How Spotify’s Algorithm Works (From Its Creator)This week, Ari is joined by Glenn McDonald, Spotify’s data alchemist and the creator of the music exploration site Every Noise at Once.

Techivation launch AI-Loudener Techivations latest plug-in has been designed to increase the loudness of mixes without raising their peak level. 

True Anomaly CEO finds the silver lining in the startup’s anomalous first missionTrue Anomaly‘s first mission didn’t go as planned by any stretch of the imagination, but the space and defense startup’s CEO, Even Rogers, said he doesn’t consider it a failure. Providing new details on what went right and wrong, he explained how they’re turning this anomaly into a “success story.” Though the company has yet […]
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5 beat making apps for iOS
Let's take a look at five useful iOS apps for creators who are looking to dive deeper into the mobile beat making world.

New US bill could make developers disclose their use of copyrighted music to train generative AI modelsAll uses of copyrighted materials would have to be registered with the Register of Copyrights under the proposed Generative AI Copyright Disclosure Act
Source

Soldering the Elusive USB C PortMany SMD components, including some USB C ports, have their terminals under the component. When installed, the pins are totally hidden. So, how do you solder or unsolder them? That’s the problem [Learn Electronics Repair] encountered when fixing a Lenovo Yoga, and he shows us his solution in the video below.
He showed the removal in a previous video, but removal is a bit easier since you can just heat up the area, yank the connector, and then clean up the resulting mess at your leisure. Installation is harder because once the socket is down, you no longer have access to the pads.

Unsurprisingly, the process starts out with plenty of flux and some hot air to preheat the pads. he then tins the pads with a conventional soldering iron. The penultimate step is to align the connector and preheat it almost to the melting point. Then hot air reflows the solder beneath the connector.
We were worried he might disturb the adjacent components, but he has a steady hand. We might have masked the area off with Kapton tape.
The result looked good. We’d encourage you to test for shorts or opens electrically where possible. High-end techs can inspect with X-ray, but most of us don’t have that kind of gear.
If you need some SMD practice, there are plenty of kits to try. Just remember that when doing SMD sometimes less is more.

Sleater-Kinney at the Showbox, SeattleA surge of excitement rushed through The Showbox – one of Seattle’s most historic venues- and transformed into an electrified, hushed pause as Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker took the stage. The longtime founding members of Sleater-Kinney, the Pacific Northwest-based band whose brazenly bold lyrics and strikingly sharp compositions helped place “Riot Grrl” into the glossary of essential musical history, grabbed their guitars and strummed out the delicately dark intro to “Hell,” from their 2024 release Little Rope. After several stated measures highlighting Corin’s crystalline calls and Carrie’s sustained chords, the two careened into the song’s chorus. The sound of the band’s iconic incendiary wails and intricate guitar work took to the air, hit the walls, and pierced the ears of the awestruck, sold-out crowd on the first of two back-to-back shows. 

Sleater-Kinney continued to fill the venue with their distinctive sonic aberrations that featured acerbic lyrics exploring the weight of the world from internal and external vantage points. Carrie embraced the lead in the angularly structured “Needlessly Wild” (Little Rope), with Corin stepping in to create the co-fronted vocal/guitar collaboration found in many of their compositions, including the brusque “Bury Our Friends” from 2015’s No Cities to Love, and the sleek “The Center Won’t Hold,” the title track from the band’s 2019 release.  

Corin and Carrie’s clarion calls moved into a round of classics, which included “One More Hour” from 1997’s Dig Me Out and 2000’s eponymous “All Hands on the Bad One.” Together, the consecutive songs showcased Sleater-Kinney’s signature polyphonic sonic lexicon where mellifluous vocals effortlessly intertwine with complex guitar arpeggios. The band then moved toward darker poetic odes that explored multifaceted themes: confronting humanistic fears in “Hunt You Down” (Little Rope), the depths of depression with “Jumpers” (from 2005’s The Woods), and tackling precarious situations in the cautionary Brothers Grimm-meets-Aesop’s fable “The Fox” (The Woods) - each song performed with guttural beauty and biting grace.  

The hour-and-a-half show neared its dénouement as Corin unleashed herself from her guitar to perform the stunning “Untidy Creatures” (Loose Ends) alongside the adoring crowd. Following a brief interlude, Sleater-Kinney returned for the time-honored encore with a selection of songs including the critically acclaimed indie-hit “Dig Me Out” and the searing “Entertain” (The Woods). Sleater-Kinney’s impactful show made a palpable impression on the concertgoers, who emerged from The Showbox with a renewed sense of strength, prepared to tackle whatever strange, circumstantial haunts might lurk around life’s sharp corners. 

Playlist:

Hell

Needlessly Wild

Bury Our Friends

The Center Won't Hold   

Small Finds 

One More Hour  

All Hands on the Bad One  

Hunt You Down 

Hurry On Home

Start Together 

Don't Feel Right  

Slow Song 

Jumpers   

Can I Go On 

Six Mistakes   

Dress Yourself

The Fox  

Modern Girl  

Untidy Creature

Encore:

Good Things

Say It Like You Mean It

Dig Me Out

Entertain

Double-Checking NASA’s Eclipse Estimate at HomeIf you were lucky enough to be near the path of totality, and didn’t have your view obscured by clouds, yesterday’s eclipse provided some very memorable views. But you know what’s even better than making memories? Having cold hard data to back it up.
Hackaday contributor [Bob Baddeley] was in Madison, Wisconsin for the big event, which NASA’s Eclipse Explorer website predicted would see about 87% coverage. Watching the eclipse through the appropriate gear at the local hackerspace was fun, but the real nerding out happened when he got home and could pull the data from his solar system.
A graph of the system’s generated power shows a very clear dip during the duration of the eclipse, which let him determine exactly when the occlusion started, peaked, and ended.

