SOUND ON SOUND
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* Score = 1/5. Format: Audio. Over three hours of warm and punchy drumming well suited for modern pop, electronica or hip-hop...
**** Score = 4/5 stars. LOP is a superior, consistently played, musically thorough and sensibly programmed library.
A new company adds another affordable effects unit to the market. But does it have what it takes to compete with the established big names?
Copyright law may be very rigid these days, but in the context of creativity, who actually 'owns' a sample?
Spectrasonics' new software instruments are based around a vast library of sampled material, but also contain enough processing options to make them more like virtual synths. We check out the rhythm-oriented Stylus...
The SOS team rushes to the rescue of a reader in Somerset suffering from boxy vocals, a weedy mix, and a dodgy tweeter.
Surely the only convincing synth pianos are sample-based ones? A sound as rich and expressive as that of an acoustic piano is far too complex to be rendered by subtractive synthesis... isn't it? Let's find out...
The German team behind the inexpensive MARS have been responsible for several SOS-reviewed products in the past, although the MARS is the first under their own brand name Vermona. But is it more of a Trabant than an Audi?
After seven years, one of the most successful digital consoles has been completely overhauled, improving the sound quality and ergonomics, and catering for new high-resolution and surround-sound formats.
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.
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.
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?
Although it features a familiar analogue-style control interface, the CLX440 has a digital interior that allows it to offer advantages such as a 'Look Ahead' facility more commonly found in plug-in processors.
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?
Not content with reviving and staging a 1920s avant-garde work for the first time, Paul D. Lehrman also worked out a way to reunite the piece with its contemporary film, which was never used due to technical problems. This is how...
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?
*** 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...
**** 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.
With record industry cutbacks all round, the prospect of success with a major record label seems more remote than ever for most musicians. So why not start your own? Many of us think about it, but what would you actually need to do? Our new 7-part series tells you...
Some engineers earn a reputation for classic recording techniques and live bands, while others help to create the cutting-edge sounds of modern rap and R&B. From Foreigner and the Rolling Stones to Timbaland and Missy Elliot, Jimmy Douglass has done both.