Suzy Shinn (Weezer, Fall Out Boy) makes an indie pop song in Pro Tools
Suzy Shinn sat down with us at Sound Factory, where she reacted to the new Splice x Pro Tools integration and made an indie pop track with it.

Bill Burr slams AI band The Velvet Sundown: “These f**king nerds are taking over”Comedian Bill Burr has made clear his thoughts on AI-generated music, particularly that of the Velvet Sundown, the “band” which was recently revealed as an AI project created using Suno.
The fake group went viral last month, with nearly half a million monthly listeners on Spotify. Many people had their suspicions that the band was fake, though, after listening to the music and viewing its very AI-familiar cover art and press photos.

READ MORE: “When you have phones in front of you, it looks like it’s robots”: Producer Raphael Saadiq on the benefits of phone-free shows

The revelation provoked ire among some listeners, and also called into question the legitimacy of those 470,000 monthly listeners, and whether a certain chunk of that figure was the work of bots.
“These fucking nerds have taken over the music [industry],” says Bill Burr. “People who can’t even play instruments, with computers, are inventing bands that don’t exist, writing songs.
“And then they have bots listen to them, so they get, like, 500,000 views and then people think, ‘This is a real band.’ And it isn’t.”
Burr asks: “What fucking world are we living in here? It’s unbelievable.
“These fucking people, they cannot make enough money. It wasn’t enough to be screwing musicians the way that they have, unapologetically, just fucking them over. The entire existence of the music business – they’ve done nothing but absolutely bend over and fuck musicians. And that still isn’t enough. Now they’re the band, they’re writing music.
“This is like Fleetwood Mac meets Funkadelic with just a dash of Bryan Adams. And then they just put it in the thing and it spits it out.”

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Revealing the AI-powered nature of the Velvet Sundown in a phone call with Rolling Stone was one Andrew Frelon, who said “I think it’s important that we allow artists to experiment with new technologies and new tools, try things out, and not freak out at people just because they’re using a programme or not using a programme.”
Only thing is, Andrew Frelon isn’t a real person at all, and in a recent post on Medium, explained why he opted to tap into the online conversation surrounding the Velvet Sundown despite having no affiliation with the project.
“I also noticed in media coverage that since the band had not had much of any social media presence, none of the journalists covering the band had been able to reach out to them for comments or quotes to include in their articles,” the person explained. “This left a gaping void in the narrative around the band, a situation that is dangerous for the reputation of any brand.”
The post Bill Burr slams AI band The Velvet Sundown: “These f**king nerds are taking over” appeared first on MusicTech.

“When you have phones in front of you, it looks like it’s robots”: Producer Raphael Saadiq on the benefits of phone-free showsBy now, the debate surrounding smartphones at music shows and whether or not they should be banned is picking up steam.
High-profile artists including Swedish rockers Ghost have already enacted phone bans at their shows to try and foster a more present atmosphere, with huge names like Sabrina Carpenter also mulling over the idea.
Now, Beyoncé producer Raphael has offered his opinion on the matter, citing his experience after mandating phones be locked away at some of his recent No Bandwidth: One Man, One Night, Three Decades Of Hits shows.

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“Taking the phones away just made it so I can give people the same opportunity that I had as a young [person] going to the Oakland Coliseum and watching The O’Jays,” he tells Tonya Mosley of NPR.
“I mean, I could see them walking up the stairs. I could see the lights on their shoes. I could see the lights on the amps. I paid attention to so much detail. Now, when you have phones in front of you, you see people stiff, and nobody’s moving in the crowd.
“It looks like it’s robots. It’s not really real people. So when there’s no phones… I just – I like it.
“The testimonies I heard, people said, well, they got a chance to hug, kiss, dance with each other…
In general, arguments in favour of phone bans tend to center around Saadiq’s point, that not having access to their phones makes a crowd feel more connected both to the artist on stage and to one another in the moment.
While we asked if it was really feasible considering the legions of teenagers in her fanbase, Sabrina Carpenter recently revealed she was considering the idea, after attending a phone-free Silk Sonic show and saying she’d “never had a better experience at a concert”.
“I genuinely felt like I was back in the ’70s,” she went on. “I genuinely felt like I was there. Everyone’s singing, dancing, looking at each other, and laughing. It really, really just felt so beautiful.”
She continues: “I’ve grown up in the age of people having iPhones at shows. It unfortunately feels super normal to me. I can’t blame people for wanting to have memories. But depending on how long I want to be touring, and what age I am, girl, take those phones away. You cannot zoom in on my face. Right now, my skin is soft and supple. It’s fine. Do not zoom in on me when I’m 80 years old up there.”
Asking fans to temporarily swear off their phones is, of course, a tall order in 2025, and artists will undoubtedly be concerned about dents in ticket sales as a result of such bans. But as it stands, the conversation is picking up momentum.
Indeed, a recent study by phone company Compare and Recycle estimated that fans seeing Oasis’s reunion tour will each watch 12 minutes of the show they attend through their phone while filming. The company says this amounts to 17.3 million minutes of the tour missed collectively.
The post “When you have phones in front of you, it looks like it’s robots”: Producer Raphael Saadiq on the benefits of phone-free shows appeared first on MusicTech.

