FM Transmitter Remotely Controlled Via ESP32Imagine you’ve got an FM transmitter located some place. Wouldn’t it be mighty convenient if you could control that transmitter remotely? That way, you wouldn’t have to physically attend to it every time you had to change some minor parameters! To that end, [Ricardo Lima Caratti] built a rig to do just that.
The build is based around the QN8066—a digital FM transceiver built into a single chip. It’s capable of transmitting and receiving anywhere from 60 MHz to 108 MHz, covering pretty much all global FM stereo radio bands. [Ricardo] paired this chip with an ESP32 for command and control. The ESP32 hosts an HTTP server, allowing the administration of the FM transmitter via a web browser. Parameters like the frequency, audio transmission mode, and Radio Data Service (RDS) information can be controlled in this manner.
It’s a pretty neat little build, and [Ricardo] demonstrates it on video with the radio transmitting some field day content. We’ve seen some other nifty FM transmitters over the years, too. Video after the break.

Universal makes big move in China’s hip-hop scene, inking deal to distribute artists from ‘The Rap Of China’All upcoming songs from the latest season's artists will be distributed globally under UMG
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Teardowns Show Off Serious Satellite HardwareAs hackers, we’re always pulling stuff apart—sometimes just to see what it’s like inside. Most of us have seen the inside of a computer, television, and phone. These are all common items that we come into contact with every day. Fewer of us have dived inside real spacey satellite hardware, if only for the lack of opportunity. Some good gear has landed on [Don]’s desk over the years though, so he got to pulling it apart and peering inside.
[Don] starts us off with a gorgeous… box… of some sort from Hughes Aircraft. He believes it to be from their Space & Communications group, and it seems to have something to do with satellite communications work. Externally, he gleans that it takes power and data hookups and outputs RF to, something… but he’s not entirely sure. Inside, we get a look at the old 90s electronics — lots of through hole, lots of big chunky components, and plenty of gold plating. [Don] breaks down the circuitry into various chunks and tries to make sense of it, determining that it’s got some high frequency RF generators in the 20 to 40 GHz range.
Scroll through the rest of [Don]’s thread and you’ll find more gems. He pulls apart a microwave transmitter from Space Micro — a much newer unit built somewhere around 2008-2011. Then he dives into a mysterious I/O board from Broad Reach, and a very old Hughes travelling wave tube from the 1970s. The latter even has a loose link to the Ford Motor Company, believe it or not.
Even if you don’t know precisely what you’re looking at, it’s still supremely interesting stuff—and all very satellite-y. We’ve seen some other neat satellite gear pulled apart before, too. Meanwhile, if you’ve been doing your own neat teardowns, don’t hesitate to let us know!

PSPaudioware introduce Datamix A567 PSPaudioware say that their latest EQ plug-in has been designed to almost never sound neutral, and that simply placing it on a DAW track with all its bands set to zero will be enough for users to either love or hate it!

Viral hit The Spark by Irish youth group has been longlisted for two Grammy AwardsViral drum ‘n’ bass track The Spark, created by an Irish youth group, has been longlisted for two Grammy Awards.
The song was made by a supergroup of children from across Ireland. Created by the Kabin Crew in Cork, it was then completed with help from children from a refugee centre in Clare, known as the Lisdoonvarna Crew. It gained both media attention and virality across TikTok and Instagram since it was released last May.

READ MORE: “The rules regarding the right way to do it – none of those are real. You can discard all of them”: Rick Rubin says there’s no “right” way to make music

The Spark has made the longlist for both Best Dance/Electronic Recording and Song of the Year. The final shortlist for the 2025 Grammy Awards will be announced on 2 November. The ceremony for the awards, which will mark its 67th year, will take place in Los Angeles on 2 February next year.
You can remind yourself of the hit track below, that’s if you’ve ever managed to get it out of your head since it was released:

The Spark was recorded at The Kabin Studio, a youth music space housed in a repurposed metal container in Knocknaheeny, Cork. The studio was set up in 2012 with the support of Music Generation Cork City. The song was originally made as part of its Rhyme Island initiative for the Cruinniú na nÓg festival, an annual event championing young creativity. At the time of writing, it has over six million views on YouTube alone.
Creative director of The Kabin Studio, known as GMCBeats (real name Garry McCarthy), shared their Grammy longlist news on Instagram earlier this October: “What a mad few months this has been! A song that we created for the Rhyme Island initiative with the crew of legendary kids and tutors at The Kabin and in Lisdoonvarna is longlisted for the Grammys,” he wrote. You can check out his post below:

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A post shared by Garry / GMCBeats / Kalabanx @ The Kabin Studio (@gmcbeats)

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LANDR Composer is an AI-driven plugin for creating chord progressions, melodies and harmoniesOnline mastering and music creation platform LANDR has acquired Orb Plugins, and quickly put its expertise in AI plugins to use with the all-new LANDR Composer. Driven by AI, the plugin aims to support artists in generating chord progressions, basslines, melodies and harmonies.
Essentially an enhanced version of Orb’s existing Orb Producer Pro plugin, LANDR Composer “integrates the best of Orb’s powerful assistive intelligence algorithms into LANDR’s ecosystem, offering an intuitive, efficient, and refreshing experience for creators at every level”.

