Key Of Grey

November 3rd, 2010 - I'm sure you've all heard that Protools, along with going native, now has an SE version that ships with either a USB microphone, an interface similar to the Mbox mini, or a MIDI keyboard. You may also have heard that you don't have to go to your local Guitar Center to buy one either; you can get them at Best Buy. Power users may scoff at the baby Protools (after all it has a maximum of 16 tracks) however ... Read More

July 14th, 2010 - Was your mom suitably impressed enough by Kid Beyond to send you a Youtube video? Ever wish you could get your family in on the fun you have with looping? MIT has released MmmTsss Playful Looper, for free download. With a super simple and fun interface, everyone will be able to immediately get into looping antics. You definitely won't be at Beyond's level, but you'll still have fun nonetheless. Check out the embedded video below to get a feel ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Roger Linn Design June 12th, 2010 - Roger Linn Design has released the AdrenaLinn Sync, a software plugin that emulates the AdrenaLinn guitar pedal. You may remember Roger Linn from a little device he created: the freaking MPC. The AdrenaLinn uses time-based effects, and includes some beat accompaniment. I can't say that I really enjoy the added beats, but the time-based effects and more traditional effects (filters, tremolo, phase, etc) sound fantastic. In the video below, I'm not sure if he's ... Read More

June 10th, 2010 - Aviary, developer of online audio editor Myna and a host of graphic design applications, has released Roc, an online music creation tool. Unlike Myna (which I assume will be integrated into Roc later down the road according to their feature list), Roc is a grid based sequencer. While Myna allows you to drag in waveforms and loop them, Roc is similar to piano rolls and matrix sequencers. The beta below allows you to sequence single note instruments (eg. a ... Read More

June 2nd, 2010 - In case you're one of the three people left out there that hasn't heard the news, Propellerhead has posted teaser videos for the forthcoming Reason 5. I didn't post about it last week because they were releasing a feature each day and I figured it'd be best to just post about it when all the info was out. Reason 5 adds many features that users have been asking for. The Dr. Rex player has been upgraded to the Dr. ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Togu Audio Line April 21st, 2010 - Who doesn't love free high-quality audio plugins? Togu Audio Line, the brainchild of Patrick Kunz, is a large set of free audio plugins that are available for both Windows and Mac platforms. The plugins run the gamut from plate reverbs to vocoders. Patrick has thoroughly designed the plugins, down to the very professional looking graphic interfaces. Try out some of the plugins, and if you like what you hear, donate to support future development. ... Read More

February 24th, 2010 - A couple months ago, I reviewed the Vestax Spin which is paired with Algoriddim's djay softare. As I got used to using the Spin and djay, I got a little more bold and started diving into the more advanced techniques I could get out of both. Because the Spin has a limited amount of buttons, I mapped an additional Korg NanoPad. This allows me to use all of the common features of djay that previously needed to be ... Read More

February 21st, 2010 - I've been tooling around with Logic for almost 10 years now, and one of the additions in version 8 that I never really used was MainStage. MainStage is an application meant for performing live. You can use instruments and effects from Logic combined with live looping and MIDI triggering, to pull off Ableton-esque performances. With version 9 of Logic, MainStage was beefed up with better amp modeling, and better looping features making it more enticing for musicians. Since I ... Read More

February 13th, 2010 - I was watching a tutorial on multi-band rhythmic gating from Next Step Audio and Brian was using a cool audio unit plugin within Logic. It turns out that it was the Gateboy plugin from Sinevibes which is a pretty advanced gate with many cool parameters to tweak. You can achieve swing with your gating, or even get sounds that emulate beat slicing. They have demos of the plugins at the link below and you can check out the ... Read More

February 7th, 2010 - Andrea Pettinao is the sound designer behind Pettinhouse, a site where you can buy guitar, bass, and percussion sample kits for NI's Kontakt. He has a pretty big section of free Kontakt downloads. Most of the kits have a preview link so you can listen to what they sound like before you download them. There's some pretty good stuff on there. Of course, if you like what you've downloaded, you can always donate and support his libraries. Download page Read More