I had 2 days of meetings making a post very difficult this week, I aim for a Monday review of the past week, so I am a little late! We did get out meet up begun!

NEWS and EVENTS:

Our FIRST meet up is announced: Sunday September 27 2009 at the Walnut Room (Denver) 6:30-9:00 pm FREE EVENT 21+
Here is a link to the event post on our site and a link meetup.org

Thanks for your support – go confirm if you have not already!

The New Deal is making 3 stops in Colorado.  TND is a killer 3 piece House band – 90% improv and on top of my inspiration list. For information goto the band site. The stops are 9/24/2009 @ FT COLLINS, HODI’S HALFNOTE, 9/25/2009 @ BOULDER, FOX THEATRE and 9/26/2009  DENVER, GOTHIC THEATRE.

Friday the 18th – Boulder – Bring your support! VibeSquaD “Joyful Noise” CD Release Party @ The Fox Theater w/ EPROM & S.P.E.C.T.R.E. Tickets

Hope the Monolith Festival was fun for anyone who went.   There were a few acts that seemed like a blast.

CONTENT:

This is cool, possibly only because there are blinking lights! (Arduino based) Stribe 1 Kit + shield + ableton live test from Mudo de Nacimiento on Vimeo. (Note – FFox was having Vimeo issues for me)

Here is a totally off topic article showing the stribe in use for non-musical needs.

Any Brian Eno Fans out there? Here is a Synthopia article with Brian Eno discussing composing.  There are some other great links if you are into this sort of thing.

New video for the Wacom Nextbeat on YouTube.This looks cool, but the video did not sit well with me.  Not my music possibly?

FREE STUFF

Reason Free-ness : For those who have Reason already and just purchased Record, the Record + Reason FX -  a collection (download page) of insert and send effect patches, such as Auto Panning, Vocoder Effects, EQ Sweeps and many other desirable effects not obtainable in Record alone.

Free NOISE.SOFT Industrial VST plugin YouTube Video (sound only). The download is on the home page of NOISE.SOFT.

Baaba Maal Remix competition – we love native tracks.

UPDATES AND UPGRADES

Max For Live Buffer Shuffler video - Cool stuff, moves rather fast.

GEAR WATCH:

I am a Leslie freak (I have a 122 that is mod’ed with speed control (custom UI – shocker I know) using a restored Fender Bassman head (1969).  Now for all you synth-heads out there who have NOT run your favorite analogue synth through a (real) Leslie – it is bliss! So, check out this doo-dad the popped up in from Sweetwater. (approximately 24″ cube that weights 92 lb – ouch)

Heard of Ardour? Well you should.  Floss Weekly gave it an episode. In brief Ardour is Linux based (and OSX)  DAW software.  Yeah, I am part Linux geek.

So I use a TC Electronic Konnect for my rig but this new Focusrite USB break out box looks rather tasty. Also of note is the OctoPre

I just bumped into the genoQs Nemo, a rather interesting sequencing and MIDI device. The genoQs product page shows the product line. This Synthopia article gets to the point rather quickly.

New Novation controller announced : The Nocturn.  I would love to get some feedback on the biuld quality of the unit.  Anyone seen it yet? There are 25 and 49 key versions.  How will this compare to the MPK series? Synthopia post.

This is interesting (via Sweetwater originally) – The Mackie Onyx-i series is taking some steps forward.  This board really changed the landscape on DAW interfacing.  I was really close to getting one, and still might.  Oh, by the way, Mackie is reporting M-Powered compatibility, go to CDM for details

This was the week of Korg announcements.  I have had a bunch of Korg gear over the years and I have always enjoyed the product line.  Here are a few highlights of the new gear:

Korg microSampler : iPod ready (is this good or bad?) KAOSS+ effects included (read the articles for details).  Seems to be a step forward for Korg (like some other releases), check it out, this looks like some fun!
Synthopia article with un-boxing video.

This also looks super cool, thanks Gear Junkies! The next generation of Korg WAVEDRUM is on the way! January 2010 is the delivery date.  Watch this item!

SHOUT OUT:

DJ Shiftee is World DMC DJ Champion.

OFF TOPIC:

The Synth Glove – a modd’ed Nintendo Power Glove.  I get confused watching the video.  I don’t exactly like the music, but i *think* I like the potential.

Well, that is is for now. See you soon and keep tweaking your warp markers.

Create Digital Music has been expanding the breakdown of the Snow Leopard compatibility grid here.

Here’s a few videos on the topic – they are of marginal interest to the music / Ableton world, but insightful to some.

And this one

People are crawling out of the rocks for this release.

Is it the low price tag?

Is it recession boredom?

Hard to say.

As I mentioned earlier, proceed slowly. Verify that your hardware and software is ready for the upgrade.  Twitter, Facebook, friends, sharpie on the men’s room wall is NOT a reliable source all the time.

With Snow Leopard coming out tomorrow (28aug2009) there are a lot of people nervous.  Here’s the main reason why:

Very few digital audio professionals rune one app or hardware on a (computer) Mac.  A new OS release provides the opportunity for some hardware and software to work on the new OS leaving a patchwork of compatibility seriously hindering performance and work.

So far the big fail is coming from Presous (no compatibility until later October). In the interest of keeping this professional, talk to me directly on my Presonus experience.  Here is a CDM article for more info.

Create Digital Music also has this article compiling the score as the information becomes available.  So far CDM seems to be the most comprehensive coverage on the OS migration from a digital audio perspective.

If you know anything send it through to us or get your comment on in the CDM post(s).

What ever you do – procede carefully – here are a few tips:

• Don’t upgrade right before a gig
• Back up everything
• Know how to roll back
• Contact your hardware / software vendors regarding the new OS
• Test your new gear (I usually run Ableton in the background for 24 hours or more while poking at the CPU with a sharp stick)
• Have a back up plan
• Consult your local pagan computer guild on what you should sacrifice to appease the digital gods in this time of great change

As for Ableton specifically I have already collected varying advice, all from reliable sources.  Here is the link from Ableton (forum), a few notes I will pass along:

• Regarding 8.0.4  : “While Live 8.0.4 may work without problems, we cannot guarantee compatibility yet, as internal tests are still ongoing.We will release a free Live 8 update in the next few weeks which will officially support Mac OS X 10.6″
• What about 7.x? Should work, will lag in testing.
• And what about 64 bit? Coming…not yet.
• What should you do? “If your main concern is stability, we don’t recommend upgrading to 10.6 until compatibility for Live and all of your third-party software and hardware products has been assured by the responsible companies.”

This link will return a search for “Snow Leopard” in the forums.

I am (seriously) not a Mac person.  My little white bastard box stumps me on a regular basis.  It does, however, play Ableton perfectly with almost no downtime.  I will be watching the digital airwaves for news and pass along anything valid to our user group.

Good luck everyone – see you soon.

–Marc