Getting It Done: Last week in D.I.Y. & Indie MusicLast week, our tips and advice for independent, do-it-yourselfers covered how to promote music with Instagram Reels, how often to post on social media, and more.
The post Getting It Done: Last week in D.I.Y. & Indie Music appeared first on Hypebot.

REWIND: New Music Industry’s Last Week in ReviewCatch up on what everyone in the music industry was talking about last week, with MediMusic transforming healthcare; a report revealing songwriter stats, and more…
The post REWIND: New Music Industry’s Last Week in Review appeared first on Hypebot.

Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway sells half its Apple stockWarren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway cut its Apple holding by around half, to $84.2 billion, according to an SEC filing. While Apple remains the firm’s largest stock holding by far, Buffett had already reduced its stake by 13 percent earlier this year, hinting that he didn’t mind selling “a little Apple” for tax reasons. Berkshire Hathaway […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

Steam Deck, Or Single Board Computer?With a number of repair-friendly companies entering the scene, we have gained motivation to dig deeper into devices they build, repurpose them in ways yet unseen, and uncover their secrets. One such secret was recently discovered by [Ayeitsyaboii] on Reddit – turns out, you can use the Steam Deck mainboard as a standalone CPU board for your device, no other parts required aside from cooling.
All you need is a USB-C dock with charging input and USB/video outputs, and you’re set – it doesn’t even need a battery plugged in. In essence, a Steam Deck motherboard is a small computer module with a Ryzen CPU and a hefty GPU! Add a battery if you want it to work in UPS mode, put an SSD or even an external GPU into the M.2 port, attach WiFi antennas for wireless connectivity – there’s a wide range of projects you can build.
Each such finding brings us closer to the future of purple neon lights, where hackers spend their evenings rearranging off-the-shelf devices into gadgets yet unseen. Of course, there’s companies that explicitly want us to hack their devices in such a manner – it’s a bet that Framework made to gain a strong foothold in the hacker community, for instance. This degree of openness is becoming a welcome trend, and it feels like we’re only starting to explore everything we can build – for now, if your Framework’s or SteamDeck’s screen breaks, you always have the option to build something cool with it.
[Via Dexerto]

Homebrew Relay Computer Features Motorized ClockBefore today, we probably would have said that scratch-built relay computers were the sole domain of only the most wizardly of graybeards. But this impressive build sent in by [Will Dana] shows that not only are there young hardware hackers out there that are still bold enough to leave the transistor behind, but that they can help communicate how core computing concepts can be implemented with a bungle of wires and switches.
Created for his YouTube channel WillsBuilds, every component of this computer was built by [Will] himself. Each of the nine relay-packed protoboards inside the machine took hours to solder, and when that was done, he went out to the garage to start cutting the wood that would become the cabinet they all get mounted in.
The entire build process is documented in the video, and is interwoven with short segments that go deeper into the various concepts at play. If you’ve never been able to figure out how a box full of relays can add numbers together, this might be the video that finally makes it click for you (no pun intended).
We were particularly impressed with [Will]’s determination to not let any modern technology sneak into his build. When researching other relay builds, he found that some of them relied on anachronistic components like the 555 timer or quartz crystals to generate the clock signal. That simply wouldn’t do, so he initially tried to put together a variation of the clock circuit that [Paul Law] used in his gorgeous relay computer. In the end he couldn’t quite get it working the way he wanted, so he went really old school and came up with a clock module that uses a motorized cam and microswitch to generate the necessary pulses.
In the era of the 10 cent microcontroller, when it’s often easier to write a few lines of code to get something working than figuring out how to do it with discrete components, this project is certainly refreshing. Especially when it’s coming from a younger maker. [Will] definitely came away from this build with several new skills under his belt and a new appreciation for concepts that many of us take for granted these days, and we’re looking forward to seeing what he comes up with next.

Why indie labels are mastering the art of reissuing musicArthur Verocai, Mary Clark, Gloria Ann Taylor, William Onyeabor, The Supreme Jubilees, — all artists that, before recent reissues, you’d likely never heard of. Thanks to the relentless devotion of independent labels and crate diggers, these artists and countless others have seen a second wave of renown and success. With their music being remastered and redistributed, these old-school gems have found their way to DJs, dancefloors and streaming algorithms, which are letting them shine decades past their original release.

READ MORE: How will young people learn music and production in a post-AI music industry?

