Neural DSP Technologies Introduces 'TINA' Robotic Amp ModelingAs part of its enduring commitment to pioneering industry-leading amplifier modeling technology, Neural DSP announced the arrival of TINA, the company’s proprietary data-collection robot which takes authentically and faithfully modeling the sonic nuances of a guitar amplifier to an unprecedented level. TINA – a Telemetric Inductive Nodal Actuator – marries mechanical robotics with machine learning to digitally replicate analog devices, such as guitar amplifiers, like never before.

Leveraging the advanced capabilities of TINA, Neural DSP also launched CorOS 3.0.0 and the arrival of Quad Cortex Plugin Compatibility (PCOM), giving creators the ability to access the virtual devices in their Neural DSP plugins on their Quad Cortex. This initial release includes compatibility for two plugins: Archetype: Plini X and Archetype: Gojira X, with additional QC-compatible plugins set to launch in subsequent CorOS updates.

"TINA represents a groundbreaking integration of robotics and state-of-the-art machine learning for audio processing, furthering Neural DSP's commitment to redefining the standards in guitar amplifier modeling accuracy,” says Douglas Castro, CEO at Neural DSP Technologies. “This feat is the result of collaboration between our respective plugin and Quad Cortex teams, who have worked tirelessly to significantly improve the architecture of both platforms to ensure plugins can run on Quad Cortex. We’ve successfully removed all human intervention within the amplifier modeling process – ensuring an unparalleled level of precision in every model by capturing every subtle detail in the amplifier's controls.”

TINA: Leveraging Robotics for Authentic Sound Replication

In the spaces between the markings on an amplifier’s controls — gain, bass, mid, treble, presence, master — there is an entire universe of complex interactions and sonic distinctions. Guitarists will naturally play with these controls in a subjective manner, dialing in changes instinctively. But in trying to digitally emulate that process, even snapshot models of different configurations of those controls cannot translate all of the possible fine-tuned interactive combinations, and managing those million or more combinations would be impossible.

What Neural DSP does with TINA is robotically access the entire spectrum of every control’s range by physically connecting with those controls via actuator arms. Every control is systematically turned with its output recorded. With enough recorded examples (typically thousands of control positions), a neural network is trained to replicate the behavior of the device for each one of these settings. Through this training process, the finished model will also generalize and precisely infer the sound of the device in any unseen control setting and input signal.

TINA does the tedious part, deducing what control positions need to be recorded, plans the sequence to turn the knobs while minimizing wear-and-tear, and finally returns a collection of recordings with all of the related control positions carefully and precisely annotated.

By combining robotic data collection with machine learning, Neural DSP can distill the full range of an amp’s continuous control into a single neural network model with unparalleled precision. It also removes the need for painstaking and often biased human analysis and design. The collected data is always a complete representation of the device and its history; every tube, every transformer, every pot, every ding, and every scratch; anything you can hear and feel will be a part of the data the models are trained on.

“TINA is the backbone of our robust and automated modeling pipeline, pushing the boundaries of model fidelity,” says Aleksi Peussa, Machine Learning Team Lead and Researcher at Neural DSP Technologies. “The collected data provides the ground-truth for the sound and feel of the device. No assumptions, no preferences, no limitations. Purely data. The vast amount of data along with advanced machine learning approaches can systematically push model accuracy to unparalleled levels of realism. Our goal is always to create models that are indistinguishable from the real thing, even by experts.”

To learn more about PCOM and how to update to CorOS 3.0.0, click here and here.The post Neural DSP Technologies Introduces 'TINA' Robotic Amp Modeling first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Link Rot: Why your Digital Links won’t last foreverUnfortunately, link deterioration, often called link rot, is inevitable. Here are some effective strategies for managing its impact on online content. by Bobby Owsinski of Music 3.0 Just about everyone. Continue reading
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Music Sustainability Alliance Announces 2025 Summit and Other ProgramsThe Music Sustainability Alliance, the hub for the industry to learn, innovate, and collaborate to advance sustainability in the music business, has announced its 2025 Summit dates as it ramps up its program offerings.

The 2025 Music Sustainability Summit, held each year on the day after the Grammy Awards, will take place on Monday, February 3, 2025, in Los Angeles.

