For a truly unique and very much last-minute gift for anyone you know, look to CDM’s favorite game of year, the gorgeous, blood pressure-lowering title for Windows and – at long last – Mac. I may personally identify a little too much with the abstract protagonist of this game, as my holiday activities could well be described as floating around the universe, sucking particles into my gravity well as I grow in size. But whether or not I feel literally like an expanding bubble of matter, one of my favorite experiences this year was entering this ingenious physics-based game. It fuses visuals with a sparkling minimal electronic soundtrack by some favorite artists, from Gas to Loscil, and could be a perfect surprise hard drive stuffer for a Mac or Windows user – even if they’d be puzzled by, say, a sophisticated virtual analog instrument.

$10, Mac and Windows, instant download.

Osmos @ Hemisphere Games

I’m not doing this as an advertisement, either – I’m buying it and placing it on the hard drive of someone dear to me, who I’m fairly certain isn’t reading this blog and to whose laptop I have easy access.

Lastly, to help celebrate the holidays, we’ll have treats in the form of free downloads and tips leading from this weekend into the New Year. Among them, I’m pleased to offer the exclusive official Osmos soundtrack as a free CDM Sounds podcast. (I hoped to have that edited in time for today, but expect it by Monday. And yes, it’s the rare soundtrack that you’ll still want to hear after the game is over.)

Best gift I could have received: http://createdigitalmotion.com is back after a screw-up with our domain. It won’t happen again, and we’ll make it up to our visualist readers with extra content starting next week.

Thanks, everyone, and enjoy the season. Winter is, after all, a great time to bunker in and make music.

It’s either the last chance to rush delivery on gifts, or the first chance to start thinking about picking up some music tech projects for yourself to keep up with musical New Years’ Resolutions. Either way, it’s time to give a shout out to some of the great gift guides that have been going up around the Interwebs.

And nicely enough, there’s a strong emphasis on cheap and DIY projects, meaning these can be ideal even in tough economic times.

SX-150 button mod from Collin Cunningham on Vimeo.

MAKE: Blog > Music Makers’s Gift Guide

Assembled by our friend (and Handmade Music regular) Collin Cunningham, these are the geekiest DIY treasures you can find. I got hands-on with a couple of these recently. The plastic Theremin kit is fun, although you won’t get fantastic results out of it. My favorites: the awesome SX-150 synth kit (above), previously seen only in Japan, and the Thingamakit (which also got mentioned in our holiday guide). They’re both affordable and make some lovely sounds the moment you start using them, with hacks possible later.

For fans of the Arduino electronics/microcontroller platform, see Collin’s separate guide.

The monome didn’t make the guide this year, though it topped our list, but given that you have to basically preorder the moment a run is announced, that’s not exactly a slight.

wire to the ear > Five inexpensive Chistmas gifts for musicians

This small but neat selection is just perfect, I think, from the Moog schematic on a t-shirt (above) to flash memory earrings to Live sound packs from Puremagnetik.

Digital LoFi > The 2nd Annual Digital LoFi Holiday Gift Guide for the Disenfranchised

Digital LoFi has some fantastic selections: buy one, get-one-free offerings from Soniccouture (makers of fantastic Kontakt scripts, by the way), a pay-what-you-will EQ, and wonderful donationware plug-ins. The site also calls out CDM’s own Winter Guide print-on-demand – thanks!

Pt. I
Pt. II
Pt. III
Pt. IV

Honorable mention: The wacky scientists in residence at New York’s Eyebeam research center have introduced Hack Me Elmo. (Thanks, Chris Hahn!) That’s right: it’s a blockbuster holiday toy from years past, hacked into something very odd. Check out our own Mike Una’s how-to on circuit bending if you want to transform a toy into something musical and wonderful, also in our Winter ‘08 guide.

And yes, the rest is here:

It’s not too late. In the spirit of procrastination, I offer my last round-up of products. Mail order these suckers “rush” or stop by your local music store, and you’ve still got time. (Or, if you’re really lucky, you’re giving to someone like me with a January birthday and the “holiday season” just extends onward and onward.)

Here’s the rules: all gifts are about US$200 and under (street). Sound tough? Not at all: there’s lots of good gear that can be had on the cheap — cheap enough to buy yourself. (I definitely want a Rock ‘N Rhodes Christmas; more on the fantastic site this shot is from in a separate story.)

Now, we proudly present some of CDM’s favorite musical tools and toys of 2005, as part of our Gifts You Should Buy Yourself if No One Else Does:

There are plenty of Moog-labeled goodies deserving of special mention in our ongoing gift guide. It’s a bittersweet pleasure since we lost Bob Moog this year, but the Moog film (above) and accompanying film soundtrack are simply must-have, and a worthy gift even for those new to synths. They’re available from your local CD and video outlets, or as a set directly from Moog Music.

Some criticized the Moog film for eschewing narrative and history, focusing instead on modern interviews, but perhaps that’s the most appropriate: it’s a picture of the Moog synth and legend as it lives now, as seen through the eyes of artists ranging from Keith Emerson to Stereolab. Having lost Dr. Moog, it’s all the more heartening to see the living musical legacy in action. The two-CD soundtrack is just as essential, covering a quirky journey through new Moog-made grooves on disc one, followed by the obligatory “Lucky Man” and other classics on disc two. The result is better thought of as a film soundtrack than a survey of electronic music history; if you want some history, too, throw in a copy of the CD/book set Ohm: The Early Gurus of Electronic Music.

The CD and film are terrific, but you can’t wear them to the gym. To show your synth geek colors, check out the Moog Music site, which is shipping Moog track suits and belt buckles, among the usual t-shirt and hat fare. Cooler than my Alesis underoos. (Okay, I don’t actually have any Alesis underwear, so if you’re out there, Alesis, I want you making some by next month’s NAMM show. That’s my kind of swag.)