It may be 2009, but you can still play electronic music as though you’re an invading alien visitor from the future. Just ask The Sonic Manipulator, an electronic musical performer and inventor, alias Claude Woodward. His musical creations range from warped radios to instruments derived from turntable scratches and Theremins. And then there are some instruments that seem to be sonic weapons. (Apologies to recent protesters in Pittsburgh.)

CDM reader Andrew Cordani caught Claude at the UK’s British Invention Show. Claude is apparently a Perth, Australia transplant, by way of Cambridge, though Andrew writes that he “has been known to travel about a bit (Mars, Venus, Jupiter, Alpha Centauri, Epsilon Indi, Teegarden’s star and further).”

Andrew describes Claude’s other creations:

Met at the British Invention Show (http://www.britishinventionshow.com/show/index.html), at Alexandra Palace (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandra_Palace)
(Organized by [MP3 player inventor] Kane Kramer – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kane_Kramer)

http://www.youtube.com/user/sonicmanipulator

http://www.sonicmanipulator.com/

http://www.sonicmanipulator.com/Inventions.htm

The Claude-a-tron – a sort of pre-wireless (i.e. wired) Theremin – and is “Way cool”

The Radiolian a lot of fun – Essentially triggerable (pre-recorded) radio samples – Used to switch-between radio programs (reminds me of http://www.neave.com/television/ )

The Greet-o-metre + The Transatron should be given out to all travellers, interstellar or not!

(My fave was the Rap Rod – which does for scratching what CDs did for vinyl. The Bash-a-tron was a close second, though)

Definitely check the Sonic Manipulator site for many, many more bizarre creations if the one at top doesn’t impress you. See a couple of my faves at bottom.

Fans of DIY, the whole event sounds fantastic! Thanks, Andrew, who can be found here (with his own futuristic creations):
http://midisticks.ltd.uk/

The Music Bore – Video 2 from Nicholas Humfrey on Vimeo.

“I’m sorry, Dave, I can’t allow you to listen to Coldplay.”

What would radio be like if playlists were not only robotic, but had robot DJs pulling information from the Interwebs dynamically? That’s the question asked by the winning team at London’s Music Hackday last weekend, which created an epic mashup of data sources to produce a voice-synthesized IRC chatbot that researches and plays music for you.

Music Bore

Music Bore was just one of a number of projects developed in the weekend of musical hacking, some for listening, and at least one (a fantastic and free synth plug-in) for what we really like – production. With some of the world’s top musical coders in attendance, the results were amazing, even if not all projects were entirely finished. (Hey, that’s why they call it hacking.)

You can check out the full list on the wiki, but here are some favorites — and if you were there, do shout out to us as you put more documentation up of the event and projects.

Harmony Box by Dave and Mike is a synth plug-in for Mac (AU/VST) and Windows (VST, thus also Linux) that quickly creates lovely chords. I love the simplicity of the instrument – really lovely work, gents – and I think I may actually use it on a project. They accept donations if you’d like to see this instrument mature. Of course, with everyone else doing Web mash-ups, this didn’t win, but it’s more up our alley. (Web 2.0 – meh, whatever.)

The synth has its own project blog:
http://davenoise.com/blog/

Other winners (in our book, and as recommended by Harmony Box co-creator Dave Gamble):

LonelyHarps by Jamie Hollingworth and David Padbury is a Last.fm-based tool concept that helps you find dates – and choose the right tracks to set the mood – using music for compatibility. And, really, do you really want to date someone who doesn’t have musically compatible tastes? (I’m sure it’s just because they spotted lots of hotties on Last.fm, but…) The only bad news: the app didn’t actually get fully made yet, but we’ll stay tuned, gents. They do have impressive-looking formulas.

Music Zeitgeist by Cristiano Betta visualizes lyrics by decade, such as the 1980s, above. (Yeah, it was all about wanting and karma, the 80s.) Check out the project directly.

Theremag by Jono Cole and Jonty Wareing of Last.fm is actually the app I most want to see, but there’s no documentation yet. It’s a Theremin emulator on the Google Android-based HTC G1, with an unusual sensor — the built-in magnetometer (the one that normally acts as the compass) which was used to pitch-bend Michael Jackson. Once they get documentation up, expect to see it here. (I love that magnet sensor, too. Good fun.)

iPhone Music Visualizer by George J Cook and Matt Biddulph grabs Soundcloud files, analyzes them with Echonest (which recently got an iPhone-friendly Cocoa API), and then plays them back with a visualizer. It looks like a great place to get started if you’re planning on building something similar yourself.

