Industry Talk

Carlsbro Retail's installation arm, CTS, has recently set up a brand-new sales facility near Nottingham. Paul White takes a look around.

When one of the Sony development team for the new Sony MDMX4 MiniDisc multitracker flew into the UK recently, along with the member of the product planning department, it was an ideal opportunity to find out more about Sony's plans for the home studio-based musician. Martin Walker listened in.

Alan Fish-Barnes asks " what's in a name?" and concludes: "quite a lot, actually..."

A surprising amount of the music you hear on TV and radio is not specially commissioned but is taken instead from libraries of ready-written themes. Nigel Beaham-Powell explains how the library music system works and gives some pointers on getting into it.

Paul White talks to Symetrix President Dane Butcher about the birth of a new PC hardware range, Lucid, intended up to open up the world of high-quality computer-based digital audio at an affordable price.

Musicologist and composer Big George wonders...

The proliferation of independent record labels in the USA has increased the demand for low-budget records, and sparked the home music studio market, moving it from spare bedroom demo mill to centre stage. Our man in America, Dan Daley, reports.

If you've heard of Paris's IRCAM, you probably imagine it's government-funded research bunker devoted to a kind of avant-garde sonic and musical experimentation that has little relevance to the average hi-tech musician. Over the last few years, though, as Paul Tingen discovers, IRCAM has been coming down to earth, and a new spirit of openness and commercial awareness now shapes its work.

Designers of the SoundBlaster range, Creative Labs recently unveiled their next generation soundcard, the AWE64 Gold. Paul White discusses the future of PC soundcards with Creative lads Franco De Bonis and Mike Chandler.

Singer/Songwriter Patcee Francis argues that music should transcend technology, not be circumscribed by it.

Within just a few years, the Mackie brand has come from almost nowhere to a prominent position in the project studio mixer market. Now the company are looking to the future and deciding where they can next apply the Mackie philosophy. Paul White takes a busman's holiday to Seattle and looks behind the scenes in R&D.

Debbie Poyser and Derek Johnson fold up the cybermap, put the virtual surfboards back into storage, and conclude their musician's guide to the internet.

'Manager' speaks with forked tongue, says Rehearsal Studio co-owner Nicholee Smith.

Equipment manufacturers frequently boast that with their gear, your creativity will be limited only by your imagination. Electronic musician Ian Boddy explains how his increasing his limitations actually enhanced his work.

The Internet contains far more information than you could hope to assimilate in one lifetime — the problem is finding things you actually want to know about! In the first of a two-part series, Derek Johnson and Debbie Poyser don their Tour Guide badges and present a musician's guide to interesting World Wide Web sites...

These days, you can pick up an Atari ST computer for under £100, and its once-guaranteed studio ascendancy is seriously threatened by the Mac and PC. Paul Ward checked out all the alternatives when upgrading his computer, and decided to stick with the faithful ST. Here he explains why.

The School Of Audio Engineering celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. Debbie Poyser and Derek Johnson talk to SAE founder Tom Misner and European General Manager Rudi Grieme about the school's development into a worldwide concern, the courses SAE offer today, and the changing business of teaching music engineering and production.

This month's Sounding Off lives dangerously, re-opening the dreaded 'Mac vs PC' debate. With tongue planted firmly in cheek Stephen Bennett prepares himself for next month's onslaught of hate mail from PC evangelists...

In this second article on digital music production, Clive Williamson looks at how musicians can use computer technology to get their work from a DAT tape to the final product — the CD.

The pitch-shifting and harmonisation facilities available in the Digitech Vocalist series have been widely acclaimed as the most natural-sounding on the market. Paul White talks to Fred Speckeen of Canadian company IVL Technologies, who are behind the Vocalist and other pitch-shifting technology.

The latest crop of dance-specific sound modules are a bad thing, both for pop in general and dance music in particular, says SOS Contributor and self-confessed 'cynical old hippy' Norman Fay.