Originality Of The Specious

March 8th, 2010
digital music

Here’s an example of how new art can be created by copying old art – this video by Nina Paley was designed to illustrate the flaws in our current copyright systems, and how we shouldn’t be basing these systems on the impossible concept of originality…
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Can We Cope With Artificial Music?

March 2nd, 2010
music technology

Many people perceive art as an expression of the human soul, a revelation of our unique humanness. However, one modern composer – Emily Howell – has generated a great deal of controversy and thrown these beliefs into question, partly because her compositions are actually quite good…
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Music For The Converted

February 23rd, 2010
music technology

This year’s RPM album by Canabrism will be based on an XKCD cartoon – at least partially. I used a program that can convert images to sound, then took the output as a sample source, which I further processed into something that (hopefully) fits with each song. But there are other things that can be converted into music as well…
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When Copyright Goes Wrong

February 15th, 2010
sales and promotion

Sometimes the quest to protect intellectual property does more harm than good – particularly when those claiming to be the protectors are not the actual creators of the property in question…
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Is The Album A Dying Format?

February 5th, 2010
sales and promotion

The Internet has already had a profound impact on music distribution, but it also has an effect on consumption. Last year, digital single downloads outsold physical and digital albums by a factor of 2.5. So is it time reconsider how we present our music to the public?
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RPM Challenge 2010 Begins Today

February 1st, 2010
music technology

In what has now become an established tradition, today marks the beginning of another RPM Challenge. The task is to write, record and produce an entire album in 28 days during the month of February…
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Touchable Projections For More Control

January 26th, 2010
music technology

Touchscreens seem set to take off in a big way this year, but we’re actually not far from moving beyond the touchscreen already. This demonstration of interactive projection illustrates some gaming potential, but it could equally be applied to music controllers…
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Four Golden Rules Of Mixing

January 22nd, 2010
DAW

Although every mixing project is different, there are a few techniques that producers tend to use all the time, regardless of whether the music is throat singing, ska punk, disco thrash, ambient foot squeaking or armadillo cajon rock…
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Facing The Music With 30 Seconds To Mars

January 19th, 2010
sales and promotion

There’s always a new way to engage with your audience, and putting them on your album cover is a good example of how a simple idea can generate a lot of positive publicity. This is exactly what 30 Seconds to Mars have done with their latest album…
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114 Free Plugins For Your DAW

January 12th, 2010
DAW

It’s a whole new music-making year, and what better way to get started than with a batch of free audio mangling goodies. This is a perfect opportunity to combine two mega sources of free VST and AU plugins…
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