SoundCloud: The Tour from SoundCloud on Vimeo.

SoundCloud, an online sharing community for sound and music, is now hours from public launch. I’ve been playing around with a closed beta for several months, and have to say, I’ve been really impressed. SoundCloud isn’t the first attempt to provide places to share music files with others, but previous attempts have been lackluster when it comes to easy sharing, features necessary to make music listening more enjoyable, and upload capacity. Most importantly, none has accomplished the community “stickiness” that has been the cornerstone of successful media services like Flickr, Vimeo, and YouTube. In fact, there’s been so much of a noise-to-signal problem with the Web space, I expect a lot of you have simply tuned out new Web services. There are some good reasons to pay attention to SoundCloud, though:

• Singing telegram, anyone? Music on SoundCloud acts more like a messaging service. Tracks from people you’re following appear in an inbox for you to sort through. You can even create a DropBox for other people, so this could be huge for people running labels or live events. (That’s especially welcome now that a lot of people have given up on individually clicking myspace links to hear what someone sounds like.)
• Easier uploads and sharing: Getting files on the service in your favorite format, with whatever length you want, is a whole lot easier than on competing services.
• Smart player interaction: Services like this now live and die on their embeddable player. SoundCloud’s is really clever and attractive. Download links are everywhere. Also, SoundCloud attacks the biggest problem with music – it’s invisible. There’s a waveform view, and people can comment on specific points in your music. That feature has been annoying in a lot of video players, but here comments appear only if you want them to, and I’ve found them really helpful in getting feedback. (See my example track below, for instance.)
• Open API: A full API means you can built interesting apps atop SoundCloud. Check out the lovely Radioclouds by Matas Petrikas for an example of how interesting this can be; source code is available.

SoundCloud, indeed, seems to have all the kinds of features that made Flickr stand out from a crowd of photo services. Labels are already onboard, too: Compost, BPitch Control, and Goldie are already making it part of their workflow, says SoundCloud.

It’s Flash 909, and Amiga Flash.

Code wizard Andre Michelle has already made a name hacking audio capabilities into Adobe Flash and ActionScript 3. We got to see his work in the form of real-time audio effects processing in the GarageBand-like online sample-and-compose interface for Splice:

Interview: How Splice.com Has Taken Music Real Audio Processing to the Web

Well, there’s more, well into the “Things Adobe Wouldn’t Normally Expect People to Do With Flash” category. There’s 8BitBoy (warning: link autoplays music), a Flash-based player for Amiga MOD tracker tunes. There’s a 909 emulation (cutely named FL-909). There’s open ActionScript 3 source called popforge [@ Google Code] with all the Flash-hacking tricks needed to do audio.

Now, the most tantalizing bit yet: Andre has a new music environment coming, and to tease its arrival, he’s put up a little application with Roland emulations and stompboxes — and it’s all part of the Rich Internet Application of the Future:

Our friend David Battino writes from O’Reilly Digital Media site to share the massive reader response they got to the Zoom H2 recorder. (The H2 is a smaller version of the H4, which made a guest appearance of sorts on Morning Edition this week.)

Mark Nelson didn’t manage to make this his fifth portable flash recorder review in Hawaii, but he made up for it in depth. His review of the Zoom H2 is almost 5,000 words and contains surround-sound links galore as well as some nifty audio examples.

What’s especially cool was that it became a collaborative review after I asked readers what features they wanted us to test when the H2 finally shipped. They piled on with questions, driving my blog to #1 on the whole O’Reilly Network. At last count, I had close to 300 comments. One reader even wrote a Mac plugin to convert the H2’s quad recordings to 5.1.

So, there you have it: mobile recording geekery can have mass appeal!

Review

Pre-discussion

As readers look for the ideal mobile recording device, we’ve had ongoing, vibrant discussion about the Zoom H4. Its built-in stereo mic pair, real XLR jacks, and low price are big pluses — enough so that at least some are willing to overlook fidgety mic level settings. But one major problem could be a deal-breaker: an audible buzz in recordings.

Fortunately, it seems there’s a fix: if you don’t want to have to plug in the AC adapter all the time (which would defeat the purpose of a mobile recorder), make your own DIY battery pack. Zoom forums and RC car enthusiasts to the rescue!

Brad Linder, whom I met today at the NYC Jelly coworking session out in Brooklyn, is a blogger (Weblogs, Inc.) and NPR freelancer. Needless to say, NPR’s audio requirements will be higher than the typical amateur podcaster. Brad extensively documents his DIY RC battery pack.

Building an external battery pack for portable electronic devices [Brad Linder's Digital Home]

Good stuff, and now that I’ve just gotten my own H4, I’ll be trying this out myself.

A couple of other questions come to mind, though: have others had trouble using external mics (which is part of the point of getting an H4)? And, power gurus, I wonder if a LiPoly battery (Polymer Lithium Ion), as used in cell phones and sold via vendors like SparkFun Electronics, could do the trick? They’re not cheap, but the slim design is a big improvement over the Ghostbuster-esque design above. Thoughts?

Previously:
Zoom H4 Mobile Recording: Useful for Movie Production?

Zoom H2 Portable Flash Recorder Coming Soon; Mic Design Delay (with loads of comments from Zoom owners and folks who went with competitive devices like the Edirol mobile recorder)

For field recording, sampling, recording practices and performances, video production, and a lot of other purposes, just about everyone wants an ideal digital mobile recorder. If you haven’t been following comments, we’ve had an extended discussion by readers on the Zoom H4 mobile recorder, its upcoming smaller sibling the H2, and competitive devices like Edirol’s R09.

