As always, we won’t cover every last bit of news, just the stuff we really find important. And in a twist, we’re also looking to volunteer participants to help us cover the community around music technology, not just the big industry-driven stuff.

Where and when to get your tech news

At 10:00 or 11:00 am tomorrow, January 14, Pacific Time (GMT-8), embargoes begin lifting on most NAMM news.

You can follow CDM’s coverage in two places: here on CDM, of course, but also at:

namm.noisepages.com

On CDM, we’ll have our own editorial look at the show. For the latest, round-the-clock news, videos, and clips, dispatches from our contributors, as well as unedited press clippings, watch namm.noisepages.com. We’ll take the best bits of the noisepages site and round them up on CDM.

We’ll be covering official and unofficial news this week. So, yes, we expect to cover big names like Roland. We’ll also be picking up on tech in hotel rooms, open-source oddities at the party Friday, and hardware that can’t afford NAMM booths – you know, just like we always do. Every day is a news day around here.

Friday night in Los Angeles, I’ll be part of the big, unofficial Wham Bam Thank You NAMM party. We’ll have video, sound, and feature coverage both of the artists and of the discussion we hope to kick off about the future of music tech. So watch for bits of that over the coming days.

What to expect

Our most anticipated news:

Ableton and Serato have already teased ableton-serato.com. So, obviously, if you were to tune into CDM at 11am California time tomorrow, I’m sure there won’t be any news whatsoever. Got that? Do not, by any means, expect any news Thursday around 11am.

I’ve been looking forward to talking to Teenage Engineering about their gorgeous-looking, Casio-inspired, FM radio and FM synthesis-equipped OP-1 synthesizer for months now; NAMM had always been the timeframe. Whatever isn’t ready, I should be able to catch when I’m in Stockholm in February. I’m imagining their studio looks something like the Wonka Chocolate Factory. If you’re there, you can find them on the floor.

I expect lots more controller hardware from lots more makers, and, whether it’s at NAMM or Messe or (for many manufacturers) completely independent of any trade show, I think 2010 will see more integrated hardware-software products.

No LinnDrum. There won’t be a LinnDrum announcement this year. That’s actually not a rumor. I think it’s best to diffuse any potential disappointment early. Dave Smith Instruments, though, have promised an announcement, so we’ll see what Dave’s been up to and I hope to catch up with Roger (Linn) later this year.

I could make more predictions, except I already know a lot about what’s coming out, so the predicting is somewhat less fun. Let’s see, let’s see, something I don’t know — I predict that the panelists I assembled on Friday will propose something so ludicrous and absurd for futuristic music tech that we’ll all be forced to make it.

And protests of major guitar manufacturers. On a more sobering note, the Korean workers who make major US brands like Fender, Ibanez, and Gibson are assembling a protest of the whole show, as reported by MusicRadar. Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello is even involved. It’s guitars, which strictly speaking isn’t NAMM news – but nearly everything we make (even the inner circuits of a US-assembled monome) is built with Asian labor. If anyone can get the scoop on this protest, I’m happy to hear it.

Big 2010 NAMM news that’s… not at the NAMM show

A lot of the big news in 2010 may happen outside NAMM:

• Big makers skipping trade shows: Native Instruments, for instance, is skipping pricey trade shows to talk directly to would-be customers on the Web. So if there’s an announcement from NI – among ranks of manufacturers I expect will gradually grow – it’ll be elsewhere. I hear this Web thing is going to be huge.
• Renoise 2.5, 2.6: The underground tracker is adding some unique features. The 2.5 upgrades, like its unique matrix view, look cool enough, but it’s the 2.6 version, with full-blown scripting and OSC support, that gets even more interesting. We should know more about each as the year goes on. (There’s no NAMM announcement, but you can catch Renoise at the Indamixx booth on the show floor.)



• Ruin & Wesen’s magic box: The techno geniuses of Ruin & Wesen have been hard at work on their MiniCommand, plus the open Miduino library – built on Arduino – that powers it. This deserves a lot more attention for things like algorithmic musical programming, but the short version: expect magical music-programming capabilities that bridge hardware and software.
• OpenSoundControl/OSC: Yeah, I know: OSC has been waiting for its big breakout year for some time. But don’t forget, OSC already has new traction, from becoming a standard in live visual/VJ apps almost overnight to inclusion on new hardware. There’s some big news as far as better hardware and software implementation in the pipeline. Oh, and because it’s open, we’ll get to just talk about this, and actually make it happen. OSC won’t be at NAMM because that’s not where it belongs: it’s a way of implementing Internet standards as much as it is a way of creating music-specific protocols, and a lot of its future lies directly in your hands.
• Open hardware: It won’t be on the NAMM floor, but there is a convergence of monome users, alternative developers, and even (at the party Friday night) open-hardware Arduinomes. DIY tech is something we’ll be watching in Anaheim and all year long.
• …and the suitcase brigade: Technically, NAMM doesn’t allow “suitcase” behavior – that is, people showing stuff who don’t have a booth. But I have at least one product demo booked offsite at a hotel room I think you’ll like. (Whoa, that sounds way more illicit than it is.)

