Korg iKaossilator updated, includes iPad support.

The Korg iKaossilator has just been updated to version 2.0.0. This new update includes quite a few cool features and improvements that make the app that little bit more useful.

The first thing that I noticed was that now the iKaossilator has native iPad support, meaning that now you can run it perfectly on your iPad without having to run it in that annoying x2 mode. I think this is an feature that should have been included at the start, the iPad makes playing and performance a lot easier (as I mentioned in my first review) as the bigger screen allows for more precise control of the x/y pad.

Audio export is another feature that was needed from the start, it's a standard that nearly every music app has and I'm surprised Korg missed it from the original release. Along with audio export comes audio copy which basically allows you to exchange recorded parts from iKaossilator to other iPad apps that support the audio copy feature (GarageBand for example).

Support for soundcloud has also been included in the update. Users can now share their loops, phrases or tracks with the world via. the popular soundcloud platform.

An unusual addition is the flex play function which "makes it easy to generate fills and breaks". Flex is a way of further manipulating your loops, giving you more creative options and room for experimentation. Just hold the loop size or tempo buttons and move your finger around the x/y pad. The x axis will effect the length of the part and the y axis with effect the tempo. By doing this you can come up with quite a few interesting results.

These new features really help the iOS version of the Kaossilator. When I first downloaded it onto my iPhone I could tell that it was a bit limited so I'm glad this update didn't take long to come about. Finally I can use it on my iPad without having to run it in x2 mode.

Update: To celebrate the release of iKaossilator v2.0.0 Korg are offering their other iPad apps for half price until December 2nd 2011.

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Bloom iPhone app

Here's a short video of me playing about with the Bloom iPhone app. Bloom is an ambient generative music app for iOS. It's perfect for creating chilled out loops.

Bloom is available in the app store for £2.49

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Kill The Noise on Propellerheads Reason.

LA Producer kill The Noise speaks out about is love for Propellerheads Reason. The good people over at Propellerheads software have uploaded another awesome artist interview, this time with Jake Stanczak AKA. Kill the noise.

The new Kill the Noise EP is available from BeatPort now.

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Free FoundSound percussion loops and one shots

There's ten loops in this sample pack, the loops are made with recordings of things that I found around my desk.

I've also included the original one shot samples so you can have a go at making your own loops.

Download them Here [.RAR]

All samples and loops from this site are royalty free.

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Voltage controlled sample collection vol.1

If you didn't know, Voltage-Controlled offers a selection of royalty free samples and loops. Every now and then I'll upload a new sample pack to the site, the samples are completely free to download and you can use them in your own productions or music without having to worry about copyright or anything like that.

A few weeks ago my external hard drive decided that it was going to die on me, this resulted in me losing backups of older sample packs and music. So to make sure that this wouldn't happen again I've gone through the site and re-downloaded the samples.

While I was re-building my backup folder I thought it would be a cool idea to upload the whole thing to the site and give you lot the option to download all of the Voltage Controlled samples at once. So that's exactly what I did, I compressed the samples down into two .RAR files and uploaded them.

You can download the Voltage-Controlled sample collection Vol.1 (Part1) here (.RAR)

You can download the Voltage-Controlled sample collection Vol.1 (Part2) here (.RAR)

There's more than 1GB of samples in this collection including, drum loops, one shots, synth hits, synth waveforms, found sound and much more.

As always the samples in this folder are completely free to download and they're also royalty free.

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Ableton live, TouchOSC + FB383

One of my favourite hardware synths that I own has to be the FB383. I've posted about it a few times here on Voltage-Controlled and I've used it in quite a few of the sample packs.

The FB383 is a clone of the famous Roland TB-303 Bassline synthesiser. I picked it up a few years ago from a second-hand place for just £20. It was listed as 'Hi-Fi accessories' so I'm guessing that the people from the shop had no idea what it was that they were selling.

The unit has been sitting on my shelf for a few months now feeling neglected, so I thought that it was about time I took it down for a good jam session.

Because the 383 has no internal sequencer (like the original TB303 does) I've chosen to trigger it using the ABL2 vst plugin via Ableton Live. The drum loops are taken from one of the Voltage-Controlled sample packs that are available to download for free on this site.

I used the TouchOSC app on the iPad to trigger the clips in Ableton. I love how customizable TouchOSC is, creating your own personalised midi controller is a godsend when using music Production software.