Reissuers spend countless hours securing audible gold to democratise access to PVC slices of tropical cool; music from far off lands that would only exist with exorbitant price tags, if available at all. If done right, reissuing contextualises the music and the culture it originates from – distributing revenue fairly and ultimately bringing new attention to deserving artists.
This, however, is no easy job. So, here, we learn from some of the most interesting reissuing labels around, the artists who’ve benefited from the process, and an award-winning audio technician who’s remastered and pressed much of this work to glossy new vinyl.
The process
“There’s always a story, and never an easy licence”, says Kevin Griffiths, who founded the wonderfully eclectic Isle of Jura Records in 2016. First, you choose a piece of music that deserves to be more accessible. Next, through a lot of “mundane detective work” you find the best quality physical copy you can and contact the licence holders – preferably the artist and original record label but, failing that, the producer, writer, or artist’s next of kin. From here, you work out a licensing arrangement; commonly five years of streaming, plus the remastering, repressing, and distribution of newly-pressed physical media.
Some reissues come together easily, such as Parisian Afrobeat and Afrofunk label Hot Casa’s reissue of Benin singer Stanislas Tohon’s killer 1985 four EP Owhaaou…! — as the French label had mutual connections with Stanislas. Others… not so much. Julien Le Brun, the label’s founder took seven years and eight or so trips into Togo to make its Togo Soul 2 compilation, a 13-track treasure-trove of rare and unusual music from the West African state.
A successful reissue often relies on strong personal connections and networks to find the original physical media and the original artist or label. Hot Casa’s musical connections, as well as the shared culture and language between France and its former colonial subjects in sub-Saharan Africa, are vital assets to founder Hot Casa’s reissuing catalogue.
Napo de mi Amor, an artist whose music was reissued by Hot Casa for their ‘Togo Soul’ compilation series.
When mutual connections aren’t present, it gets tricky. The quest to find the original creator of great music has even led Isle of Jura, based in Australia, to hire a private detective to hunt down the original creator of a record that has never had a full release, from 1982 New York.
Griffiths says he was introduced to the PI through a friend at another label who’d also used his services. It’s “unusual” for the label to go down this route, and this was the only time Isle of Jura had done it, but all other avenues were exhausted and there was little info online. Although he was successful in finding out who the artist was, they’d unfortunately passed away. Griffiths managed to find a family member, but at the time of writing, no licensing agreement has been arranged.
Even when you find the original creators, it isn’t certain that it will result in a reissue. After many hours, Hot Casa tracked an artist who wouldn’t give the rights over on religious grounds, as they became a devout pastor. The label has over 20 pieces of music they want to reissue but can’t because they either can’t find the person or said person won’t give permission.
The ethics
The benefits that reissuing provides to the original artists, both artistically and monetarily, are undeniable. Although some relationships between label and artist are inevitably shaped by the historical legacy of colonialism, the original artist still benefits greatly and withholds all artistic licence and responsibility. The benefit may be mutual, but it is far from exploitative; it’s symbiotic.
However, we can’t ignore streaming platforms’ insufficient contribution to original artists or labels. Josh FB from Discoteque Tropicales, a London-based brand specialising in Zouk and other classic French African dance music, adds that, despite the significant reach streaming can provide, this isn’t “sufficient to support artists”. Purchasing digital copies of music, if and when possible (particularly off Bandcamp, where fans have paid artists and their labels $1.3 billion to date), is still, and probably always will be, better than listening on streaming services.
Ronnie Lion x Isle of Jura
When considering the circumstances, however, even limited income from streaming is better than nothing — which may be what these artists would receive if their music stayed locked in insular markets, and only available on physical media; and this is before we consider any future potential revenue this new-found audience could provide through vinyl sales and concerts further down the line.
Reissuing is a positive force economically. Culturally, however, there is a fine line to tread; like timeless art or historical objects in museums, care must be taken to properly contextualise the artist and the art to pay homage to their work and the culture that created it.
It wasn’t made in a vacuum — and a reissue is merely a reflection of the powerful work already done by someone else; the limelight is theirs. Focusing the story on this, rather than picking it up from where and when the label found it, is essential to not whitewashing art and erasing the culture that made it. This should be as much of an act of historicising and story-telling as remastering, marketing, and distribution.
Sound quality
Some audio purists debate about reissues, often claiming that they’re not reproduced from analogue source material and, therefore, are of lower audio quality.
There is some truth to this. It’s unlikely you’d find the original lacquer cutting of an old recording, especially rare productions from developing countries. However, the reason the quality may be poor isn’t due to digital technologies poisoning the analogue process – particularly in this context.
Digital doesn’t necessarily mean worse. In fact, we’ve never had access to better-sounding material thanks to all the digital tools that can complement the work done by analogue workhorses. This “wasn’t true in the 90s” due to limited technologies and “flawed” CD formats, says Frank Merritt, leading technician and owner of The Carvery – a multiple Grammy-nominated vinyl cutting and mastering studio in East London. But it certainly is now. “It’s all contextual, and a hybrid approach is best.”
Frank Merritt of The Carvery.
Access to the original master copy, if made by a purely analogue process and if stored in perfect condition, would likely create the best copy reissue. Since this is far from likely, however, the best quality reissues today are made via hybrid technologies. Merret says that digital tools can remove “80 to 90 per cent of clicks to clean up a damaged physical copy” – a real asset for potentially damaged physical media.
The main pieces of tech Merret uses for reissues are the following, although he stresses he doesn’t always need them all:

