Moog’s Moogerfoogers, the boutique all-analog hardware effects units, are brilliant piece of sound gear. They’re accessible, terrific sounding, and exquisitely-designed in terms of interface and control. Even as a software person, I just have a lot of respect for the design of these boxes.

I’m sure Moog Music hopes you collect these things (oh, if I had that budget), but if you had to take just one Moogerfooger, the just-announced MF-105M might be your strongest candidate. First, it combines the two previous Moogerfooger MuRFs – that’s the Bob Moog-designed Multiple Resonance Filter Array. The MuRF (rhymes with “Smurf”) is basically eight filters which are sequenced to “animate” the effects in interesting ways. The original MuRF led to a set of bass filters, aimed at bass players or guitar players “looking for a heavier, darker sound.” Previously, you’d have to buy two separate Moogerfoogers to get both; the MF-105M just gives you both in one box.

More importantly, the “M” in the MF-105M stands for MIDI. Modulation is only fun if you have something with which you can modulate. As on the whole Moogerfooger line, you can use Control Voltage, but the MF-105M also uses MIDI, as seen in the demo video below.

• Change from pattern to pattern using MIDI Program Change
• Sync your patterns to tempo with MIDI Clock, so you can play along with a drum machine, Ableton Live, whatever
• Control any front panel with MIDI Control Change messages – for instance, control the envelope with your Mod Wheel
• Play the filters with MIDI notes

It’s still US$479, but you get what would otherwise require two of these units plus a MIDI-to-CV converter. And it’s all set up to use out of the box. It’s definitely a keyboardist and synthesist-friendly Moogerfooger – and for guitarists with MIDI guitars and a lot of imagination.

Moog Moogerfooger MF-105M

Thanks to Ben Hovey over at Moog for sending this our way. (And yes, everyone is free to send us your product news, please – can’t guarantee it won’t get lost in my frightening inbox, but…)

Available in August. Video (silly titles, but about halfway through they have some useful demos):

You’ve got to respect BeatKangz: here’s an independent company doing something new in the world of hardware drum machines. Their design is blinged out like crazy, the polar opposite of a minimalist MachineDrum, but with easy access to the controls you need. It’s a box that has personality in a world of gear that often doesn’t. The team has at least some experience, too, having made the SB-246 drum machine for Zoom. (Okay, I hadn’t heard of it before, but it looks like a fun toy for about $200. Here’s a video review.)

I have to say I’ve done a pretty terrible job of covering their upcoming Beat Thang, mostly because, well, I just don’t know anything about it, beyond seeing the videos everyone else had. (And yes, I’ve heard the complaints about the fact that I haven’t been covering it.) So I’ve been waiting for some news about the actual hardware shipping.

Unfortunately, the shipping gear isn’t here just yet. The good news is, Beat Thang hardware is now promised for October, with a pre-sales price of US$999. The bad news is, for now you’ll have to live with a “virtual” software edition. What looks like a very cool hardware interface gets translated directly to the screen – where it just doesn’t make as much sense to me. It may just make you want the hardware all the more. (Full disclosure: I’m biased. I’ve never been a fan of software that emulates hardware. Even less so when you have the actual hardware to look forward to.) It could be really useful to someone who owns the hardware – if you’re on a bus with your laptop and can’t grab your hardware BeatThang. For hardware lovers, though, it’s a bit of a tease.

Still, if you’re starved for BeatKangz news, at least this gives you more of an idea of what to look forward to – and the workflow features look impressive indeed. My guess is they’ll use software sales to fund production. If you’re already committed to this concept, your US$149 spent on the software gets you a $149 off coupon on the final hardware – nice idea.

Feature set details from the company:

Electronics and code and whatnot are great fun, but a lot of people want to know, how can they add actual, physical motion to a project? I’ve rounded up the last few odds and ends from the London Music Hackday organized in the offices of The Guardian, and came across Alistair MacDonald and Mr. Duck’s Percussion Machine, which uses Arduino with servos to strike beer bottles.

Here’s the perspective of the non-techie on the affair from the newspaper’s music blog:
Beats and geeks at Music Hack Day

Of course, I’ve heard from at least a couple of people that for this audience, you’re not entirely ready to do all your work in the cloud. APIs. Yawn – the computer musician audience still is happiest with as much CPU power as they can muster, live sound making in native code on a local machine, and, you know – rocking out. But that to me is a bit interesting in itself.

Also from the hackday:

Roger Linn, father of the modern drum machine and creator of some of its greatest models (including the MPC60 and MPC3000), really is working on a new generation. I’ve seen some of that design work, and I’m confident it’ll ship in some form. But announced yesterday, that shipment won’t happen third quarter this year. Also, it seems that, while this was always a LinnDrum and not a SmithDrum, the product is tending even further toward the Roger Linn side and not so much the Dave Smith side – especially with Dave Smith’s own synth business going great guns.

I will say, I prefer a few months’ delay with fewer compromises (or in this case, maybe a lower price). The big names in the industry have such firm release dates that often some significant functionality slips instead of the ship target. Part of the reason a lot of people don’t talk about projects before they’re done really isn’t competitive secrecy – it’s because the evolution of a hardware design can be unpredictable.

But so you can decide for yourself, here’s the published note from Roger:

CrudBox by Steven Litt at ITP from Core77 on Vimeo.

How much performance power can you pack in a briefcase? What if you could have a magic box that did whatever you wanted?

That’s the question asked, in various different ways, by the artists we’re showcasing at this month’s Handmade Music NYC, Thursday evening 7/16 in Brooklyn. It’s a free event if you’re in the New York area, and we’ll be bringing as much of the work to you online around the world. Full event details:

Brooklyn, July 16: Suitcase Sequencers, Handmade Loopers, APC Hacking, Shake That Egg

Facebook event/RSVP

Join the global Handmade Music group on noisepages

The projects:

Sequence everything: CRUDBOX / STEVEN LITT
The CrudBox is an original hardware step sequencer in a briefcase, which plugs into and sequences everything from cassette decks to power tools and turns them into musical patterns.

Looping hardware: LOOOP-R / RUI PEREIRA
Looop-R is a musical, visual, hardware, software instrument.

Shake the beats: EGGBEATER / TED HAYES
This wireless, egg-shaped controller lets you mash loops, control filters, and play music using live gestures.

Ableton hacking: AKAI APC40, HACKED / MICHAEL HATSIS
Live laptop fans, take note: the commercially-available Akai APC40 Ableton Live controller warped to make new musical performances possible.

Handmade Music is FREE and, as always, made possible by our hosts at Brooklyn’s 3rd Ward creative space, plus our friends at XLR8R Magazine, MAKE Magazine, and DIY marketplace Etsy.com.

Handmade Music’s Brooklyn home:
http://www.3rdward.com/handmade-music/

Handmade Music in NYC and (soon) around the world, @ CDM’s Noisepages:
http://handmademusic.noisepages.com