One of the most visionary products I saw at the NAMM musical-instrument show was DigiTech's Vocalist Live, a footpedal that listens to your guitar playing and automatically generates vocal harmonies. To me, it's a great example of using computer power to make things simpler. (Indeed, one of the most tedious demos I saw at the show was when a demonstrator...
While sifting through photos for tomorrow's NAMM show report, I saw this head-scratcher of a phrase near a pair of headphones: The Real Virtual Reality. The ’phones come from Beyerdynamic, a German company, and are designed to simulate surround sound. What makes them more real, I suppose, is that they rotate the simulated environment as you turn your head, thanks...
Macworld 2007 was busier than I've seen in years, but it didn't feel like a computer show. Indeed, as I squeezed past everything from iPod toilet-paper holders to all manner of cases, bags, and enveloping speakers, I was struck by how many of the products were simply designed to dress up your toy. The ubiquitous music player has become a...
I recently listed my podcast at the iTunes Store and wanted a shorter way to give out the URL. The standard link you get by right-clicking the tile is this monstrosity: http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=207870198 Note that the important part is the last nine characters, the iTunes numeric ID. Apple's Scott Simpson clued me in to this little-known shorter version of the...
People ask some revealing questions when they hear that I review music technology gear. "Do you get to keep it?" "Don't advertisers get better reviews?" "Do manufacturers ever tuck a $100 bill in the box to influence you?" Canadian music journalist Kyle David Paul wondered about these issues and more after reading my article "The Secret Life of a Product...
The report from Project Bar-B-Q 2006 is now online, and its annual predictions are as provocative as ever. Bar-B-Q (I'm on the advisory board) is a four-day conference designed to shape the future of music on computers. Hosted by the Fat Man on a Texas ranch each October, it brings together 50 experts in chip design, music software, game music,...
Brad Fuller's article "Inside Pandora: Web Radio That Listens to You" went behind the scenes of the Internet radio station with the human touch. As Brad explained, Pandora's playlists are shaped by a staff of expert music analysts. Now one of those analysts has launched a podcast that goes inside the music itself. The working title Pandora Podcast is the...
One of the most intimidating audio interfaces for beginners is the conventional mixing board -- the Neve console at the studio where I used to work had well over a thousand knobs, buttons, and faders. (We used to record settings by snapping Polaroid photos.) At the same time, having one control for each function can make a device easier to...
Downloading a photo from a Web page is easy—you just right-click it or drag it to your desktop. But what if you want to grab an embedded movie or sound? Try this simple technique....
A friend wrote, "Each year my brother and I tend to exchange bizarre sound-making devices at Christmas. Until I get back to being an active musician, my connections to the sound world are rusty at best, and I don't have 'the coolest new thing' at my fingertips. Can you suggest something crazy that you might have come across in your...