The event, which convenes leaders from across the industry, covers a wide range of topics related to reducing the negative environmental impacts of the music industry while advancing and accelerating positive impacts.

left to right Kurt Langer, VP & Board Member, Joel Makower, Strategy Director & Industry Council Chair , Amy Morrison, CEO, Co-Founder & Board Member, Eleanor Anderson, Project Advisor & Board Member, Michael Martin, Co-Founder & Board Member

Among the topics covered at the 2024 summit were: 

the role of promoters and venues in advancing sustainability solutions

increasing the use of plant-based foods at concerts and festivals

creating zero-waste events by fostering reuse

advancing alternatives to diesel-powered electricity at events

streamlining industry freight and logistics

reducing the impacts of fan travel to music events

supporting the role of the artist as activist

“The Summit represents a meeting of the minds working on music industry sustainability, both leaders and learners,” said MSA CEO and co-founder Amy Morrison. “The industry has nearly unlimited potential to model the future we all want to see by supporting and propagating leadership practices and technologies that can address the climate crisis, the biodiversity crisis, the waste crisis and other societal challenges. The summit represents an annual opportunity to collaboratively learn and to showcase and accelerate the industry’s progress.”

In addition to planning the summit, the MSA team has recently launched three other initiatives:

— Music Votes, spearheaded by MSA and launched in June, is a collaboration among 20 music and cultural organizations to increase voter participation in the 2024 U.S. elections. It offers a turnkey solution for artists, managers, music companies, venues and other music outlets to have a tangible impact on this year’s election. 

— Three MSA Working Groups have been launched, in which industry representatives are collaborating to identify best practices and develop evidence-based recommendations and propose standards for sustainable practices. The three working groups focus on:

Renewable Energy and Power Solutions

Waste Management and Circular Economy

Reporting, Metrics, and Standardization

— The Green Room, an MSA webinar series, kicks off on September 3, with a session on “Turning Fans Into Activists,” including how musicians and bands are encouraging fans to become politically active, and do so without alienating parts of their fan base. Speakers include singer and activist Dawn Richard and leading sustainability communications analyst Suzanne Shelton. 

Register hereThe post Music Sustainability Alliance Announces 2025 Summit and Other Programs first appeared on Music Connection Magazine.

Warner Music Japan Chief Operating Officer Kazuhiro Shimada exitsShimada joined Warner Music Japan in November 2022
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Lenzo Yoon, one of the key execs behind the rise of BTS, is leaving HYBE (report)Exec joined the company in 2010 as Head of Strategic Planning
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How to plan your next release 2024 [Jay Gilbert]Veteran music marketer Jay Gilbert offers an updated how-to guide for every musician, label, and music marketer on planning your next release.
The post How to plan your next release 2024 [Jay Gilbert] appeared first on Hypebot.

Maximize your Ad Budget as an Independent ArtistThis ultimate indie guide covers strategic planning and targeted marketing to maximize your Ad budget as an independent artist or label. by Tim Jack, CEO @ RiseLA, posted on Symphonic. Continue reading
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Music Tectonics launches 2024 Music Tech Startup CompetitionApplications are now open for the 2024 Music Tectonics Startup Pitch Competition. This multifaceted event empowers startups to gain exposure and get feedback from investors and industry experts.
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Master Your Music Library: Top Tips for Organizing Music FilesTransform your music library with these expert tips for organizing your files. Learn the secrets to seamless file management and boost your productivity quickly.  by CRISTINA CANO of DIY Musician. Continue reading
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5 creative ways to share music using QR codesHere are some innovative ways to share music and expand an audience with QR codes. Learn how these simple codes can make promoting your music more effective and engaging. by. Continue reading
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The Power of Royalty-Free MusicAs disputes between labels and social media platforms like TikTok continue, it may be time to reembrace the sounds that have soundtracked the internet since its early days: royalty-free music.. Continue reading
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Mainstream is the new nicheFive years ago, we made the call that ‘niche is the new mainstream’. Today, this dynamic is so fundamental to music and culture that we are firmly in the stage of second order consequences. Superstars are getting smaller, the long tail is getting longer, and rightsholders are bringing in earnings thresholds to keep that growing long tail at bay. But it was a blog post by my colleague Tatiana – “Did Charli XCX go mainstream, or did the mainstream just go niche?” – that got me thinking whether, now five years in, the mainstreaming of niche has reached a tipping point.