Neumann W492 and W495B equalisers
Maselec MTC-1X Mastering Transfer Console
Thermionic Culture Phoenix tube compressor
Maselec MEA-2 equaliser
Klark-Teknik DN-50 reverb
Gyraf Audio Gyratec XXI Magneto-Dynamic Infundibulum multi-band analogue soft clipper
CEDAR restoration software
iZotope RX

All things considered, putting new material to wax is best done via analogue. There have been cases of big labels skimping on quality for profit – which led the excellent folk and country duo Gillian Welch and David Rawlings to press their own cuttings following the Dutch label Music On Vinyl using a CD source to make “poor–sounding” vinyl copies of Ms. Welch’s 2003 album Soul Journey.
“What people do nowadays is take a digital file and just run vinyl off that,” says Rawlings. “In my mind, if we were going to do it, I wanted to do it the way the records I love were made – from analogue tapes.” So, in 2000, the pair spent $100,000 on their own record-cutting lathe to make sure the labels pressed analogue-sourced material.
Reissues shouldn’t be held to the same standards as a new, original pressing. The remastering process for a reissue is just doing the best it can to improve flawed copies of old music which can’t be re-recorded, and which otherwise wouldn’t be heard at all.
As Zag Erlot, the man behind the hit YouTube channel and mix series My Analog Journal, says: “When you know the reissuing label won’t disappoint, I cannot see a reason why anyone would spend hundreds, if not thousands, on an original pressing that is probably not going to be in great condition. At the end of the day, a DJ shouldn’t play a tune with lots of crackles.”
The people behind the music
We should be grateful, then, to those who undertake the mammoth task of a successful reissue. It’s an act that can mean far more than may appear at first glance. Yes, previously unheard and unappreciated music can now grace more peoples’ ears and the turntables of enthusiasts, but what’s more beautiful is that new life that can be given to original artists following a successful reissue.
Sometimes, this simply reignites a passion; a wonderful thing when four decades or so after your work, someone tracks you down and wants to invest in your art and spread it to new listeners.
Other times, it starts a chain reaction worthy of a biopic. Reissues have shone a light on genius artists, who are now perhaps forgotten and stuck in everyday drudgery – inspiring a second wind in their musical career. Sometimes, this even results in new music and tours decades after their original creations.
This is best summed up by Discoteque Tropicales, whose killer reissue of Guadeloupean Manix’s 1988 EP Voyager, inspired the artist to say: “Now in my 70s, what a joy it is to discover my songs are being loved in new parts of the world that I could never have imagined them spreading to in the mad 80s. A reissue is like a renaissance, a second wind that reaffirms my belief that both music and love will never die.”
Discotheque Tropicales with Manix following his reissue
One particularly impressive story is Who is William Onyeabor?, a 2013 compilation album by William Onyeabor released by Luaka Bop. This was the first official reissue of the artist, who was widely heard in Nigeria in the late 70s and early 80s, but remained reclusive and had little influence outside of his home country.
Following the reissue, William found a new international interest in his music. In 2014, Noisey released Fantastic Man, which documented Onyeabor’s legacy as well as Noisey’s attempt to track him down for an interview. His song Fantastic Man was also featured in a television commercial for Apple’s iPhone 7 Plus in 2017, as well as a 2023 commercial for H&M. Onyeabor died at his home in Enugu from natural causes in 2017, aged 70.
The consequences
Pioneering artists, particularly from the broad musical umbrella of Afrobeat and Afrofunk, made (and still make) timeless music – but it’s often unavailable to those outside of their regional markets. Through significant effort, investment, and time taken, reissuing labels and their remastering engineers change this.
So, let’s salute the record hunters trawling through dusty boxes in far-off lands or those closer to home. They take the time to find lost gems, restore their natural shine, and democratise access, so everyday people like myself can feel the warm glow of cool success as we get a rare record out and place it gently onto the platter.
The post Why indie labels are mastering the art of reissuing music appeared first on MusicTech.

