A few words on Steve Jobs, RIP.

Rest in peace Steve Jobs. I've just heard the sad news that the creative legend behind Apple has passed away. His products have helped me and many others like me to learn and craft their specialty and trade. As you probably know from reading this blog I am a huge fan of his work and the products that he has created. I would be completely lost without my apple devices and they have helped me greatly in my music creation and day to day life.

Apple.com has changed its front page to a memorial to Jobs with a short message in his honour. If you would like to share your thoughts, memories, and condolences, please email rememberingsteve@apple.com

I wish Tim Cook all the best in filling his boots and keeping his legacy alive.

Steve, you will truly be missed.

Steve Jobs 1955-2011

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Let's talk iPhone

Guess what I was doing last night? That's right, the same as pretty much every other tech head and gadget freak out there. I was sitting at my desk following the Apple keynote via the Engadget live blog. I was also voicing my opinions and conversing with some of you on Twitter via the iPad. I actually broke a personal record for my Tweet with the most Re-Tweets (I think it was like 40 times. Sad, I know).






'let's talk iphone' was a strange one, and I suppose Apples choice to not give us a live feed should have told us something. That something being that there was nothing actually really exciting going on. What we saw lat night was basically a recap on iOS5/iCloud with a few release dates and the new iPhone 4s. All of this bundled together and spread out across various stats and numbers that made the whole thing sound more impressive.

A lot of us were expecting the announcement of the redesigned iPhone 5, maybe Facebook integration on system level or something completely different. But what we got instead was an identical iPhone 4 that was a little bit faster and took better pictures. You can also talk to it thanks to the new Siri voice recognition feature although I'm not quite sure if I'd ever use it. It does look pretty clever though, it might be a fun pastime to just sit there and insult it for a while.

I'm not even sure why this new Siri feature is only limited to the 4s, surely it could have been built directly into iOS5. Or is it to do with a better built in microphone or something like that? Who knows. But I can't really see it really influencing anyone's decision on upgrading or not. I don't know anyone that uses voice recognition software in the way that they did in that demo video. I've always found the whole talking to technology thing a bit creepy to be honest.

Don't get me wrong, I haven't lost all faith in Apple (I'm actually writing this on an iPad) but I'm just saying that yesterday's keynote was a bit of a letdown. I'm quite positive that we will see some shiny new tech from them soon, be it the iPhone 5 or a third generation iPad. To be honest I'm quite capable of waiting a few months for a new redesigned iPhone, my fouth generation model hasn't let me down yet. Who knows, maybe I'll get lucky and they'll release it on the day that my 2 year contract runs out. That way I can upgrade straight away and once again be an early adopter, one of the cool kids. But saying that, I could just lie and say I have an iPhone 4s. Who would know? They look exactly the same.

Anyway, the best news for me was the release date for iOS5. Bring on October 12th!




I know this post hasn't had anything to do with music but the iOS platform has made quite a name for itself as the way to go for portable music software. I thought I'd stick it up here anyway.

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Pulverizer envelope follower

Here's another quick tip from propellerheads featuring the new pulverizer effect in Reason 6.

This is probably my favourite device that's included in the new Reason update and I cant wait to get my hands of it.

the video shows a creative use of CV routing using the matrix pattern sequencer and the envelope follower section of Pulverizer.



Reason 6 will be available on September 30th. Only a few days to go.

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Name your price for reason 6.

Propellerhead have announced that If you own both reason and record you will be able to name the price that you're willing to pay to upgrade to reason 6.

The guys at Propellerhead software are asking 'what's reason 6 worth to me?'

You can pay as much or as little as you want for this upgrade.

Watch the video for more info.

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Propellerheads Echo micro tutorial

Here's the third micro tutorial that propellerheads have put out there. This time it features the brand new echo effect that will be introduced in Reason 6.

The video showcases some of the features and sounds that the effect is capable of creating.

We're getting closer to the actual realese of reason 6 and this only teases me further. I really can't wait to dive into this software and play about with the new features.

Reason 6 comes out on September 30th.

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Remix Opportunity

Remix my latest track 'King Jellyfish' for a chance to to featured on my latest EP.

I always like hearing remixes of my work. It's a great way to hear what other producers/artists can do with your sounds.

Last year I released my second SKatterBrain album 'The Basic condition of Life' and along with that I put out a free remix album that featured every album track remixed my a different artist.

That seemed like a long time ago and my production skills and style have changed considerably.

So here's the deal; I provide you with the stems and you do pretty much whatever you want with them. I'll pick some of my favourites to go on this new EP. If I don't pick your remix for this release then there's still a good chance that it will surface on another release in the future.

Get the stems here (.RAR)

Here's a clip of the original track.
King Jellyfish [preview] by Dan303

Some basic guidelines:

- Any genre or style is fine.

- There must be at least 1 recognisable part. (Otherwise it's not much of a remix really)

- You have to program your own drums. (I don't provide drum stems & it's more creative if you use your own)

- If you put it on your own site you must make it clear that it's your remix of 'King Jellyfish by SKatterBrain'. (I don't mind putting it out there on the web so people can listen to it)

- If it get's onto the EP and you've already uploaded it elsewhere then a link to the EP would be nice.

- When your remix is done post a link to the .WAV file to DanWeatherall@Dan303.com (Make sure you include your artist name and a link to somewhere people can find out more about you/your music)

Can't wait to listen to some of these remixes, good luck.

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Sunrizer iPhone, iMaschine, New Moog app

The other night I downloaded the new iPhone version of the Sunrizer app for my iPhone, my review of the iPad version proved to be pretty popular and brought quite a few hits to the blog. I was thinking of doing a short review of the iPhone version and sticking it up on here as well but as of yet I've not really got around to it. When I do, I'll be recording a short video of me messing around with presets and sticking it up on YouTube.

There are also a couple of other iOS apps that have got my attention. The first being the Native instruments iMaschine which is an iPhone version of their popular controller/software package. To be honest I'm surprised that they're only advertising it as an iPhone app; I would have thought it would have made more sense to release it as a universal app. The iPad seems to be a more logical choice for beat making software as the screen size helps a lot with playability. I could be wrong, it might actually be a universal app but what I've seen so far it's definitely pointing towards the iPhone.

The second is the new Moog app. I have no idea what it is yet because I've only seen the teaser video that was posted on the Moog Facebook page. My guess is that it's going to be a full synthesizer, maybe a virtual Little phatty synth or something along those lines. I'm thinking it could be in the same class as the Korg iMS20. Whatever it is I can't wait to get my hands on it and have a mess around with it. I loved their Filtatron app but to be fair it was more of a noise maker rather than an actual playable instrument.

These apps are still awaiting release; this is a good time for mobile music making. Finally some of the big companies are realising the potential of the iOS platform for music creation and experimentation. Hopefully some of the other big names will follow their lead. Either way they still have some catching up to do to get to get up to speed with some of the independent developers that have already made a name for themselves on the iOS platform.

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