How to Send Us News Tips

Are you a manufacturer with a product? An attendee with photos, video, sound, or words on anything cool — even that late-night jam back in the hotel room with friends? We’d love to have you get it to us. Directions on the namm.noisepages blog:

Community-driven coverage: Help Us Cover The Stuff Everyone Misses

If you’re introducing or demonstrating new products at NAMM, and you’d like to be considered for CDM’s curated NAMM products guide, let us know. Incidentally, since I don’t represent the NAMM organization, that can mean anyone in LA around NAMM or otherwise timing announcements that week, whether or not you’re an exhibitor. One- and two-person shops are as welcome as big manufacturers, as always.

There is no charge to be in the CDM guide, excepting the need to have something cool. We can’t cover everything and want to avoid information overload, but we’ll pick some stuff we know CDM readers will want to know about.

Also, I will be in Anaheim for limited meetings during the NAMM show on Thursday and Friday. If you’d like to meet up (especially if you’re not exhibiting), please get in touch. I know I won’t be able to meet up with everyone I’d like to on this trip, but we can give it a shot.

Manufacturers/inventors, we want to hear from you:
For meetings or to get in our news coverage, I’ve set up a form:
CDM NAMM Meetings and Announcements [Google Docs; form embedded below]

CDM does not break embargoes, period. I’ll be working hard to make sure news coverage is timed; if you can get us materials early, that helps.

Interested in being a correspondent? I’m looking to enlist anyone interested in covering the show floor and getting photos of oddities and awesomeness, as well as talking to artist guests. If that sounds like you, get in touch. To put this another way, if we don’t get materials early, it’s very hard to get them up as quickly!

Keep your schedule clear: the big news is that we’ve got a major event coming up Friday night in downtown LA, and we’re talking to LA-area artists. More on that very soon.

Here’s the embedded form (you’ll need to click through to the site if reading inside an RSS reader):

Here’s a cruel joke for you: the first day of Frankfurt’s Musikmesse trade show? The date on which all the music tech press releases for the show have dated their embargo? April First.

Now, to me, the whole point of April Fool’s is surprise, or at least humor. April Fool’s has become so obligatory that everything from faux press releases to blog posts are dedicated to the topic whether they were inspired or not. So, you know what? No April Fool’s Day here. Anything covered on this site tomorrow will be – to the best of my knowledge, anyway – real. (Or as near reality as we ever get.)

Ironically, news in our world is so unsurprising, any interesting news is immediately suspected of being fake. Teenage Engineering’s Operator-1 is so cool looking that, aside from concerns it may not ship, some of you have gone so far to worry the whole thing is an elaborate April Fool’s prank. (One clue that that’s nonsense: it was announced on March 30. It even missed the Ides of March.)

But there you go: case in point. Reality actually can be cool. So we’ll stay away from the pranks this year, and any foolery will be of the technological kind. Enjoy.

I had Chairman Bill running in a corner of my screen while I cleaned house, hoping for something interesting like gesture recognition in Windows 7, so I didn’t snag images quickly enough. Gizmodo has a good write-up with images and on-demand video from CES should be available soon. He did choose JayZ over Timbaland as his producer, I’m guessing because even Gates was offended about that whole Finnish chiptune controversy.

Since Gates is currently a Windows user, I suggest loading up the retirement laptop with platform-exclusives FL Studio and SONAR (alongside plenty of great cross-platform tools). And since presumably Gates still has a house filled with flat-screen projection surfaces, might I suggest a side order of VJing — especially if the music thing doesn’t work out?

Sadly, this leaves the rest of us dreaming for a gestural, multi-touch operating system that isn’t installed in a hotel lounge doing cool-looking but semi-pointless things.

• Apple
• Ableton
• Cakewalk
• Native Instruments
• Cycling ‘74
• Trinity Audio (the mobile Linux folks)

I’ll let you figure this one out; some of those folks have made announcements, and some have not.