TINA amp modelling neural DSP 😎

Zoom announce MS-80IR+ MultiStomp  Zoom have announced the release of the MS-80IR+ MultiStomp, the latest addition to their acclaimed series of multi-effects and modelling pedals.

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.

Ethereum futures open interest hits 19-month high, yet ETH price weakness intensifiesEthereum derivatives metrics show increased activity, indicating higher interest but not necessarily a bullish trend.

FTC and Justice Department sue TikTok over alleged child privacy violationsThe U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department are suing TikTok and ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, with violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). The law requires digital platforms to notify and obtain parents’ consent before collecting and using personal data from children under the age of 13. In a press release issued […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.

Custom Hat Gives Vintage Mitutoyo Calipers a New Lease on LifeMetrology fans are usually at least a little bit in love with Mitutoyo, and rightfully so. The Japanese company has been making precision measuring instruments for the better part of 100 years, and users appreciate their precision almost as much as the silky smooth feel of their tools. If you can afford it, a Mitutoyo caliper is quite an addition to your toolbox.
As good as they are, though, they’re not perfect, which is what led to this clever Mitutoyo digital caliper hack by [turbanedengineer]. The calipers in question, a digital set from the early 1980s, happen to have a unique history with a tangential Hackaday angle — they belonged to [Dhaval], mechanical engineer and avid motorcyclist who happens to be the late elder brother of our own [Anool Mahidharia].
The tool, in need of a little TLC, made its way to [turbanedengineer] who first restored the broken battery contacts. Once powered up again, it became apparent that while the caliper’s native metric measurements were spot on, the internal conversion to inches was considerably off. This led [turbanedengineer] to the data port on the tool, which is intended to send serial data to an external computer for logging measurements. After a little experimentation to nail down the data format, he prototyped a tiny circuit using an ATtiny85 and an OLED display that reads the caliper data, converts metric to inches, and displays both measurements on the screen. The prototype led to a more permanent version, which cleverly sits over the original display and taps into the data port without any free wires. The video below shows the very slick results.
Our hearts go out to [Anool] and his family for their loss, and we tip our hats to [turbanedengineer] for his thoughtful and respectful hack of a storied tool. We know that anthropomorphizing tools makes no rational sense, but we think it’s safe to say that a tool like this has a soul, and it’s probably happy to be back in the game.

Over-molding Wires with Hot Glue and 3D Printed MoldsWe’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: water always finds a way in. That’s particularly problematic for things like wire splices in damp environments, something that no amount of electrical tape is going to help. Heat shrink tubing might be your friend here, but for an electrically isolated and mechanically supported repair, you may want to give over-molding with a hot glue gun a try.
The inspiration for [Print Practical]’s foray into over-molding came from a video that’s making the rounds showing a commercially available tool for protecting spliced wires in the automotive repair trade. It consists of a machined aluminum mold that the spliced wires fit into and a more-or-less stock hot glue gun, which fills the mold with melted plastic. [Print Practical] thought it just might be possible to 3D print custom molds at home and do it himself.
His first attempt didn’t go so well. As it turns out, hot glue likes to stick to things — who knew? — including the PETG mold he designed. Trying to pry apart the mold after injection was a chore, and even once he got inside it was clear the glue much preferred to stay in the mold. Round two went much better — same wire, same mold, but now with a thin layer of vegetable oil to act as a release agent. That worked like a charm, with the over-mold standing up to a saltwater bath with no signs of leaking. [Print Practical] also repaired an iPhone cable that has seen better days, providing much-needed mechanical support for a badly frayed section.
This looks like a fantastic idea to file away for the future, and one that’s worth experimenting with. Other filament types might make a mold better able to stand up to the hot glue, and materials other than the ethylene-vinyl acetate copolymer found in most hot glue sticks might be explored. TPU over-molds, anyone? Or perhaps you can use a printer as an injector rather than the glue gun.

BeatConnect launch Drops feature BeatConnect recently announced an update to their online collaboration platform that allows users to explore a diverse array of audio projects created by the community. 

From HYBE’s restructure to Warner Music’s leadership shakeup… it’s MBW’s Weekly Round-UpThe biggest stories from the past week – all in one place…
Source