We’ve seen lots of gadget lust around the tiny Pacemaker mobile DJ device, but could you, say, show up in Miami with one and DJ? Alfred Nerstu, who’s actually an Assistant Art Director for Pacemaker’s maker Tonium (not a PR person), sends along this video they made.

Answer: yes, you can be taken seriously with a Pacemaker, but you’ll have to lose your shirt. (Literally — not just because the Pacemaker costs some dough. And, hey, I’m sure you could afford one Pacemaker for about the cost of a two-night hotel stay in Miami during WMC…) I’m still not convinced I could take a Pacemaker seriously as a primary DJ tool, but it does look like something you could have a lot of fun with or add to your toybox of gear on the road.

That’s Tonium employee Willem, shirtless.

The best part of the video? The YouTube comments like these, which, whatever they mean, just look insanely cool:

haha fantastiskt

haha pappa willem? skjukt bra film du får fan fixxa rabbat till mig :D //gräsätarn

Fantastiskt, indeed.

Damn, I wish English weren’t such a square language. Keep your native tongues alive, folks.

Pacemaker.net

After the jump, Arthur shares a bit of "beachjaying" — clever idea for a video; maybe I should do this with a Game Boy tracker or something for the geekier among us. I’d better work on my washboard abs first, though, if my tummy is going to be in the shot.

We first heard about the Mawzer modular control surface over two years ago. In CDM time, that’s like the Bronze Age. The idea was appealing enough: assemble controller layouts by plugging in different modules in whatever combination you like, Lego-style. (See below for someone using actual Legos; that’s another story.) Building specialized music hardware from scratch and dealing with production issues takes time, though, so for quite a while the Mawzer has been off the radar screen. Surprise: the Mawzer is nearly here.

The modular controller prototype has been making the rounds in performance. As of last month, the Mawzer’s creators began taking preorders for the device. And starting this week, the MAWZER is touring Europe in a series of workshops in the device. If any of you Europeans happen to be a stone’s throw from one of the workshops, we’d love a hands-on report! Do take photos!

Mawzer to Launch [Matrixsynth]
Mawzer Controller Demo bei Schneidersbüro [Sequencer.de; in German]
Mawzer News

In the intervening time, I have to admit I’m somewhat less interested than I was originally, just personally. If you want to go custom, it’s not just custom layouts that matter, but changing the form factor and controllers themselves. And since 2005, an increasing number of people have begun forming communities around building such truly custom controllers. I also notice that you can’t hot-swap modules; there’s a warning printed on the inside of the module bay. But those things said, I still love the concept, and I’d love to see the actual unit — if the overall form factor makes sense, this could be ideal. (It also looks especially nice for visualists; one of those performances involved VJing with Resolume.) If you are interested, here’s the preorder pricing, which I imagine looks less scary if you’re in Europe and aren’t suffering from an insanely weak US Dollar:

Prices are intented for first batch of production due July 2007 :
M1610 (empty case) : 627,40 €
Case to hold 16 modules with core system and LCD
M3210 (empty case) : 770,20 €
Case to hold 32 modules with core system and LCD
POTv410 / POTh410 module : 46,35 €
4 potentiometers in horizontal or vertical position
FADv110 module : 43,40 €
1 fader 10cm
ENCv410 module : 49,75 €
4 endless encoders
BUTv410 module : 48,25 €
4 push buttons with leds
XFDv110 module : 51,35 €
2 push buttons with leds + 1 fader 6cm
BLANK module : 6,00 €
Empty module

Related Project: stekgreif: Build Your Own Modular MIDI Controller out of Legos

Europeans tired of hearing the rest of the world talking about the imaginative music exploration game ElectroPlankton, now you can get your hands on it. Creator Toshio Iwai just got his European edition, as seen on his blog. He’s also taken the lovely photos of the packaging of the different editions shown. He deserves it: it’s great seeing interactive art getting this kind of wide release.

See our previous coverage of ElectroPlankton, but at the very least, we believe this can provide inspiration for future musical games/apps/interactive music making.

The Nintendo DS just became America’s best-selling game console. Nintendo says that’s part of a transition to mobile game systems. In CDM’s world view, it’s part of the world’s transition to mobile interactive music. Of course, we’re insane.

Speaking of Toshio Iwai, he’s the keynote speaker tomorrow (probably today by the time you read this) Thursday July 20 at Futuresonic 2006 in Manchester, UK, and is performing Friday the 21st with another of his wonderful creations, the Tenori-On, as seen on its official Yamaha site. If you go to either, a) we’re jealous and b) let us know how it is! I also expect we’ll hear back from our friend Cris @ Pixelsumo while he’s there.