In fact, it’s well worth checking out the wiki not only because some of the projects have (okay, sometimes-sloppy) source code, but point you at the resources you’d need to tackle something like this yourself if you’re a coder. And the event prompted a lot of folks from Last.fm to Echonest and BBC and others to get their APIs together.

It’s a terrific idea, and it sounds like we need another music hackday here. (Press releases, ahem, claimed this was the “first” music hackday, even though we’ve done a global event ourselves, but who cares — let’s do more!)

New York would make a nice base of operations for a similar event because a lot of folks with interesting APIs are here (or in nearby East Coast towns), but I think it’d be great to get more people online and not just in one locale.

What think you, sirs and madames? Tips on how we could make an online event work?

Policy, intellectual property, and changing business models remain hot threads to follow on this site as we watch the transformation of music distribution in the electronic age. This time, we welcome a new contributor to look inside the issues. Surprise: one radio host sides with the record industry, and the issues may not be as clear as you think. Jo explains. –Ed.

Imagine this:  A track from your new record is being played out on the radio — nonstop. All the major indie stations in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Miami and Atlanta have picked it up. At this point, I’m sure you’ve already ordered a fancy synth that you plan to pay for with your big check. But there is a problem: You did an acoustic version of Jimmy Edgar’s “My Beats.” So who gets paid? Jimmy Edgar. Guess who does not get paid? You!

The Performance Rights Act is a bill before the US Congress that would require terrestrial radio stations to pay royalties to the performer of a track. It is being supported by artists like Billy Corgan (who recently testified on behalf of the artists’ rights group, the musicFIRST coalition) Don Henley, Jay-Z, Billy Idol, as well as the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Aside from the issue of “fairness,” the United States is one of the few countries that does not require payment to the performing artist when her track is played on the radio.

Celia Hirschman, host of “On the Beat” on Los Angeles’ KCRW public radio, a broadcast on changes and trends in the music business, says she agrees with the act. (Celia notes these are her personal views, and do not necessarily reflect the position of KCRW.)

“For decades, the laws have favored a free license to play artists’ music on radio,” says Hirschman. “This was ratified by Congress and basically accepted by all concerned…This free pass no longer makes any sense, especially for commercial radio. A reasonable compulsory license fee for all radio, with lower rates to non-commercial is an equitable solution for artists and labels.  Commercial radio stations earn their income by selling advertising because of their programming content.  It’s only fair that the content providers are compensated.”

“This free pass no longer makes any sense.”

Celia Hirschman, host of “On the Beat” on KCRW

Opposing the bill is the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) who claim the legislation amounts to a “tax” and will force many radio stations to go bankrupt. Additionally, opponents of the bill point out that many artists were first discovered because of radio exposure, which translates into sales (ticket sales, album sales and merchandise) and promotion of their brand. If the station goes under, so does the performing artists’ potential income.

Dennis Wharton, EVP of NAB, claims that the RIAA “relies on cherry-picking international examples that paint a distorted picture of copyright law.” “The US protects sound recordings for 45 years longer than Canada and many countries in Europe, says Wharton. “If it’s “international parity” that RIAA is looking for, they ought to examine the entire landscape.”

In fact, the international landscape is not equal.  Many countries in Europe run stations owned or subsidized by government funding. The foundation of our copyright laws are different as well. In the United States, we use the term “copyright” whereas many European countries use a term equivalent to “author’s rights.” “Copyright” reflects an attitude that is concerned with the restriction of uses for economic reasons, whereas the term “author’s rights” reflects an attitude that is concerned with the extension of the author’s intellect and self.

I recently spoke with Brian Lee Corber, an IP attorney who has closely followed the Performance Rights Act. In his opinion the bill will not pass. “Collecting royalties for the songwriter is already inaccurate; it’s based off of surveys. Logistically, collecting royalties for the performer is even more complicated…what happens when the performer is an orchestra?” Corber feels this logistical nightmare may make it difficult for the legislature to justify passing this bill.

As a reaction to the Performance Rights Act, NAB is backing the Local Radio Freedom Act which calls for no tax or fee for the performance of a sound recording on the radio. As of March 24th, 9 more lawmakers signed onto the Local Radio Freedom Act, making the total number of co-sponsors 158.

