Running a daily website is something of a controlled experiment in the passions of an enthusiastic community. 2009 was a year in which musicians pulled no punches in debating the merits not only of tools themselves, but of the ideas behind them. What follows is not the “best” of 2009, but the “biggest” – the stories that inflamed passions and got readers clicking and commenting. Some top lists include the items about which everyone agrees. This is the list of what got everyone arguing.

Software of the year: Propellerhead Record

For all the major releases and upgrades and gear, as well as the dominance of a certain Berlin-based developer, if you had to pick one application of 2009, it’d be Record. Record tops the list not because everyone dropped everything to go use it, but quite the contrary. Record bucked industry trends, and provided a love-it-or-hate-it view of what audio software could be. In other words, it was quite reminiscent of Reason.

Centered on a mixer, emphasizing “recording” (perish the thought), and omitting expected features like MIDI out and plug-in support, Record resists modern-day conventional wisdom. That was divisive enough, even before the debates began over Record’s new hardware key. In the long run, it may be the simple fact that Record brings audio signal to Reason that gives it staying power. But in 2009, Record was the application about which everyone had an opinion.

See our original preview, May, plus details on the "Ignition Key" authorization system

Developer of the year: Ableton

What a year it’s been for Ableton. The company kicked off the year with “Share,” “Extend,” and “Touch,” as well as the release of Live 8. It sounded simple. But Ableton’s tech dominated CDM headlines in ‘09 with the variety of user tips and tricks, rants and raves. How’d they do?

Drum machines may have no soul, but thanks to an update, Native’s soft drum machine has a lot more meat.

As the year comes to a close, inevitably thoughts turn to writing “best of the year” stories and round-ups. For computer musicians, this year has been dominated by Ableton on one hand and mobile apps on the other. But one of the big software releases of 2009 was also unquestionably Native Instruments’ Maschine. The hardware/software combination returns to some of the traditional drum machine workflows, but in a way that integrates nicely with your software setup. I got to see a prototype while in Berlin in the fall of 2008, and thought it had terrific potential. It’s not that it’s radically different from other things we’ve seen so much as the hardware-software integration, combined with a beautiful implementation and lots of NI sound goodness, made it fun. But, as often happens with 1.0 releases, the first shipping version had some missing pieces – like full-functioning MIDI integration – which could be deal breakers.

1.1 changes that, finally bringing the necessary ingredients to make Maschine an essential part of your music-making process. New features in this version (see video demos from NI after the jump):

• Proper MIDI output: You can use Maschine to output MIDI to play software, and to play hardware. That makes Maschine a powerful sequencer you can drop into any host – including NI’s own KORE, making the KORE + Maschine combination finally workable. And you can use it to sequence that Minimoog Voyager / Sega Mega Drive synth you have lying around.
• Proper MIDI input: Finally, you can trigger Maschine from your host, so you can, say, drop Maschine into Live or Numerology and sequence it.
• MIDI scene switching: In addition to triggering notes/sounds, you can trigger scenes from a host, ideal for recording arrangements.
• Drag-and-drop pattern export: Export patterns as audio into a host by dragging and dropping.
• Metronome and record count-in: Yes, as I’m not a robot, this will help me actually play my patterns live.
• Use REX loops: Propellerheads’ REX remains a standard for pre-sliced audio, making it easy to import your loops.
• Better hardware integration: Navigate and adjust groups, sound volume, panning on the controller, and save files.