Exhibiting at AES? Send me your booth number and I’ll try to drop by! I should be around all weekend.

Going to AES? Let me know…

I’ve decided not to go to summer NAMM this year, so I’ll be covering new tech from afar. I’ll actually be in Chicago through the weekend, updating when I can and probably catching up next week. I have a project I’m really excited about that I’m working on in Chicago, but I can’t tell you what it is until later; stay tuned.

I do know that Ableton will be making an announcement tomorrow which we’ll be covering in detail; other than that, haven’t heard too much dirt.

But if you are in Austin this weekend, CDM wants to hear from you. Take pictures, tell us your impressions, and get instant fame, glory, and our respect for surviving this massive trade show. If not, well, as usual, I’ll be digging through the press releases to find what we really care about and, as always, to cover all the wonderful music-making stuff that doesn’t show up at big industry trade events.

I’d like to thank the Academy . . . Yes, it’s that time of year when the entire global music press put their heads together to pick their favorite products. It’s a bit like an Editor’s Choice, only with all the editors. The results sometimes lack nuance, and I wouldn’t take them as product advice, but they’re always interesting. See the complete results, but here are some of the categories we care about:

Pricey keys: All-stops-pulled beats out economy-sized in the keyboard and synth category. The Clavia Nord Stage, packed with synth capabilities (see Keyboard’s review), beat out the Roland RD-700SX and Kawai MP8. That makes some sense, as the Clavia has the longest feature list, but unless you’re a diehard Nord lover I think the Roland and Kawai are more likely what you’d take onstage with you, with an arguably better feel at a fraction of the price.

As for the Korg OASYS, well, that’s a ten-ton gorilla that deserves to win. Kong might have lost at the Oscars, but the OASYS is rightfully a synth for the ages.

Year of the emulated soft synth? Here’s the one that’s a bit more confusing: both the G-force Minimonsta and the Arturia Prophet V were nominated in the soft synth category, and the Arturia beat out one of the most impressive soft synths ever, Native’s Reaktor 5. “Too hip for the room” is the phrase that comes to mind: Reaktor’s new low-level Core modular sound engine and ground-breaking new synths are a category all their own, but maybe they’re a little too deep . . . Arturia’s melding of old and new in the Prophet V is at least interesting.

Digital beats vintage: Vintage emulation might have been winning out, but real analog and analog-style synthesis, in the form of the Dave Smith Poly Evolver and the Korg Radias, respectively, couldn’t outshine the software integration of the Access Virus TI. Hang on, I lost my train of thought, because I’d love to have a studio with all three. (The Moog would have won handily had it not been introduced at Messe; it’s a sure win next year.)

Digidesign sweep: Digi won recording software (Pro Tools 7), mixing desk (ICON), and via M-Audio, recording hardware (Project mix I/O). Recording software is basically a popularity contest, since the market is split between Digi and Everybody Else (Logic and Nuendo were nominated in this case). But the ICON is an impressive win, beating out the SSL and Neve. I think the purists got their vote split.

Ableton forever: Hint to anyone hoping to win a DJ software award: forget it. Ableton Live manages to sweep every award, in every outlet, in this category, period. Too bad there’s not a “laptop performance” category, but then, that wouldn’t have much suspense, either.

Predictable winners: Gigastudio, Vienna Symphonic Library, Native Instruments Guitar Rig 2, Genelec 8050A nearfield monitors . . . yeah, not so surprising, as these are all top-class competitors in their fields. (Though I think Kontakt is by far the more innovative sampler than Gigastudio in that category, even if that gets me in trouble with the Tascam lovers.)

A few surprises: What’s that? The Korg KAOSS Pad Entrancer VJ effects unit in the DJ category? Go, VJ superstars! (Maybe we’re onto something on CDM.) And is that the affordable Rode NT-2A ($400 for a great condenser) in the mic category?

An old favorite, reborn: Mackie mixers have long been beloved as the Everyman’s mixer. Now, they’re finally computer-savvy, with the Onyx. So it was nice to see this line win as the project studio mixing desk.

The impulse buy: Roland’s Handsonic, mystifying even the folks at Roland, I think, is a cult hit. These bongo-like digital controllers are loved by serious drummers, practicing drummers, and non-drummers alike: quality, fun hardware. And they’re a fun way of triggering software, too. The updated model has a bunch of extras; I might have to pick one up myself.