The dynamics of Charli XCX’s career (e.g., 25,000 RSVPs in one hour for a 1,000-cap Boiler Room gig) feel very much like those of Taylor Swift. Of course, the sheer scale of the Swift fandom machine is the big difference – or is it? Is mainstream about actual numbers or reach, or perhaps both? In fact, it is best measured in three key ways:

Absolute scale: how big are the numbers?

Relative scale: how big are the numbers compared to others?

Active reach: what share of the total audience does an artist have?

Let’s use Taylor Swift, as today’s biggest mainstream music artist, to test each.

Absolute scale

There is no getting away from the fact that everything “big” has got smaller. Michael Jackson, arguably the equivalent of Taylor Swift for the peak-CD era, shifted half a billion units worldwide, when units actually meant units. By comparison, Taylor Swift has fewer than 200 million ‘album equivalent sales’ – which of course means this figure is increasingly made up of streams being converted into ‘sales’. Given that so much of streaming behaviour today is radio-like, we would really need to add an estimate of total individual radio listens to Jackson, which would result in a figure that would comfortably end up in the tens of billions in ‘equivalent sales’.Yes, Jackson’s career happened in a different era, when fewer artists were competing and linear broadcast platforms dominated. But that is the entire point of fragmenting fandom.

Relative scale

It is abundantly clear that Taylor Swift has more streams and ticket sales than pretty much everyone else. She is the biggest artist on the planet right now. She has mainstream awareness, but does that make her actual listenership mainstream? 

She certainly has more mainstream cultural clout than her peers, managing to become part of the mainstream media narrative – look no further than the Financial Times running pieces on ‘Swiftonomics’. This is thanks, in large part, to the fact she first built her fandom pre-fragmentation, when music was still much more a part of mainstream culture. It is an advantage enjoyed by other artists, such as Beyoncé, that came up pre-streaming’s peak, and therefore pre-fragmentation. But an FT subscriber reading a Swiftonomics story does not necessarily make them a listener (I’ll hazard a guess that particular conversion rate is not one to sing about). Having mainstream media reach is not the same as being a mainstream artist in terms of listenership, even though the two things did largely go hand-in-hand once upon a time.So, simply being bigger than the rest does not inherently equate to being mainstream. In the same way that the fastest kid at school could leave her classmates for dust but not even qualify for national heats, let alone compete with the fastest runners in the world.

Reach

Active reach is where the picture really comes into focus. The best-selling albums in US history (when sales were sales) were the Eagles ‘Their Greatest Hits 1971-1975’, with 38 million sales, and Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’, with 34 million. Based on the respective populations of the year of release of those albums, the Eagles was bought by 17.4% of the US population, while Michael Jackson was bought by 15.9%. 

Taylor Swift’s best-selling US album was ‘1989’ (6.5 million) while ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ sold 2.9 million. As a share of the total US population, they represent 2.0% and 0.7%. 

Taylor Swift’s biggest selling release has 12 times less reach than the Eagles, while her latest release had less than 1% reach.NOTE: with modern ‘sales’ figures including streams, Swift’s total audience may have been bigger (as many different people’s streams could add up to one sale). But equally, it could be lower, as one person’s streams could add up to multiple units.

Of course, judging Swift’s reach only by album sales – an aging format, and an essentially extinct one for much of her listener base – is unfair. Yet interestingly, the c1% figure doesn’t just apply to Swift’s album sales. The record-breaking ‘Eras’ tour sold 4.5 million US tickets, which is just over 1% of the US population (and Swifties being Swifties, there was probably a decent number who saw the show more than once, meaning that percentage is likely a bit smaller). Meanwhile, Swift’s 26.1 billion Spotify streams in 2023 made her the most streamed artist of the year, yet that was just 1.4% of all global Spotify streams. Now, 1.4% of global streams for one artist is a massive achievement But in the analogue era so many more people would have listened to the biggest artist of the day because radio was the main consumption format, and on radio everyone listens to the same song, whether they like it or not.

None of this is a critique of Taylor Swift, but instead a reflection of the modern music world which she is part of. She is clearly a hugely successful artist at the top of her game. But the game is not the same as it once was. It is not that Taylor Swift is not huge — she is. But she is not mainstream, because mainstream itself is now niche. Charli XCX shows how successful you can be when you understand the power of niche. Niche does not inherently mean small, and its potential is huge. The simple, hard truth is that now everything is niche, even mainstream.

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