Squarepusher has taken over the music page of the Guardian, and the results bring joy and smiles to children and the young at heart. Just how great is it when Squarepusher is in charge?

Music singles are complete and utter fluff, and he’s not afraid to say so, picking them apart one at a time like an angry, deconstructionist Casey Kasem.

Noise and Italian Futurists get their due. Fluxus is the sort of cinema that accompanies your popcorn.

A gentleman drops by to talk about aesthetic theory, and … uh, something about how great Steve Reich is. Got a little lost on that one, in fact (not that I don’t love aesthetic theory and Mr. Reich).

Squarepusher (and Alex Thomas) demonstrate what music can sound like if you’re a musician. (Note: no fancy delays necessary to make it sound like they’ve got rhythm. Quite unlike when I’m playing, in fact. Well, not that I’m much good with Drum and Bass anyway. That’s real Drum and Bass, you see.)

And best of all, he provides commentary for the above video.

"Sometimes I cave right in." As he walked along the edge of the field, the earth seemed to splinter at each step. A glance along the cold hedgerow hurt his eye. Everything he looked at sent dread through his viscera, none the less sharp for all of its familiarity. Stones underfoot seemed to chatter and sneer, the Luton-grey sky was an idiotic, mocking expanse. He paused at the brook, cold dirty glass. Dull pain accompanied a frame of memory; he had bathed his feet here as a boy. Nearly losing his balance, he said, out loud as if to silence the roaring dead air of the November morning: "That water is too shallow to drown myself in."

The Luton-grey sky was an idiotic, mocking expanse, indeed.

It feels good to hate that video.

Enjoy.

Thanks, wesen and Resident Advisor, via Twitter.

Marc “Nostromo” Resibois, aka “m.-.n,” lives the digital life of computers. The Belgian musician and hacker [@MySpace] is renowned as a Game Boy musician, as the inventor of legendary Nintendo tracker LittleGPTracker, and even has a day job as a programmer for VJ software maker Arkaos. But lately, his thoughts have turned to more traditional synthesis hardware – hardware that acts as tiny computers. Nothing is going to shake me from my love of computers, but that doesn’t mean I’m not interested in having what he describes sitting next to mine. Here’s what he imagines – and it’s a variation on a theme I think we’ll see a lot in the coming weeks and months here on CDM. And without giving away the punchline, that Nintendo DS is going to make another appearance.

I’ve always loved small, self-contained units. Because I’m a software guy, I’ve been developing music software on handheld consoles for years. I love these little guys. They are tiny, fairly powerful, and their physical interface gives you a good amount of control, leading to a growing stack of interesting applications.

However, recently, a couple of interesting projects started to emerge from the hardware side of things. That makes it possible to start dreaming about building your own little synth, even for people like me who can’t even deal with sticky tape.

My first hands-on with hardware was when I started fiddling with the Arduino piano. You might argue that once it’s built, it’s still software platform, but I really enjoy working on this bit of kit. The interaction is even more straightforward than game consoles: press a button, turn a knob, and get sound. Although it might seem limited compared to software synths, it also has dimensions that a lot of virtual instruments lack. I’ll call these qualities depth and exclusivity.

What do you say when it’s all been said? We felt it was time for a fresh perspective on the MPC phenomenon — one a normal review couldn’t provide. So we got the opinion of our friend, samplist/producer and Segue member Dave Dri. And the verdict: there’s still something about an MPC — even if it suggests why there’s also something about software, too. But it involves dust. Here’s his op-ed:

Recently I had the task of reviewing an MPC5000 for a local street press magazine. The MPC part of it was fine — the word limit was trickier. Over the last decade I have reviewed the MPC2000XL and the MPC1000, with a lot of time and gigs passing between them. From early days in a live breaks act to my current progressive house act, an MPC has been right under hand. In the week that I reluctantly handed the 5000 back to Musiclab, the drummer that guested in my band at the Big Day Out festival asked me to play keys and samples in his band at a local festival. [Ed.: Our own Jaymis filmed the Big Day Out gig if you want to check it out.] I found myself in a chance conversation with a friend from the live breaks act Bitrok and the very next day, somehow, I’m on stage with his MPC2500 — a unit which I have since bought. So why did reviewing an MPC5000 lead to me buying an MPC2500 after years of happy service from an invincible MPC2000XL?

If you’re reading this, you probably know what an MPC is, and you can readily review any number of link-bait Google results for the product mentioned in the title of this post. [Ed. Hmmmm, link-baiting MPC's, huh? "10 Ways an MPC is Like a Cupcake"? "15 of the Best MPC YouTube Videos Featuring Hot Women MPCers?" perhaps? -PK]

What you probably want to know is what it’s really like. So I will tell you.

Wallace is CDM’s resident turntablist, and he’s also immune to blind gear lust. I’m waiting to pass judgment until I get first-hand contact with Xponent, but I’m equally confused from a product perspective. Now, let’s see — we could copy and paste a press release here. Or we could try Wally. I just hope we’re able to figure out what he really thinks. -PK

Let me get this straight - an overpriced control surface is what’s gonna change DJing?

M-Audio Torq Xponent

M-Audio announced their Xponent control surface/USB audio interface today, and this long-time DJ is distinctly underwhelmed. You know, when all there was to the SynchroScience line was the Torq software, the Conectiv and the X-Session Pro, I had this idea that they were building this mini-galaxy of interoperable DJ gear that one could purchase bit by bit and eventually put together a nice, integrated digital DJ system with all the bells and whistles. However, the emergence of the Xponent today turns out to be a bit of a head scratcher.