Simple de-essing with Black Salt Audio DSR Black Salt Audio's simple de-esser promises to offer enough power to tackle sibilance without negatively affecting the overall frequency balance of the vocal.

CMajor Releases FREE Pro-54 Browser-Based Synthesizer
Developer CMajor has released the Pro-54 Synthesizer, a faithful port of the classic Native Instruments Pro-53 synth. Surprisingly, it’s not a VST plugin. Instead of your DAW, it operates in a browser window. I didn’t get into music production during the early days of VST plugins and music software. However, I have a deep respect [...]
View post: CMajor Releases FREE Pro-54 Browser-Based Synthesizer

Global recorded music revenues grew by 9.8% in 2023Growth is back! After a slower 2022, global recorded music revenues grew by 9.8% in 2023 to reach $35.1 billion, compared to 7.1% in 2022, which means that the market is now more than double (124.5%) the size it was in 2015. 2023 was the year in which the industry settled back into a positive growth trajectory after the volatility of the pandemic and post-pandemic years. But the numbers also point to a market that is embarking on a major period of change.

The recorded music market is becoming more diversified, and although streaming is still the centre piece, its role is lessening. Streaming revenues hit $21.9 billion in 2023, up a relatively modest 9.6% on 2022. For the first time ever, streaming grew slower than the total market, to the extent that its share of total revenues actually fell (to 62.5%). Interestingly, over the same period, the five publicly traded DSPs grew revenue by 15.9%, and Warner and Sony collectively grew music publishing streaming revenue by 18.4%. Value is beginning to shift across the streaming value chain.

In other years, the recorded music streaming slowdown would have been cause for concern, but not in 2023. This is because other formats picked up the slack. Physical, after a decline in 2022, was up again (4.6%) in 2023, as was ‘other’. Interestingly, physical is emerging as the industry kingmaker: so far in this decade, over each of the two years that physical revenues grew, industry revenue growth was strong, and in the two years physical fell, industry growth was slow. Physical is the difference between good and great.

The growth in physical revenues, however, is more than just a revenue story, it reflects an industry strategic shift. Anticipating the streaming slowdown, labels and artists alike have been looking for diversification and new growth drivers, with superfans emerging as the central target. The strong growth of physical and ‘other’ revenues in 2023 are the first fruits of the new superfan focus.

The most compelling evidence for the superfan shift, is expanded rights. A subcategory of ‘other’, expanded rights reflect labels’ revenue from sources such as merchandise and branding. In short: superfan formats. Traditionally, expanded rights are not tracked as part of recorded music industry revenues, but last year, because of the industry’s growing fandom focus, we decided we had to include them, even if other entities still do not. 2023 underscored the importance of that decision. Expanded rights revenue grew by 15.5% to hit $3.5 billion – 10% of all global revenues. Expanded rights are one of the main building blocks of tomorrow’s music business.

Change was not constrained to formats. Market shares took some interesting turns, too. Non-major labels had a great year (and we’re calling them that, rather than independents, because a lot of the bigger ‘independents’, such as HYBE, have little in common with what people think of as traditional indies). Non-majors grew revenues by 13.0% in 2023, compared to 9% for the major labels. This meant that non-major label market share was up for the fourth consecutive year, reaching 31.5%. (Though, note this is measured on a distribution basis, not an ownership basis. Therefore, independent revenue that is distributed via a major record label or a wholly owned major label distributor will appear in the revenue of the respective major record label. So ‘actual’ non-major share is higher).

Non-major labels had a great year in expanded rights, outgrowing the market, in large part thanks to Korean labels, which accounted for nearly 70% of non-major label expanded rights revenue.

In stark contrast, 2023 was a tough year for artists direct (i.e., self-releasing artists), with various streaming market developments seeing them grow streaming revenue and their number of streams much more slowly than in previous years. 2023 was the first year artists direct lost market share. Streaming revenue grew just 3.9% in 2023, compared to 17.9% in 2022 and 35.5% in 2021. The result was a 0.4 point decline in streaming market share. Despite a difficult 2023, artists direct revenue in 2023 was 57.7% higher than in 2020, though the impending streaming royalty changes will likely see growth slow further.

On the majors’ side of the equation, Universal remained the largest label group, with its $10.0 billion representing 28.3% market share, but for the first time since 2020, Sony was the fastest growing major, increasing revenues by 11.6%, growing market share 0.3 points to 20.3%

Concluding thoughts

2023 was a very positive year, and it may prove to be the one we look back upon as ‘when things started to change’. Streaming growth slowed, on the recordings side of the equation, at least; monetising fandom became a serious part of the industry; non-majors locked into long-term market share growth; and self-releasing artists started to see a clear divergence between what they streamed and what they earned. 