For More Information:

Music First Coalition: www.musicfirstcoalition.org

National Association of Broadcasters: www.nab.org

KCRW: www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/ob

Sources:

Dougherty, F. Jay. Copyright Law Class at Loyola Law School, March 24, 2009.

“Mr. Corgan goes to Washington for a Bigger Piece of the Radio Pie”

http://blogs.suntimes.com/derogatis/2009/03/updated_mr_corgan_goes_to_wash.html

“NAB disputes RIAA Claim Ahead of Performance Rights Hearing”

http://radioink.com/Article.asp?id=1206143

“NAB, musicFIRST go Head-to-Head on Royalties”

http://www.fmqb.com/Article.asp?id=1235167

“Smashing Pumpkins Singer, Billy Corgan Testifies Before Congress”

http://www.opposingviews.com/articles/news-smashing-pumpkins-singer-billy-corgan-testifies-before-congress

Los Angeles-based CDM contributor Jo Ardalan is the Managing Director and Founder of Fixed Noise, a community-based company specializing in audio software development, artist management and business development in tech and entertainment.

She’s a veteran of Waxploitation and Native Instruments, an experienced sound designer and engineer, and consultant.

And she has a Reaktor tattoo.

I need voice recognition, because I’ve just covered my keyboard with drool.

The Teenage Engineering OP-1 (Operator 1) is a “pocket-sized” controller and synth. For once, it eschews the cliches of modern hardware design for a look that is truly 2009, influenced by the layout of classic Roland drum machines but made minimal and elegant. It’s a controller. It’s a synth. It has … an FM radio in it? (Yes, that’s FM radio, though it also has the FM synthesis you might expect.)

Features:

• Controller functions: transport controls, 4 rotary encoders, 16 dedicated “quick keys”
• Motion sensor so you can shake the thing
• Stand-alone synthesis (no computer needed), with 8 synth models, 8 samplers
• Synth models: FM synthesis, virtual analog, more (can’t tell what other synth models they intend)
• Effects: Delay, Flutter, Filters, EQ
• Sequencer — described as “at present time, secret.” A secret sequencer? Isn’t it already somewhat secret, seeing as the device isn’t shipping?
• Arpeggiator
• FM radio (so you can record Akufen-style radio samples?)
• Built-in mic, speaker
• Record to MP3
• 12 mm thin
• USB 2.0, minijacks for audio in / out+heaphones
• Battery-powered using the power connector, which is “the same as used in robotic automation applications”
• Holes for a carry strap

All of this has an unbelievably beautiful interface.

Teenage Engineering Operator-1

The only real question is, is all of this too good to be true? Teenage promises an initial run of 100 to the “beta” list, with the project completion slated for 10-12 months and price TBA. Now, we’ve heard that before, and painfully, we tend to see a rough correlation looking something like this:

But note, this is only correlation, not causation. That is, the awesomeness of something does not prevent it from shipping. So I’m holding out hope that the OP-1 will indeed see the light of day, and we’ll be sampling FM radio and programming FM synth sequences on a bus. I can’t wait.

(I’ll amend the illustration, and we’ll put the OP-1 alone in the upper right-hand corner of this graph.)

As noted in comments, LSDJ creator Johan Kotlinski is on the team, too. That makes the “secret” sequencer all the more tantalizing. (It still makes sense that it’d be some sort of step sequencer, given the hardware interface, but what kind?)

Teenage Engineering are not new to truly brilliant designs. They created an installation of toy-like robotic singers for Absolut – the vodka company – called Absolut Choir. Heck, I want these, too. Brilliant work.

Found via the wonderful True Chip Till Death.

More information

Operator-1 Details: The Casio VL-Tone of the 21st Century, Plus the Synth Alarm Clock!
High-Density Screens Due; OP-1’s Gorgeous Display

Could meshes of data help the creation of new, international radio broadcasting and receiving mechanisms – even in rural areas? Artist Juan Esteban Rios proposes a design to do that. It’s not just a software concept; a hardware design would make the idea accessible even to people who don’t own or know how to use computers.