I have to admit, the video that I've uploaded has poor sound. This is because It was recorded using the camera on my iPhone. The speakers connected to my laptop weren't turned up very loud so there's a bit of obvious background noise and the mic on my iphone failed to pick up some of the very low frequencies. Other than that the video quality's quite good. After all, I wasn't planning on documenting the sound of the unit and it was recorded just as a random bit of fun. Enjoy.

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PocketLoops iPhone/iPod keyboard dock

I've reviewed quite a few iPhone and iPad music apps here onVoltage-Controlled. I have to admit the majority of them are aimed at experienced musicians and producers that know their way around music software or have basic knowledge of how to program a synthesiser.

But what about the people that are inexperienced with high end music production and just want to make a few beats and have a bit of fun?

Gear4 have announced PocketLoops, a portable music creation platform aimed at the beginner. PocketLoops is a miniature keyboard dock that allows the user to create their own beats and melodies using the PocketLoops app on their iPhone or iPod touch. Just slide your Apple device into the keyboard dock and download the free PocketLoops app from the AppStore.

The app lets you create your own beats no matter what your level of musical expertise. You can record and layer your own musical loops, add drums and perfect your creation without really having to know anything about music creation.

The app also includes a selection of 13 different sounds to play using the Gear4 keyboard dock including synths, organs pianos and more.

If you're already quite confident with your music production skills then maybe this app isn't for you and you'll probably know of some of the other iOS music creation apps out there. But if you just want to have a bit of fun and make a few cool beats on your iPhone then the PocketLoops keyboard dock is available for just £49.99.

You can pick it up now from the Gear4 site now.

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Moog Animoog gets an update.

The Moog Animoog iPad synth has been updated to version 1.0.1. This update brings a few new features to the app and fixes a few bugs.

So, what's included in the update?

Animoog now has support for background audio, meaning that you will still be able hear audio from the app even if you close it. This is especially useful if you want to jam out with some of your other iPad instruments and Animoog at the same time.

There's now a four beat count in for the record module which can be configured in the setup page. Also, a preview button has been added to the timbres page so that you can now select timbres silently or choose to audition them.

There's now a new 'Random Preset' button in the setup page. When you press this all the settings on Animoog with automatically randomise and give you a complete new sound. I'll warn you though, this can get addictive. It's also very hit and miss, you might end up with an awesome sounding preset or you might just get noise and sometimes absolutely nothing at all (silence).

You can get Animoog for iPad in the AppStore now for just £0.69

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Bad links

If you've linked to my site in the past then you will probably be experiencing some dead links. This is because I've recently changed the domain name of the site from dan303.com to Voltage-Controlled.com

This message goes out mainly to people that have linked to the samples and loops that I've uploaded. If you have a link on your site that is broken then you can just change the beginning of the link from 'blog.dan303.com' to 'www.Voltage-Controlled.com'. This should work form all previous links that you've posted.

Ive also set up a redirection page with a 'we have moved' link under the blog.dan303.com domain. So hopefully any links that direct to the old domain will fall onto that redirection page.

If you're still experiencing bad links then drop me an email at DanWeatherall@Voltage-Controlled.com and I'll see what I can do.

-Thanks for your support, Dan.

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Propellerheads ReCycle updates to version 2.2

I'm a big fan of Propellerheads ReCycle and I'm extremely happy to find out that it's been updated to version 2.2. A few months ago my old laptop died and I had to replace it with a better more up-to-date model. Little did I know that the older version of ReCycle wouldn't work on my shiny new laptop because it wasn't compatible with the 64-bit operating system.

For those of you that have never used ReCycle before, it's quite a simple program that allows you to create .REX files from basic audio files. This is especially useful if (like me) you make a lot of loops to use in your music production.

Now that I can use ReCycle again, you can expect some of the newer sample packs that I upload here to include .REX loops as well as basic .WAV files.

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Introducing the Monotron Duo & Delay

Korg have announced two new additions to their family of portable pocket sized analog synths. The Monotron Duo and the Monotron delay are the latest additions to korg's line up of handheld analog synthesizers. I can remember getting my original Monotron through the post earlier this year and spending hours messing around, making huge sounding siren noises and creepy effects. It now sits at the side of my computer distracting me from whatever I'm supposed to be doing and at the same time annoying anyone else that happens to be near me.