Live Nation endorses 20% ticket resale cap, full artist controlLive Nation endorses a 20% ticket resale cap along with more giving artists "full control" of how their tickets are resold.
The post Live Nation endorses 20% ticket resale cap, full artist control appeared first on Hypebot.

Sony to launch ECM-778 shotgun mic Aimed at those working in TV and film, the latest addition to the company’s line-up promises to deliver high-quality audio recordings as well as benefitting from boom- and camera-mounting options. 

AI meets Live Performance in Sinvocea’ by DJ DeLaurentisOffering a hint of what's possible when AI meets live performance, Sinvocea’ by DeLaurentis has been named the first winner of the Reply AI Music Contest.
The post AI meets Live Performance in Sinvocea’ by DJ DeLaurentis appeared first on Hypebot.

“Extraterrestrial analogue energy”: Arturia’s MicroBrute UFO Edition is a serious piece of eye candyArturia has unveiled a limited-edition version of its MicroBrute monophonic synthesizer, sporting an alien-themed green-and-black enclosure alongside the features which made the original so popular following its launch in 2013.
While the MicroBrute was discontinued several years for reasons unconfirmed, the mini but powerful synth has landed back to Earth. Here’s everything you need to know about the Arturia MicroBrute UFO Edition.

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For musicians and producers seeking a compact, affordable analog synthesizer with real hands-on control, MicroBrute is a pure analog powerhouse that punches above its size,” Arturia explains.
Obviously, straight away we’re going to talk about the new aesthetic design. While the original 25-key MicroBrute featured a black and grey enclosure – with traditional black and white keys – the UFO Edition is outfitted in Space Black and Martian Green, with tidy visual touches including an alien head in place of the “O” in “MicroBrute”, and Martian Green UFOs scattered across its front face.
Arguably, though, its most alluring aesthetic overhaul is the addition of all-black keys. Very sleek, indeed.
Credit: Arturia
Under the hood, the MicroBrute features a 100 percent analogue signal path, delivering “raw, warm tones without digital oscillators or DSP”.
At its core sits a single VCO with Ultasaw, Metalizer and Overtone controls, while a Steiner-Parker multimode filter offers low-, high- and band-pass shaping.

There’s also a built-in 64-step sequencer and a patchable CV/Gate matrix, offering semi-modular flexibility and seamless modular integration.
Whether you’re a beginner exploring synthesis or a seasoned artist building a modular rig, MicroBrute UFO offers a true analog experience with a small footprint and pro-grade features,” says Arturia.
“Every function is directly accessible from the panel – no menus, no presets, just pure sonic creativity.
“MicroBrute was built to answer a clear need in the synth world: a simple, powerful, and compact analog instrument that doesn’t compromise on character.
“With a full modulation matrix, sequencer, and classic analog signal path, it stands out in a sea of over-complicated or digital-first synthesizers.”
The Arturia MicroBrute UFO Edition is priced at €349. For more information, head to Arturia.
The post “Extraterrestrial analogue energy”: Arturia’s MicroBrute UFO Edition is a serious piece of eye candy appeared first on MusicTech.

“This isn’t just a simple ‘investment’… it is about control”: Over 200 music industry leaders call for an investigation into Universal Music Group’s acquisition of Downtown Music HoldingsBack in December, Virgin Music Group, a part of UMG, sought to acquire Downtown Music Holdings for $775 million. However, music industry leaders are now calling for an investigation into the deal.
According to Music Week, over 200 music industry leaders and CEOs have signed an open letter addressed to Teresa Ribera, the Executive Vice-President at the European Commission (EC), seeking an investigation into UMG’s proposed acquisition of Downtown Music Holdings.