Now, the excellent new blog bleeps has had some hands-on time with the H4 in movie production:
10 reasons a Zoom H4 is handy on a movie set!

Interestingly, the main issue other readers have had with the H4 — difficulty accessing mic level controls — wasn’t really a problem in this application. The basic internal stereo mics did just fine for stereo imaging. And there’s no shortage of uses:

• Recording primary on-location sound in stereo (even with the built-in mics, though the H4 also has XLRs)
• On-the-fly foley / sound effects
• Ambient audio, room tone, etc.
• On-location audio playback
• Lots of storage for interviews, extra tracks
• It’s not a camera.

Everyone is looking for the Zoom H2, a nifty portable flash recorder with a merciful street of around US$200 and a built-in mic. We know because you’ve all started hitting our ancient page on the H2. It in fact isn’t shipping yet; Sweetwater has an explanation on their site:

The Zoom H2 is expected to begin arriving in stores in August (slightly delayed by an improvement to the microphone design).

Just to demonstrate I’m not linking to them for affiliate cash, I’ll, erm, not link to them. But I expect you can find them (add a dot-com to their name) or try your favorite retailer and perhaps get a similar story.

It looks very nice, and I have to admit I’m myself looking for a new portable recorder. It seems like it’d actually be worth spending the extra US$100 and getting a Zoom H4, which adds XLR/line ins and phantom power for when you need them. (It’s also got four-tracking capability and effects, but the external mic in to me is the big draw.) Advice?

There’s such interest in this, I think we may need to make a portable recorder mega-page. Leave your suggestions here.

We broke the story on the H2 and deferred to our friends on O’Reilly on reviewing the H4. But you will find lots of reader comments (surprisingly, more H4 feedback on the H2 story — check out comments). Could help you make a smart purchasing decision; I’ll be using it to make mine:

Recording@NAMM: Zoom’s $199 USB H2 Mobile Mic/Recorder, Found in the Wild
O’Reilly Reviews Zoom H4 in Hawaii: Good, with Quirks

Okay, Akai. You’re going to have to get on the ball, fast. Sure, the new MPCs have all kinds of sophisticated music production capabilities. But can they remix the sultry, animal call of The Cheat, or make the ladies swoon with a solo by Strongbad?*

Onetwo, short video made with looping … uh … things [Homestarrunner.com]
Onetwomixer: MixMastah 800 for mixing it yourself

Yes, a lot of these Flash-based remix tools / mash-up gimmicks have been somewhat … limited … musically-speaking. But this is strangely fun. I dare you to use it live. (If they had only played up the “mash-up” angle, maybe they might have gotten mentioned in Wired. Sigh.)

*Oh, and Akai/MPC fans: I’m kidding.

Visual Acoustics is an online musical toy built in Flash designed by Alex Lampe (”Ample Interactive”) of the UK. (Via Music Thing.) The motion visuals are beautiful, and the music and interface is very reminiscent of Toshio Iwai’s work (see Nintendo’s ElectroPlankton, for instance). As with Iwai’s designs, just about anything you play will sound good and ambient. Now, there are two schools of thought on that. One suggests that these kind of futuristic interfaces make music accessible to anyone. The other would hold that part of what makes traditional musical instruments lovely is that, while they take a long time to learn, the rewards are much deeper. I’m not sure one is inherently better than the other, but I still wonder if it isn’t possible to build visual interfaces that are harder to master but deeper to play.

If you want some inspiration for moving in either direction, Visual Acoustics certainly shows potential. Now you just need a Wacom tablet-enabled version that, rather than conventional sliders for parameters, adjusts to gesture and pressure.

It’s not Ableton Live by any stretch of the imagination, but Verizon has commissioned an interactive app built in Adobe Flash that lets you remix the sound of some top beatboxers. Featuring samples from Antoinette “Butterscotch” Clinton (international female beatbox champion), Masai Electro, max b, rahzel (also a member of The Roots), and click, the app gives you a basic MPC-style interface and sequence timeline on which you can create and share mixes. Watching the video clips at top is sort of fun as you play, and this does demonstrate that all kinds of creative musical apps could be built in Flash (and made more sophisticated than this one, if you like):

Verizon Beatbox Mixer

… now, if there were just some samples from former Verizon spokesperson James Earl Jones, this would be really cool. You can read through clunky marketing prose about how these artists are using the “online community space” (I’m guessing you already know what the Internet is good for if you’re here); instead, skip straight to mixing your own stuff and check out these very talented beatboxers. There’s a live performance planned this week in New York as part of the Digital Life expo.

The best link here is max b’s own beatbox tutorial site, including video tutorials to take on your PSP or iPod:

beatbox.tv

Tonight here in New York, I’ll be presenting a free workshop on detecting and visualizing motion from camera inputs, which may be of interest not only for those of you eagerly anticipating the new Create Digital Motion site, but also anyone who’d like to use cameras as controllers for music. Full details after the jump.

If you’re not in New York, don’t fret; I plan to organize this stuff and have online examples/tutorials in the near future. But if you are there, say hi! And yes, I finally plan to deliver on my New York CDM get-together promises in June; my schedule will finally allow that.

Still from a recent performance with Eric Dunlap and Mare Hieronimus at Eyewash, the visual performance series in NYC.