SOUND ON SOUND
**** Score = 4/5 stars. To save wading through the stacks of unwanted vinyl at the local charity shop, Big Fish Audio have produced Breakbeat 3, a two-CD set of live drum loops.
First there was the 4416, then the 2816. Now Yamaha have announced a baby brother for their AW audio workstations, in the form of the AW16G.
This pair of nearfields from EMES offer precision monitoring for small rooms.
**** Score = 4/5 stars. LOP is a superior, consistently played, musically thorough and sensibly programmed library.
*** 3/5 Stars. Recorded in the Townhouse's stone room, Scottish session drummer Geoff Dugmore bashes his way through some classic rock beats with many variations, intros and fills...
The VK8 is Roland's latest addition to their long-established VK series of tonewheel organ emulations. But due to the current popularity of the tonewheel sound, there are now plenty of other Hammond imitators around. Can the new VK stand its ground?
It's a sequenceable filter, it's an amp modeller, and it's a drum machine... it's the AdrenaLinn, the new guitar processor from famed designer Roger Linn, best known for his classic drum machines and sequencing workstations.
What does a sample developer do after creating an acclaimed orchestral strings library? Take a holiday? Not if you're Gary Garritan...
**** 4/5 Stars. This is an experienced, technically accomplished drummer playing some good, controlled multi-purpose rock and pop grooves with a strong, but not unduly aggressive delivery.
At a price point of around £300, there are already very good contenders for your money on the quality condenser mic market. Does the 4040 SM have what it takes to become a front-runner?
Focusrite's Platinum series expands further with an unusually affordable eight-channel mic preamp boasting dynamics on every channel.
**** 4/5 Stars. A copyright-free collection of conventional, innovative and sometimes downright unusual Hammond licks, fills, riffs, grooves, progressions, slides, growls and funky bass lines all designed to spice up any track.
What if you could access the sound and controllability of a range of the best-known classic analogue compressors and EQs, from a single rackmount box, in the digital domain? Two advanced processors from Sintefex aim to offer just this ability.
Akai's MPC sampling workstations have been a studio fixture for nearly 15 years, and the MPC4000 is the most powerful one yet. But the world of sampling has changed dramatically since the MPC2000XL was released. Can an MPC still cut it in the 21st century?
**** 4/5 Stars. While Ghetto Grooves has an obvious hip-hop and R&B bias, it should appeal to producers of every flavour of downtempo dance music.
This hybrid physical modelling, valve and solid-state design, presented in a classic AC30-style format, aims to offer the best of all possible worlds. How far does it succeed?
The Phantom is the first valveless mic from a company known for their top-quality valve designs. Will their solid-state debut make as good a name for itself?
Users of Propellerhead's Recycle could be forgiven for thinking that sample slicing couldn't get much easier, but Bitshift Audio's pHATmatik Pro aims to prove them wrong by offering an unprecedented level of integration with MIDI + Audio sequencers.
Dynaudio Acoustics use cutting-edge digital signal processing, developed with TC Electronic, to increase the fidelity of their existing driver technology.
Sonic Foundry's popular stereo editor takes another step forward with the introduction of non-destructive editing and a multitasking audio engine.