READ MORE: How to record vocals on your phone and mix them to perfection

The letter focuses on how the deal could “stifle experimentation” as UMG already owns a large fraction of the music market – almost 40%, in fact.
Downtown Music Holdings is a large, multi-faceted rights management and music services company headquartered in New York City comprising 10 divisions across “Artist & Label Services, Distribution, Royalties & Financial Services, and Music Publishing”.
The company has over 20 offices across six continents, and its portfolio of businesses includes Songtrust, CD Baby, FUGA and Curve Royalties.
Omdia’s 2024 Music Market Shares report noted that UMG already controlled over “40% of the recorded music market”. As the open letter notes, this is already “near double the second biggest player”, which could lead to an imbalance of “control” of distribution and royalty infrastructure.
“The deal would place a significant chunk of essential infrastructure under the control of the market leader,” the letter reads. “Many independent music businesses are already tied to Downtown’s services, meaning that we would have to rely on our biggest competitor to connect our artists and their music to their fans.”
“That’s why it’s critical that the deal is reviewed through the lens of its “control share” over the digital markets economy, as well as the physical market, not just share by revenue. This isn’t just a simple “investment” in one of the world’s most prominent independent companies; it is about control.”
The letter also notes how the acquisition could “reduce choice for consumers”, as UMG has recently recently absorbed 8Ball Music, Hyperion, Oriental Star Agencies, and more. This could “narrow the range of voices, styles, and cultures” that are supported by the music industry.
“Everyone has a role to play – from the biggest music company in the world to the independent disruptive start-up uncovering new genres and sounds,” the letter continues. “But when acquisitions like this one occur and start to tip the scales too far, we must act.”
“We therefore urge the European Commission to open a detailed phase two investigation to examine the deeper structural consequences of this transaction. The proposed acquisition poses a clear threat to effective competition, innovation, and the growth of the music industry across the EU and globally… We must keep music open.”
So far, the open letter has been supported by the Association for Independent Music (AIM), Beggars Group, Domino Recordings, and more.
Read the full open letter.
The post “This isn’t just a simple ‘investment’… it is about control”: Over 200 music industry leaders call for an investigation into Universal Music Group’s acquisition of Downtown Music Holdings appeared first on MusicTech.

Jack Harlow and Shaboozey’s Management Company has RangeThis week, Ari is joined by Matt Graham to discuss the evolution of artist management and the inner workings of Range Media Partners.

Fictional K-pop groups from Netflix’s ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ dominate streaming chartsThe film's two virtual bands collectively attracted over 25 million monthly listeners on Spotify.
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BioSig, Streamex target gold tokenization with $1.1B financingWith eyes on tokenized gold, the companies plan to merge and launch a gold-backed treasury business.

Platinum Producer Johhny G taps KRK GoAuxArtist and producer Johhny G started, "one of TikTok’s biggest dance trends of 2020 and the viral Chinese New Year Remix #vibechallenge," according to a statement on Tuesday. "Known for his genre-defying style and catchy hits, Johnny G is turning heads with his new KRK GoAux 4 Portable Studio Monitor setup, which is as dynamic as his sound.""Best known for working with iconic talent like YG Marley on songs like 'Praise Jah in the Moonlight,' Johhny G’s production toolkit just got a powerful upgrade," they said. "A long-time user of KRK’s ROKIT 10-3 Powered Studio Monitors, Johnny G has now also embraced the ultra-portable GoAux, and he’s not looking back. 'I like the GoAux because they are compact and convenient,' he says. 'The carrying case makes it super easy to travel and transport where I need to go, and the sound is great as well.'""From impromptu beat-making sessions to vibing out with mixes, Johhny G appreciates the flexibility and uncompromised audio quality that KRK brings to his creative workflow," they added. “I use the GoAux mainly for home mixing sessions,” he explains. “I will set the monitors up and make beats from anywhere — the kitchen, balcony, you name it.”“My KRKs have good, clear sound and have helped me in my creative process,” he adds. “At the end of the day, I want everything to sound good, whether that’s through headphones or in the car, and these monitors help make sure of that.”“I enjoy the aesthetics of KRK in general,” Johhny G adds. “The look of the monitors is cool, and the bright yellow cones really stands out.”“KRK was the first pair of speakers I ever owned,” Johhny G reflects. “I grew up using them, and they really helped me find my sound.”"Whether it’s through his viral hits or high-energy TikTok dance challenges, Johhny G continues to push musical boundaries," they said. "His upcoming single, 'Human,' is set to drop on July 11, and you can bet it’s been fine-tuned on a pair of KRKs.""Johhny G has had a passion for music since he was a child, learning various instruments, singing in the school choir, and making beats in his college dorm room, which is where he discovered his love for mixing," they added. "Music has also been a way for him to bond with his dad, who he says, 'worked a lot of Saturday nights and would be off playing music for hours. Music has always kept us connected.'""As someone with a passion for both creating and producing music, Johhny G is a unique artist with a strong ear for quality sound and diverse musical interests. Instead of trying to box himself into a certain category, Johhny G leaves it up to his music and creates based on feeling, regardless of what label it suits," they said. "With his KRKs by his side, Johhny G continues to create with endless possibilities for what comes next."Check out more of what Johhny G is up to on his social channels @JohhnyG__.Credit @ShottbyjdThe post Platinum Producer Johhny G taps KRK GoAux first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Apple COO Jeff Williams to step down later this monthJeff Williams, Apple’s chief operating officer, is stepping down from his role later this month.

