If you haven’t spent every last penny you own on the latest playourwiibox, your strength hasn’t been taken away from coma-inducing leftovers and you’re in the mood for some jaw-dropping music tech bargains, well just read on dear CDMers because we have the best sales to help you start your new year of music-making off right.

EditorsKeys shortcut keyboards use stickers overlaid on your existing keyboard rather than requiring you to replace your keyboard. That has some definitely advantages: I’m not letting go of my beloved Microsoft keyboard, and the custom “shortcut” keyboards sold for programs like Logic and Pro Tools are often absurdly expensive. The EditorsKeys sticker sets cost under US$20, and right now they’re 20% off.

EditorsKeys Shortcut Keyboards

EditorsKeys tells us they’ve now unveiled a new set for Logic Pro, the first to be semi-transparent, so you can move the stickers to different keys if you’ve remapped your shortcuts.

Logic Pro Keyboard

Other sets include Pro Tools, Reason, Cubase, and SONAR, all updated for the latest releases, plus graphics software like Avid, Vegas, Final Cut, Photoshop, Premiere, and After Effects.

Now all I want is a keyboard with tiny LEDs that can change shortcuts depending on the active software. (And yes, I know a prototyped attempt to do just that evidently failed. Maybe later.) In the meantime, these are the most affordable solution.

If you’re like me, your head is about to explode from iPod overload. Can you still find something about a new iPod DJ mixer to love? Maybe: this one lets you connect other players and USB storage and scratch, change pitch, and loop. It might even appeal as a portable scratcher/sampler. And you can use it to play FLAC and OGG files, meaning you could dock it in your living room to play back all that glitchy, indie music you’ve been buying in the seldom-trod corners of online music stores. (Read: not the iTunes Music Store.) In fact, you don’t really even need an iPod. Here’s a first look at Numark’s second take on the iDJ — and some details on why we might just have to give it a second chance.

When is a digital cable better than a digital guitar? When it actually solves a problem guitarists have. We’re still not sure what’s so great about Gibson’s Digital Guitar, even after hearing it played at NAMM but we immediately grasped the utility of IK Multimedia’s new StealthPlug. It’s a compact audio interface built into a cable that makes it dead simple to plug a guitar into a computer and take advantage of software-based amp and effects modeling.

One side of the StealthPlug has a standard 1/4″ jack, while the other has a USB plug. It also includes volume adjustment buttons, an indication LED, and a 1/8 stereo output for headphones, powered speakers, or an amp. Ed: note that the headphone amp makes this a great practice amp — or an in-ear monitor feed. -PK

The StealthPlug includes AmpliTube Live and LE, with guitar amp and effects models based on modern and vintage classics. It is expected to ship first quarter for a price yet-to-be determined.

Previously:

CES: Bringing Guitarists Kicking and Screaming into the Digital Revolution

Gibson’s Digital Les Paul Guitar: Innovation or Reinvention?

Technology is great, but my favorite portable music creation device is still manuscript paper. Unfortunately, that’s usually meant giant notebooks and/or ungainly stacks of loose-leaf music paper. Reader Joshua Schnable brings good news: one of the best notebook and sketchbook makers in the business, the legendary Moleskine, has released a gorgeous 8-staff music notebook:

Moleskine Pocket Music Notebook

Photo: The European Paper Company

At 9×14 cm it’s just the right size, with 192 pages. Made in Italy (like all great notebooks), with the trademark oilcloth-bound cover, acid-free pages, expanding pocket in the back, elastic band for securing the notebook and ribbon placeholder . . . well, anyone who knows the Moleskine stuff knows what I’m talking about. Now great musicians can join the ranks of Matisse, Hemingway, and other famous Moleskine customers.

And for anyone who doesn’t know what music notation is, Moleskine helpfully explains: “each staff consists of five horizontal lines, with four spaces between, on which musical notation is written.”

Lest you think I’m marketing for the Moleskine people, the notebook is sadly out-of-stock — bet they didn’t realizing how many budding Beethovens would snap this up. A notification list is available for when they’re shipping again.