It seems a powerful idea for musicians, as well, particularly if it helped eliminate the need for dedicated streaming servers. (There may be others who are more familiar with P2P broadcasting technology out there; if so, I’d love to hear from you.) Imagine tuning into a gamelan performance in Jakarta, then a live electronic music evening from Brazil, then a performance in rural sub-Saharan African (relayed to better infrastructure in Lagos).

The technology here is radio-based (see clarification from the creator of the video in comments), but mesh and P2P technologies involving the Internet — or a bridge from remote, radio- or satellite-based communication — could likewise apply.

Video feature by designguide.tv, found via toxi.

Tonight, musical and visual artists converge for an evening of live performance at the HOPE hacker conference in NYC, 11p – 2a. Hope you can make it there, New York area peoples.

There are other ways of joining the event (and the rest of the HOPE conference):

IRC Channel — irc.oceanius.com #radiostatler

And for live radio, which should (technicalities notwithstanding) broadcast CDM’s performance:

http://radio.hope.net/listen.php

More on the event:

CDM event details and preview

Facebook page

It’s clear that the new world of music listening involves more — more music, listening in more places, with more styles of music from more places in the world. So, naturally, it makes sense that we won’t pay per-album fees for everything we hear; even if you were addicted to your indie college radio station 20 years ago, that’s the case. (And I’ll be you didn’t buy everything you heard, though you probably bought some of it.)

The question is, how to model those costs, so the people making and distributing the music make money. Make whatever argument you like about “all music should be free,” but someone will want to turn it into a business model. And it’s not necessarily fair to say all that money will come from live gigs; on the contrary, the best way to make your live gigs work as an income stream is to have other income streams.

This week, I’ve been playing with the beta of a new version of lala.com, an online streaming and discovery service. (See next.lala.com; lala.com is the old site.) Their model is this:

1. The first time you listen to a track — any in their large library — it’s free, via online streaming.
2. Add it to your library, and you can listen to it an unlimited number of times via streaming, for 10 cents a song. (Believe it or not, that adds up, but they give you 50 to start with.)
3. If you want to keep the track, you can buy a DRM-free, reasonably high-quality MP3 for 89 cents a track (slightly less for a whole album).

This should sound familiar: it’s very close to existing subscription services like Napster and Rhapsody. But those services have had their problems. First, the flat fee isn’t necessarily appealing to everyone. Psychologically, people seem not to like paying a big fee for music that they don’t “own”; despite the fact that this makes listening to massive libraries affordable, users complained that if they canceled their subscription, their library went away. At 10 cents per track, you can add 120 tracks to your library each month with Lala, and listen to them forever — not including the tracks you only listen to once, which likely includes a lot of consumption on the subscription services.

DRM is always the deal-breaker

But the bigger problem has been DRM. The whole selling point of Napster, Rhapsody, and such is that you can take media and load it to your device. What they don’t tell you is that this requires a compatible device, a Windows software client, and buggy and awkward license loading on both your computer player and mobile device. Yuck. It’s a practical issue as much as one of principle: DRM breaks stuff, so people don’t like it. It’s unnecessary technology that ironically reduces the value of what you’re supposed to be buying.

Now, you can ignore these and simply use these services as high-quality streaming services, which is how I’ve tended to treat them, and as that, they’re great. Assuming you’re regularly near your computer and not in your car or on the go, you get a whole lot more content for less money than satellite radio gives you. Too bad these services have also been plagued by clunky online interfaces. Rhapsody’s will work on different OSes — I’ve even run it under Firefox in Linux — but it’s not nearly as friendly as it could be. Lala bests them on this, too, with nicely-designed interfaces and cleaner layouts. In short, it’s simply more usable.

The record industry still doesn’t get it

Despite all these problems, many in the record industry still view subscriptions as the future, even though they would mean less money in their own pockets and a technology roundly disliked by consumers. They also assume such subscriptions require DRM. Ars Technica has a good story on this bizarre angle:

If music DRM is dead, the RIAA expects its resurrection

And this is where things get weird: it’s as if the industry is more in love with DRM than it is, you know, actually making money selling music. (I wish I could get to be a suit.)

Lala isn’t perfect, but it’s immediately apparent that the basic model is right — and it flies in the face of everything the industry is telling you.

1. It’s a subscription without DRM — and that works fine. (Keep in mind, streams don’t sound as good as downloads, and even though bandwidth prices are coming down, people would rather turn that into profits than higher-quality streams.)