At MIT, musicians make new tools for new tunesThe MIT Music Technology Program carves out a space to explore new sounds, tunes, and experiences. From the classroom to the community, students in music tech grapple with developing both creative technology and their creative selves.In the course 21M.080 (Intro to Music Technology), it dawned on Thelonious Cooper ’25 that he had the skills to create his own instruments. “I can literally make a new instrument. I don’t think most people consider that as an option. But it totally is,” Cooper says.Similar to how the development of photography contributed to a radical shift in the priorities of painting, Cooper identifies the potential of new music tools to “[pave] the way to find new forms of creative expression.” Cooper develops digital instruments and music software.For Matthew Caren ’25, his parallel interests in computer science, mathematics, and jazz performance found an intersection in design. Caren explains, “the process of creating music doesn’t actually start when you, for instance, sit at a piano. It really starts when someone goes out and designs that piano and lays out the parameters for how the creation process is going to go.” When it is the tool that defines the parameters for creating art, Caren reasons, “You can tell your story only as well as the technology allows you to.”What purposes can music technology serve? In holding both technical and artistic questions simultaneously, makers of music technology uncover new ways to approach engineering problems alongside human notions of community and beauty.Building the bridge between music and techTaught by professor of the practice Eran Egozy, class 21M.385 (Interactive Music Systems, or IMS) focuses on the creation of musical experiences that include some element of human-computer interaction (HCI) through software or a hardware interface.In their first assignment, students program a digital synthesizer, a piece of software to generate and manipulate pitches with desired qualities. While building this foundation of the application of hard technical skills to music, students contemplate their budding aesthetic and creative interests.“How can you use it creatively? How can you make it make music in a way that’s not just a bunch of random sounds, but actually has some intention? Can you use the thing you just made to perform a little song?” prompts Egozy.In the spirit of MIT’s motto, “mens et manus” (“mind and hand”), students of IMS propose, design, implement, play-test, and present a creative musical system of their own during the last stretch of the semester. Students develop novel music games, tools, and instruments alongside an understanding of the principles of user interface, user experience (UI/UX), and HCI.Once students implement their ideas, they can evaluate their design. Egozy stresses it is important to develop a “working prototype” quickly. “As soon as it works, you can test it. As soon as you test it, you find out whether it's working or not, then you can adjust your design and your implementation,” he explains.Although students receive feedback at multiple milestones, a day of play-testing is the “most focused and concentrated amount of learning [students] get in the entire class.” Students might find their design choices affirmed or their assumptions broken as peers test the limits of their creations. “It’s a very entertaining experience,” Egozy says.Immersed in music tech since his graduate studies at the MIT Media Lab and as co-founder of Harmonix, the original developers of popular music game titles “Guitar Hero” and “Rock Band,” Egozy aims to empower more people to engage with music more deeply by creating “delightful music experiences.”By the same token, developers of music technology deepen their understanding of music and technical skills. For Cooper, understanding the “causal factors” behind changes in sounds has helped him to “better curate and sculpt the sounds [he uses] when making music with much finer detail.”Designing for possibilityMusic technologies mark milestones in history — from the earliest acoustic instruments to the electrified realm of synthesizers and digital audio workstations, design decisions reverberate throughout the ages.“When we create the tools that we use to make art, we design into them our understanding and our ideas about the things that we’re interested to explore,” says Ian Hattwick, lecturer in music technology.Hattwick brings his experience as a professional musician and creative technologist as the instructor of Intro to Music Technology and class 21M.370 (Digital Instrument Design).For Hattwick, identifying creative interests, expressing those interests by creating a tool, using the tool to create art, and then developing a new creative understanding is a generative and powerful feedback loop for an artist. But even if a tool is carefully designed for one purpose, creative users can use them unexpectedly, generating new and cascading creative possibilities on a cultural scale.In cases of many important music hardware technologies, “the impact of the decisions didn’t play out for a decade or two,” says Hattwick. Over time, he notes, people shift their understanding of what is possible with the available instruments, pushing their expectations of technology and what music can sound like. One novel example is the relationship between drummers and drum machines — human drummers took inspiration from programmatic drum beats to learn unique, challenging rhythms.Although designers may feel an impulse for originality, Hattwick stresses that design happens “within a context of culture.” Designers