—

Shawn Pelton and laptop beatboxer virtuoso Kid Beyond will hold clinics. My colleagues Jim Aikin and Craig Anderton will hold power tips sessions on Friday and Saturday. Ableton will provide tutorials on getting started, DJing, and performing. At the M-Audio booth, DJ Sasha, Junkie XL, and Junior Sanchez will join Ableton co-founder/CEO Gerhard Behles and M-Audio’s Robert Hanson to talk about the future of DJing. (I have to admit, I’m more interested in the future of music performance, not just DJing, but still interested to hear what they have to say.) Hey, we should do these kinds of things more often, outside of NAMM. See the full PDF schedule.

If you’re here in Anaheim, be sure to stop by, and if not, with Ableton’s help hope to put as much of this online as possible.

And in the meantime, enjoy these juicy 3D renderings of Ableton’s booth. I’m sure it can’t possibly look this good in person, especially once we clog it up with me and bunches of other NAMM-goers, so don your VR helmet and make believe! (More images after the break. Don’t think they work with 3D glasses, unfortunately.)

Guitarists are finally catching up to their keyboard-playing brethren in embracing digital technology due to a spate of recently introduced products, including the RiffWorks guitar jamming software (which includes online collaboration, shown below) and Gibson’s Digital Guitar.

Software for Jamming

We’ve reported before on Sonoma Wirework’s RiffWorks, a brilliant piece of software that allows even technophobe guitarists to jam with their computers simply by strumming their guitar. Version 2, demoed at CES (and Macworld), adds the ability to to collaborate with actual humans over the Internet in real-time or by recording into saved sessions stored on the server. These sessions can be published to a podcast, webcast, or a personal web page with a single click, complete with an embedded Creative Commons license. Personal web pages allow songs to be organized into albums along with album art and liner notes.

The software will be available by the first quarter of 2006 for Windows XP and as a universal binary for Mac OS X on both PowerPC and Intel Macs. Pricing is yet to be determined.

Digital Guitar

Electric guitars haven’t changed much since the 50’s when such new-fangled innovations as humbucking pickups and tune-o-matic bridges were first introduced. But Gibson is about to wake the electric guitar from its slumber with the introduction of the Gibson Digital Les Paul Guitar.

In most respects, this is a conventional Les Paul, fitted with a special HEX pickup that sends signal to the MaGIC-enabled digital transport system. Guitarists needn’t worry that it won’t work with their collection of vintage stomp boxes and amplifiers. The difference is that audio can be sent in both directions over a standard Ethernet cable and signals can be processed on a per-string basis. Guitarists can adjust the volume, pan, and equalization of each individual string, applying different amplification and effects settings for each. That allows for some wicked chorus and reverb effects.

The guitar includes a breakout box with eight ¼-inch jack outputs (one for each string), plus a classic humbucker and a pass-through for microphones. Two inputs can carry audio back to the guitar for monitoring while a split mode assigns strings to different amps.

Gibson also claims to have eliminated noise and hum through the use of digital signal processing technology that occurs within the guitar itself.

Ed.: Note that the good news on the Gibson Digital Guitar is that it should ship this quarter, at long last. The bad news is, it costs US$3900. Don’t give up digital guitars yet if that’s a little too high for your budget: we’ve covered the idea previously in the form of the much cheaper (and arguably more-useful, with a direct computer connection) iGuitar from Brian Moore. -PK

Previously:

RiffWorks Software Perfect for Writing Songs (Music Player Live preview of the software)

Gibson’s Digital Les Paul Guitar: Innovation or Reinvention? Ed.: I should note, I think I was hard on the Digital Guitar as I hadn’t seen it; Lee has and is more enthusiastic. -PK

Blog Coverage:

Live From CES: Gibson Digital Hands-On [Gizmodo.com]

So, we’re down on tech? As if. Next week, CDM is headed to Anaheim, California for the massive NAMM music show, the single biggest trade event of the year for the musical instruments industry. With a dramatically narrower focus (stuff for musicians), NAMM still has almost half the exhibitors of CES. Except that since the CES exhibitors don’t manufacture drums, guitars, and tubas, meaning this show will be MUCH LOUDER.

Why else is NAMM coooler? Let us count the ways:

Really, the only thing NAMM doesn’t have that CES did (aside from swarms of international press, unless you’re counting us as a “swarm”): a giant porn industry expo next door. I’ll let you decide whether that’s good or bad. For more information, read the incredibly lame imaginary NAMM-goer diary at NAMM’s site or just tune into CDM next week, live from the show.