What’s more, by comparing the output of the panels at their lowest with the pre-eclipse peak, [Bob] was able to calculate that the light falling on them dropped by roughly 87 to 90% — right where NASA pegged it. Similarly, the timing of the eclipse as experienced by his solar system lined up within a few minutes of what the website predicted.

That the world’s leading space agency was able to properly model one of the biggest celestial events in recent memory is perhaps not overly surprising. That’s part of what we’re paying them for, honestly. But it’s always good to run a second set of eyes over the numbers.

Canada an unsung heavyweight of global music, but new Canadian content law could backfire: reportCanadian artists rank third behind only US and UK artists in their share of the world’s top 1,000 singles, a new report says
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Arturia unveil AstroLab stage keyboard Arturia's new standalone keyboard packs in 35 sound engines, bringing the power and sound of their virtual instruments to the stage. 

Arturia AstroLab puts all of the brand’s synth emulations in one hardware unitArturia announces AstroLab today during a 25th-anniversary livestream event on its YouTube channel.

READ MORE: Behringer releases its first synth plugin, Vintage, for free…or does it?

AstroLab is a 61-key stage keyboard that combines an ecosystem of software synths and intuitive tactility, with a wide range of both classic and modern sounds. It boasts ten synthesis engines, 35 engines, and over 1,300 presets to cater to myriad genres and eras.

The AstroLab ecosystem can be used to expand, manage, and control sounds and settings, and integrate with any DAW, thanks to Analog Lab, so it becomes easier for musicians to go live with their custom settings and sounds. It’s made with live musicians in mind, allowing them to personalise their own unique stage setup.
With the navigation wheel and screen, you can scroll through the vast library of presets, while there are delay and reverb controls to let you customise with up to 12 insert FX to choose from.
Another option is to plug in an external mic to AstroLab and send your voice through its vocoder and harness multi-octave vocal transformation. Combine with Vocoder V to boost supported voice-input presets. And with the chord, scale, and arpeggio modes, you can embellish your performance while staying in key and prompting more vibrant sequences all simultaneously.
You can loop any sound by up to 32 bars with AstroLab, too, which should come in useful if you want to add a back-bone melody or chord progression for freeform play. It captures the MIDI, too, so you can change to any instrument.
Don’t forget the mobile app, AstroLab Connect, either, which allows users to organise AstroLab’s library, find sounds faster, and get more sounds from the store. Meanwhile, there’s a desktop app, too, with over 2,000 sounds.
You can find out more about AstroLab on Arturia’s website.
The post Arturia AstroLab puts all of the brand’s synth emulations in one hardware unit appeared first on MusicTech.

.MUSIC is giving away 1 million free domains: Get Yours Now!.MUSIC, the new top-level domain dedicated to music, is giving away a million free MUISIC domains through May 24th.....
The post .MUSIC is giving away 1 million free domains: Get Yours Now! appeared first on Hypebot.

How are artist and royalty disputes resolved on SoundExchange?Artist and royalty disputes often happen when there is an overlap in royalty splits, or the cause could be as simple as a typo. Sound Exchange explains how they resolve these disputes.....
The post How are artist and royalty disputes resolved on SoundExchange? appeared first on Hypebot.

Shure announce MV7+ Podcast Microphone Shure's updated MV7+ boasts a new visual design, and benefits from software upgrades designed with the needs of modern content creators in mind.

“God bless Auto-Tune, it saves us, but modern vocal production makes everyone sound too similar,” says Vampire Weekend’s Ezra KoenigVampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig has discussed the pitfalls of modern vocal production techniques in a new interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe — and he seems to have mixed opinions on the sounds of contemporary artists.

READ MORE: Researchers claim to have invented a better version of Auto-Tune that uses AI

“God bless Auto-Tune,” says the Vampire Weekend frontman and son-in-law of Quincy Jones. “It saves us…but everybody’s voice sounds the same.”
He references the 1985 charity single We Are the World, produced by Quincy, which featured many of the era’s biggest stars: “Why that song is interesting to listen to and why people still get excited 30 years later watching the documentary is because people had really different voices. A modern We Are the World would not hit the same…because…everybody’s voice sounds the same”
“You think we’ve evolved as a species towards the Auto-Tune? Unconsciously, we’re becoming the AI?” asks Zane Lowe, as Koenig continues:
“If you take the 10 biggest pop stars [in 2024] and you throw in some indie rockers or whatever, our voices will be different but, with the quality of modern recording, it’s not going to be [like] when you hear Michael Jackson, Cyndi Lauper, and Bob Dylan on the same song. They’re so different and it’s so clear.
“I’m just saying, God bless all these people, but even if you did it with The Weeknd and Ariana Granda and Lana Del Rey, it’s not gonna be the same,” he continues, before joking, “And millions will die because of this, because they won’t raise the money, because the vocal quality of modern recording is too similar. Whereas back then, lives were saved.”
Vampire Weekend have also been in the news this week for their album release, Only God Was Above Us, and accompanying show in Austin, Texas, which took place during the solar eclipse yesterday (8 April), which also coincided with Koenig’s 40th birthday.
If you missed it, it’s available on-demand on the streaming platform Veeps, exclusively for Veeps All Access subscribers.
To see the rest of the Apple Music interview with Zane Lowe, check out the video below:

Read more MusicTech news.
The post “God bless Auto-Tune, it saves us, but modern vocal production makes everyone sound too similar,” says Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig appeared first on MusicTech.