extend, transform, and are influenced by existing ideas. On the flip side, if a design is too unfamiliar, the ideas expressed risk limited impact and propagation. The current understanding of what sounds are even considered musical is in tension with the ways new tools can manipulate and generate them.This tension leads Hattwick to put tools and the thoughtful choices of their human designers back in focus. He says, “when you use tools that other people have designed, you’re also adopting the way that they think about things. There’s nothing wrong with that. But you can make a different choice.”Grounding his interests in the physical hardware that has backed much of music history, electrical engineering and computer science undergraduate Evan Ingoldsby builds guitar pedals and audio circuits that manipulate signals through electronic components. “A lot of modern music tech is based off of taking hardware for other purposes, like signal filters and saturators and such, and putting music and sounds through them and seeing how [they] change,” says Ingoldsby.For Cooper, learning from history and the existing body of knowledge, both artistically and technically, unlocks more creativity. “Adding more tools to your toolbox should never stop you from building something that you want to. It can only make it easier,” he says.Ingoldsby finds the unexpected, emergent effects of pushing hardware tools such as modular synthesizers to their limits most inspiring. “It increases in complexity, but it also increases in freedom.”Collaboration and communityMusic has always been a collective endeavor, fostering connection, ritual, and communal experiences. Advancements in music technology can both expand creative possibilities for live performers and foster new ways for musicians to gather and create.Cooper makes a direct link between his research in high-performance, low-latency computing to his work developing real-time music tools. Many music tools can only function well “offline,” Cooper poses. “For example, you’ll record something into your digital audio workstation on your computer, and then you’ll hit a button, and it will change the way it sounds. That’s super cool. But I think it’s even cooler if you can make that real-time. Can you change what the sound is coming out as you’re playing?” asks Cooper.The problem of speeding up the processing of sound, such that the time difference in input and output — latency — is imperceptible to human hearing, is a technical one. Cooper takes an interest in real-time timbre transfer that could, for example, change the sound coming from a saxophone as if it were coming from a cello. The problem intersects with common techniques in artificial intelligence research, he notes. Cooper’s work to improve the speed and efficiency of music software tools could provide new effects for digital music performers to manipulate audio in a live setting.With the rise of personal computing in the 2010s, Hattwick recounts, an appeal for “laptop ensembles” emerged to contemplate new questions about live music performance in a digitizing era. “What does it mean to perform music with a laptop? Why is that fun? Is a laptop an instrument?” he poses.In the Fabulous MIT Laptop Ensemble (FaMLE), directed by Hattwick, MIT students pursue music performance in a “living laboratory.” Driven by the interests of its members, FaMLE explores digital music, web audio, and live coding, an improvisational practice exposing the process of writing code to generate music. A member of FaMLE, Ingoldsby has found a place to situate his practice of sound design in a broader context.When emerging digital technologies interface with art, challenging questions arise regarding human creativity. Communities made of multidisciplinary people allow for the exchange of ideas to generate novel approaches to complex problems. “Engineers have a lot to offer performers,” says Cooper. “As technology progresses, I think it’s important we use that to further develop our abilities for creative practice, instead of substituting it.”Hattwick emphasizes, “The best way to explore this is together.”

Better Solid State Heat Pumps Through ScienceIf you need to cool something, the gold standard is using a gas compressor arrangement. Of course, there are definite downsides to that, like weight, power consumption, and vibrations. There are solid-state heat pumps — the kind you see in portable coolers, for example. But, they are not terribly efficient and have limited performance.
However, researchers at Johns Hopkins, working with Samsung, have developed a new thin-film thermoelectric heat pump, which they claim is easy to fabricate, scalable, and significantly more efficient. You can see a video about the new research below.
Manufacturing requires similar processes to solar cells, and the technology can make tiny heat pumps or — in theory — coolers that could provide air conditioning for large buildings. You can read the full paper in Nature.
CHESS stands for Controlled Hierarchically Engineered Superlattice Structures. These are nano-engineered thin-film superlattices (around 25 μm thick). The design optimizes their performance in this application.
The new devices claim to be 100% more efficient at room temperature than traditional devices. In practical devices, thermoelectric devices and the systems using them have improved by around 70% to 75%. The material can also harvest power from heat differences, such as body heat. The potential small size of devices made with this technology would make them practical for wearables.
We’ve looked at the traditional modules many times. They sometimes show up in cloud chambers.