It's probably one of my all time favourite pieces of studio gear and I've used it in countless productions and tracks. The raw power that this tiny beast holds is astounding, the sound of that analog filter is pure gold. I'd love to be able to get my hands on one of these new wonderful new Monotrons. The teaser videos have got me pretty exited already.

Korg if you're reading this send one my way for reviewing and I'll be the happiest man alive.

Below are the teaser videos that were uploaded by Korg. I think I might have watched them about ten times each.

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Free soft synth waveforms/ put NI Massive in your Reason rack

I love making music using Propellerheads Reason but the lack of VST support can sometimes get annoying. There are tonnes of top quality soft synths out there that sound amazing but if you're only using reason then your missing out on some awesome sounds. I often find myself making a few loops in Ableton (intro) and then dropping then into an NNXT sampler in Reason so I can build a track around them.

This technique works well if you already know what sort of track you're going to be making. But if you're like me then you'll find that the best work you've done often comes from pure experimentation. In this case you want full control over your sounds so that you're track can evolve and grow over time.

It would be great to drop an instance of NI Massive into your Reason rack but as of yet VST support is not available in Reason.

Another popular option is to import raw waveforms into reason and build your own instrument from that. Fair enough you're not going to be able to replicate your favourite soft synth exactly but it will open up doors to completely new sounds and ideas.

Below I have uploaded a set of waveforms from 3 of my favourite soft synths; Massive, Firebird and Razor. There are ten waveforms from each synth so that's 30 samples in all. All the samples are pretty long so they should stretch out in your sampler giving you quite a decent range of playability.

Load them into your sampler and mess around with them add some effects and maybe a filter. You never know, you might come up with some pretty decent patches.

Download the samples here (.rar)

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Voltage-Controlled. New name, new domain.

So as you have probably noticed, there's been some major changes to the blog. The biggest being the new name. I feel that 'Voltage-Controlled' suits the blog a lot better, it tells new visitors what the blog is generally about and what they can expect to find here.

It was nice to have the blog under the same dan303.com domain but in recent months I've found that the blog has taken on a life of its own, mainly with the many iOS music reviews that I've been doing.

I've decided that it would make a whole lot more sense for the blog to take on its own course, allowing it to grow and expand much further than my own personal space on the Internet. I think the new name will give it a new burst of life and appeal to new and old visitors.

Along with he new name I've updated the look of the blog, the most noticeable aspect being the new banner and side menu icons. I've also made the blog a bit wider because when viewing on a wider screen the blog comes out as a tiny strip in the middle of the screen.

There is still a little work left to be done here and there are probably still a few little bumps and dead links floating around. If you spot anything odd please don't hesitate to contact me.

-Thanks, Dan.

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GarageBand now available for iPhone

I'm always messing around with GarageBand on my iPad, it's one of those apps that gets you coming back again and again. Today apple finally released an update makes it universally compatible across all iOS devices. This means that I can now jam out and come up with new song ideas on the fly.

GarageBand was originally an application for Mac only, sort of like a starter DAW for people that are new to recording. I was never really interested in GarageBand on the mac, to me it seemed very limited for the sort of music that I make. I know a few people that swear by it but then again most of them only use it for recording quick demos or acoustic tracks.

However, the iPad version got my attention. I'm not going to replace my trusty laptop as my main means of recording and sequencing. The iPad is great for sketching out ideas but it's a long way off from being able to take over from professional music making software. But here's the beauty of the iPad version; it gets ideas down and it does it fast. I can pick it up and in half an hour I have the basis of a new tune. If I come up with a cool idea while I'm using any of the other iPad synthesizer apps I can use the audio copy feature and paste it into the sequencer of GarageBand which allows me to arrange it and bring in some other elements using the built in instruments.

Now I can have all of his in my pocket on my iPhone. If I'm out of the house and I get a little inspiration I can just get out my iPhone and start jamming out in GarageBand. All that's missing from this update is iCloud support, I'd love to be able to start a tune with the iPhone and then add more to it later on when I pick up my iPad. Hopefully that will come up in a future update.

GarageBand is available from the AppStore now for just £2.99. If you already have GarageBand installed on your iPad then the update will be free and the app will work across all of your iOS devices.

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