2. It supports DRM-free downloads as the desired end goal. When they really love something, consumers have demonstrated that they want to listen to it again and again, where and when they want, without DRM or format/platform restrictions. I’m personally much happier now that I buy DRM-free music online and manage it with software of my choice, copying it to where I want to play it.

3. You can wind up spending more, not less, on music — but you also get more.

Anyone remember radio?

Here’s the thing: consumers have long had a “tiered” diet of music. It’s what the entire record industry has been built on since the dawn of radio. You listen to a big stream of music for free, pick out what you want, and listen to that over and over again. Whether it’s Britney or the Beatles or Beethoven, people find music — bubblegum and masterpieces alike — addictive. And that’s what makes the model work.

Lala is indeed not perfect. I find the streaming quality to be really poor; I’d actually pay a small subscription fee to get premium content. (Suggestion: how about “pro” accounts with high-quality streams and a bundle of discounted download purchases?) The library is still incomplete. I’d love Last.fm hooks and RSS feeds of music I’m hearing. But then, Lala is still early in its development, and I expect it will be one of many, because I think this basic model works.

In other words, you have two tiers:

• The “radio” tier: Free or dirt-cheap streams of music with easy online access across platforms (not in any one player)
• The “ownership” tier: Files you buy and keep in high-quality, DRM-free formats.

In that context, in fact, even band-subsidized releases, like those from Nine Inch Nails, start to make sense. They encourage online ownership for bands that have other revenue streams that can support them — or independent artists who need to make their stuff more easily available. But it’s also clear that for many artists, selling downloads will continue to make sense.

Now the only remaining question is, when will the industry get over their Chicken Little Syndrome, and their accompanying DRM fetish, and get back in the business of feeding the public’s music addiction and making money?

(Hint: if the traditional industry doesn’t do it, musicians and the growing cottage industry around serving them online will.)

Thanks again for the mention of Tone Generation. I just thought I’d draw your attention to another related piece I produced with Ian Helliwell last year. It was called ‘Expo 67 – A Radiophonic collage’ and was a snapshot in sound of the Montreal worlds fair in 1967. Tristram Cary composed music for the Great Britain pavilion and much of this is used in the programme. If you listen closely you’ll also hear Tristam’s voice popping up.

Also featured are compositions by Hugh le Caine, Donald Erb, Eldon Rathburn, Erkki Salmenhaara & Erkki Kurrniemi, Giles Tremblay and Iannis Xenakis.

As always keep up the inspiring work with CDM. It is in my top 3 sites that I visit daily alongside Music Thing and Matrix Synth.

Give the music a listen:

Expo 67 Radiophonic Collage

And to help give yourself some visual inspiration, check out this retro-fantastic archive of Montreal Expo pictures, found (bizarrely) in a scrapbook found on the street in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Montreal Expo 1967

Unfortunately, I don’t think there are any images of Xenakis’ polytope. But, perhaps on a more realistic budget (ahem), this is how I want festivals of technology and culture to be. Oh, and it’s never a bad idea to invite Poland.

If you’re curious to hear the results of the H4 in action, Brad’s story was on NPR’s Morning Edition yesterday. (More on the coworking story at Brad’s blog.) I make a brief cameo, and provide a fair bit of the ambient sound at the beginning, which I find amusing. But whether or not it’s the best choice for you, the H4 can certainly be used in pro applications.

Create Digital Music is brought to supported by readers like you. The time is twenty-six minutes past the hour.

On second though, as many artists start their own labels or self-publish, we may not be far from a world in which the artists really do run the record industry. Imagine an industry that’s actually smart and has a sense of humor. Fascinating.

AudioLemon, author of one of the best music tech blogs around (a newer arrival), says quotes the following from the fury over DAT recording (some things never change):

A coalition consisting of PEN, the Writers Guild of America, and other organizations representing writers filed a class-action suit today against major pencil manufacturers for copyright infringement. Defendents in the suit include Eberhard Faber, Riviera, Skilcraft, Cascade, Empire Pencil Co., and Dixon Ticonderoga.

The writers claim that with modern pencil technology, purchasers of books magazines, newspapers and other printed matter will be able to make exact reproductions of copyrighted material. The suit charges that royalties will be lost when people write out copies of books for friends.

Check comments for the full item and lots more:
Comments: Record Industry Now Completely Bonkers, Wants DRM on All Radio