sequencer which adapts the phoneme transitions according to the context inside a word.

Cantor’s main purpose is […]

Edirol has announced Mac OS 9 support for the FA-101, 10×10 FireWire Audio Interface. This driver set includes ASIO2.0, OMS, & FreeMIDI support on Apple computers running Mac OS 9. With OS 9 and OS X support, the FA-101 now offers low-latency, high fidelity, multi-channel audio support to essentially all Mac users.
On Mac OS X, […]