Can catching a power cord on a laptop destroy it, by tugging your machine across the stage and crashing to the ground? You bet. I’ve had a few “tripping over my PowerBook cord” moments of my own, thankfully none of them resulting in major disasters. So it’s some comfort that, among Apple’s more hyped announcements, the company has come up with a clever way to solve the problem: tug on the magnetic MagSafe connector, and you pull it out. Your gig is saved — or it would be, were there not a bunch of other cords around. In other news, you can now savely disconnected power by pulling on the cord end, just like your momma told you not to.

MacBook Pro Design [Apple.com]

You’ve officially lost your excuse for being out of tune. Thanks to the wonders of modern science, you can now tune with your:

iPod, via iRocker

Mac/PC guitar effects software using tools like the built-in tuner included in Guitar Rig

4-track digital recorder thanks to Korg’s D4

Portable audio recorder using the built-in tuner included with Edirol’s R1

Widget using the Mac/PC Konfabulator widget Guitar Tuner

Now, on top of all these options, you can pocket Fender’s new US$19.95 keychain guitar tuner, too. (You’ll be able to start up your El Camino and tune your guitar with a keychain. Plug in a guitar cable (via minijack, it looks like), and tune away. Compared to some of the other options, this one is pretty bare-bones: it only tunes E. (Fender helpfully suggests fretting E on your other strings, if you hadn’t already figured that out.) But as a stocking stuffer, this can’t be beat.

Fender speed-E Guitar Tuner, via Gizmodo via Distortion That Rocks

Hey, by the way — Distortion That Rocks is a really cool guitar blog, completely free of my “We Are the Computers” / pro-keyboard bias.

Hey kids, know what time it is? It’s Moog time — and that means it’s time to put tacky, geeky wall clocks with glowing blue neon on your wall. Truly kitschy enough that I might be willing to part with US$219.

Moog Music Wall Clock

Check out the Moogwear section of the site for still more Moog-logo products, including the great I’m an Idiot t-shirt and must-have MiniMug. Remember, coffee is the real official product of CDM. Breakfast of champions.

Pointing and hand gestures: they’re powerful means of interracting, and make sense for music. The only problem is having to be tied to a desk in a performance, as with a mouse. Nintendo’s upcoming controller shows promise for what interractions could be like in the not-too-distant future (if other tech companies follow their lead). But what about now?

Possible Mac and PC-compatible mouse products:

Gyration GyroMouse; now discontinued though you might get an overstock. A friend of mine on faculty at SUNY Stonybrook uses this with Director on his Mac.

Monster Gecko Gaming Mouse: Just $40, and beloved by both PC Gamer and Macworld, among others. (Hint: poor choice for airplane security.)

Gyration Ultra GT $80, but more features. Crippled on the Mac (no right mouse button support, though USB Overdrive might work), but lots of options on Windows.

Once you’ve got these hooked up, a program like Max/MSP or Pd can make short work of converting them to useful information or MIDI. (We may some day be able to use the Revolution controller with our Mac or PC; there are already adapters for PS2, GameCube, and Xbox.)

Of course, the major limitation here is none of these appears to pull Z-axis information. Anyone out there tried gyro mice? Got any tips? Or are these likely to be useless for the time being? (Or should we go back to building things with our own gyro sensors? That’s more fun.)

It’s the Nintendo synth that never was: a music keyboard accessories for the NES built as part of a 1984 prototype called the Nintendo Advanced Video System (AVS). Best features: a space sound and rhumba button. The one and only model is here in NYC at Rockefeller Center’s Nintendo World Store, which features various one-of-a-kind Nintendo items; see NES Central’s extensive gallery for description and photos by someone who actually knows how to take pictures (read, not me, as you can see).

I’m not sure any of these controls were actually hooked up to anything software-wise, but you can dream. Anyone want to build a keyboard for your Game Boy music system? More pictures after the break. (PS, Happy 20th Birthday, Mario! Just 1 year before we can take you drinking.)