READ MORE: Behringer’s new Grind hybrid semi-modular synth features oscillators from Mutable Instruments

New features brought by LANDR Composer include:

Assistive Chord Generation: Automatically create and tweak complex chord progressions and individual chords.
Assistive MIDI Generation: For generating unique chord, bassline, melody and arpeggio performances.
Scenes and Song Mode: Organise and arrange multiple musical ideas into a full composition.

Chord Progression Guide: Edit, move, and refine chords to perfect your harmonic sequences.

Preset Sounds and MIDI Editing: Use the built-in synthesizer to generate sounds and edit MIDI with a piano roll for precise control.

Performance Modifiers: Using simple controls, you can easily modify musical elements of MIDI-generated patterns, such as polyphony and humanization.

Drag-and-Drop Integration: Easily drag MIDI patterns into your DAW.

“We are thrilled to welcome Orb Plugins products to LANDR and to introduce LANDR Composer as a key part of our suite of creative tools,” says Pascal Pilon, Founder and CEO of LANDR. “Our mission has always been to make music creation accessible to all by providing high-quality, cutting-edge tools. This recent acquisition has allowed us to enhance the unique technology developed and refined by the Orb team over the past decade and add new features that bring even more fun and excitement to the music creation process, all while maintaining complete creative control for artists.”
Adds Richard Portelli, CEO of AI music tool maker Hexachords: “As the CEO of Hexachords, I’m excited about the synergy between Orb’s innovative technology and LANDR’s cutting-edge products. This integration combines our strengths, offering music makers a more seamless and enriched creative experience. With this acquisition, LANDR will be able to push the boundaries of what’s possible, bringing enhanced features and fresh inspiration to artists everywhere.”
You can find out more about LANDR Composer below:

LANDR Composer is available both as part of selected LANDR Studio subscription plans, and individually for $149. For more information, head to LANDR.
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How to Stand Out on Spotify Wrapped 2024: A Musicians GuideSpotify has signaled that its 2024 Wrapped will launch soon. This guide on How to Stand Out on Spotify Wrapped 2024 offers a simple roadmap for every musician to become part of this global music phenomenon.
The post How to Stand Out on Spotify Wrapped 2024: A Musicians Guide appeared first on Hypebot.

Avenged Sevenfold celebrate their 25th anniversary with spooky virtual museum inside FortniteMetal band Avenged Sevenfold have launched a virtual museum inside Fortnite, but with a spooky twist.
The museum celebrates the band’s 25th anniversary, and doubles up as a virtual escape room. In a statement shared via their official website, the five-piece state that you do not need to be a gamer to enjoy The Museum, and that users can simply use problem solving skills to navigate their way through a fun experience.

READ MORE: “We’re taking power away from corporate networks, and saying, ‘No, we’re gonna reward our fans, not you’”: M. Shadows on Avenged Sevenfold’s new Fortnite-style Season Pass

“25 years have absolutely flown by. We wanted to do something to mark the occasion of our vast history by not just looking backwards but also forward,” the band say. “We started throwing around the idea of a gallery or museum of sorts to display art and eras of the band, but it was important to us to reach more people virtually.
“With The Museum, fans are able to control their own narrative as well as unlock hidden meanings, recordings and easter eggs. This project quickly got larger and larger as we worked with our friend Ryan McKinnon [artist who works with Unreal Engine] over the last year. What we have now is basically a fully virtual gallery, experience and escape room. We hope you enjoy taking a trip down memory lane with us… To 25 more.”
Fortnite Islands is a place within the Fortnite universe where players can create their own games, content and experiences using UEFN (Unreal Editor for Fortnite).
Take a closer look in the teaser below:

This virtual experience lands as no surprise, given that A7X have been exploring fan experiences in virtual realms for some time now. Following the 2021 launch of their NFT-based fanclub, Deathbats Club, the outfit also launched Season Pass – a direct-to-fan loyalty platform offering a number of perks – in March this year.
By “participating” in the band’s ecosystem – via attending concerts, streaming music, and buying merch – fans are rewarded with points that can be used to unlock tiered rewards including collectibles, merchandise, unreleased music and even real-life experiences.
Frontman M Shadows explained in an interview with MusicTech earlier this year that much of the motivation behind Season Pass is to take back the power from large corporations which put bands into boxes with regard to how they reward their dedicated fans.
“[Corporations] want to come to the artist and say, ‘We’ve built a business off of you, and now we want to reward the fan, but you can’t reward the fan, we want you to allow us to reward the fan in our own way,’” he said.
“And we’re taking that power away from them, and saying, ‘No, we’re gonna reward the fan – who is the same fan that participates in all of your corporate networks – and we’re gonna reward them in the way that we feel is the most meaningful, which is access to us, things that we want to give them, not through [corporate networks] but through us.’”
To access The Museum, simply download Fortnite on any device. When prompted with the search bar, you’ll need to enter island code 5592-6865-3961. Find out more via Fortnite.
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Don’t miss Music Tectonics’ Creator Fair: Get $25 Discount Tickets NowNext week's popular Music Tectonics Conference has added a companion Music Tectonics Creator Fair on Oct 23rd in Santa Monica.
The post Don’t miss Music Tectonics’ Creator Fair: Get $25 Discount Tickets Now appeared first on Hypebot.

From UMG’s [PIAS] buyout to Concord’s $217m Daddy Yankee deal… it’s MBW’s Weekly Round-UpThe biggest stories from the past week – all in one place…
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No, vinyl sales aren’t down this year – they’re still on the riseVinyl record sales are still on the rise, it has been confirmed, following reports that claimed the US market was down 33 percent.
A number of news outlets were under the impression that sales had declined for the first time in 17 years since the vinyl revolution revived the medium once again. The data for such reports came from Billboard’s Market Watch weekly report, which automatically updates with data provided by the company Luminate. The company had recently changed how it gathers its data, leading to some confusion.

READ MORE: Ticket touts cost UK music fans an extra £145 million per year: “All too often fans are forced to pay a price decided by a stranger on the internet”

Discogs reached out to Luminate following such reports, and it now shares that Chris Muratore, director of partnerships at Luminate, confirms that the reported data was incorrect, and that vinyl sales are actually up by 6.2 percent. Billboard has since clarified this within its Market Watch report, and other news outlets have also updated their articles.
Luminate’s previous reporting process was in place for over 30 years, and involved “sampling independent stores to extrapolate sales of CDs, vinyl, and cassettes for the entire US marketplace.” Its new system was implemented on 29 December 2023, the first day of its 2024 calendar, and involves counting actual sales from independent stores in the entire US market, as per Discogs.
In Luminate’s mid-year report, the company stated: “While the new modelled methodology more accurately represents the independent retail market, we do not have comparable historical data to provide an accurate year-over-year trend. Therefore, independent retail physical sales are not included in our H1 2024 vs. H1 2023 US physical sales reporting.” To summarise, while Luminate now claims that vinyl sales are up 6.2 percent, this number does not include independent record stores from 2023 or 2024 to avoid an unfair comparison.
In other similar news, data shared at the end of 2023 by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) noted that the CD market had sustained its smallest annual decline in nearly a decade last year as it moved closer to plateauing. Nearly 11 million CDs were sold across the year, while sales of cassettes topped 100,000 units in a calendar year for the fourth consecutive year.
Further details on physical music sales for 2024 will likely come in over the next two months as the year comes to an end. MusicTech will bring you this data as soon as we have it.
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Beginner’s Guide to Music PublishingIf you've made some music and now you're looking for the next steps, you've come to the right place. This guide covers what music publishing is and the significant role it will play into your music success.
The post Beginner’s Guide to Music Publishing appeared first on Hypebot.

Grab 10 plugins for $49.99 with the Brainworx Heritage Bundle
If you’re looking for more advanced mixing tools, keep reading because we’ll cover a great bundle today! Until the end of October, you can get 10 Brainworx plugins for $49.99 total, which is a hefty 96% discount! Brainworx has been a staple of the audio plugin world and continues to make great tools for music [...]
View post: Grab 10 plugins for $49.99 with the Brainworx Heritage Bundle

Origin Effects launch free IR Cab Library Origin Effects have released an impulse response library that includes captures of six cabinets and combos that were used in the development of their popular emulation pedal. 

HYBE’s Weverse to launch new superfan subscription tiers… and keep up to 60% of the moneyWeverse will reportedly take up to 60% of the revenue generated on its new paid membership service
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