The industry is beginning to bifurcate between the traditional, streaming-focused business, and a new one in which fandom and creation will take centre stage. Welcome to the first year of tomorrow’s music business.

MIDiA clients read the full report here

Cizzle VCO module from ALM/Busy Circuits The latest ALM/Busy Circuits module delivers a pair of oscillators that aim to bring the sound of Casio’s CZ-series synthesizers into the modular world.

VC Arjun Sethi talks a big game about selling his company-picking strategies to other investors; he says they’re buying itArjun Sethi speaks with the confidence of someone who knows more than other people, or else who knows that sounding highly confident can shape perception. Either way, when he tells me over Zoom that “in five years, I’ll have 50% of the world’s private data” at his fingertips, and that it will be “impossible to […]
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RP2040 Boot Loader is a Worm[Hunter Adams] has written a secondary bootloader for the RP2040 that uses an IR link and can be extended to behave like a polite worm virus. This allows the easy updating of a large cluster of co-located RP2040-based controllers. This could be handy in applications like swarm robotics or virtual cattle fencing. The project he demonstrates in the two videos ( below the break ) uses a pair of IR transmitters/receivers. But he purposely wrote the boot loader to be independent of the serial link, which could be infrared, radio, audio, or just wires.
Not only did [Hunter] make a boot loader, but he documented the entire boot process of the RP2040 chip. Whether or not you need a secondary bootloader, this is an excellent resource for understanding how the RP2040 responds to power cycling and resets. The boot loader code is available at his GitHub repository.
You may recall that [Hunter] is the lecturer of Cornell University’s Designing with Microcontroller classes, whom we’ve mentioned before. We’ve also covered some of his students’ projects as well, like these air drums and this CoreXY pen plotter.

Simple NTP Clock Uses Custom RGB 7-Segment DisplaysA great majority of hackers build a clock at some point. It’s a great way to get familiar with electronics and (often) microcontrollers, and you get to express some creativity along the way. Plus, you get something useful when you’re done! [Tadas Ustinavičius] recently trod this well-worn path and built a neat little NTP clock of their own.
The build uses an ESP 12F as the core of the operation. It’s charged with querying an NTP time server via its WiFi connection in order to maintain accurate timekeeping around the clock. For display, it drives a series of custom 7-segment displays that [Tadas] built using 3D-printed housings. They use WS2812B addressable LEDs and thus can display a rainbow of colors.
For initial configuration, the phone creates its own WiFi hotspot with a web interface for changing settings. Once configured, it connects to the Internet over WiFi to query an NTP server at regular intervals.
It’s a simple build that does a simple job well. Projects like these can be very valuable, as they teach you all kinds of useful skills. If you’ve been working on your own clock design, don’t hesitate to let us know. You can use a microcontroller, relays, or even a ball.

Jazz Harmonic Analysis using Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro 10In this latest version of Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro, we’ve expanded the arrows and brackets analysis to include several new symbols that highlight some of the most commonly encountered harmonic progressions and cadences in jazz tunes, addressing some of the omissions from previous versions. These new arrows and brackets will undoubtedly enhance the analysis, providing a more comprehensive understanding of the harmonic structure within the tunes. Let’s look at what each of these symbols indicate.

It’s important to understand that we have two types of lines: Solid & Dashed, and two types of symbols: Arrows & Brackets.

Solid Arrow: a dominant chord that resolves a perfect fifth down.(i.e. V7 to Imaj7, V7/II to II-7)

Dashed Arrow: a dominant chord that resolves down a half-step.(i.e. subV7 to Imaj7, subV7/II to II-7)

Solid Bracket: a m7 (or m7b5) chord that goes to a dominant chord a perfect fifth down.(i.e. II-7 to V7, II-7/II to V7/II)

Dashed Bracket: a m7 (or m7b5) chord that goes to a dominant chord a half-step down.(i.e. II-7 to subV7, II-7/II to subV7/II, subII-7 to V7/II)

Headless Straight Arrow: a maj7 (or maj6) chord that turns into a m7 chord(i.e. Imaj7 to II-7/bVII, IVmaj7 to IV-7)

Solid Step Arrow: a dominant chord that resolves a whole step up to a maj7 (maj6) or minor chord(i.e. bVII7 to Imaj7, V7 to VI-7)

Solid Circled Arrow: a maj7 (maj6) chord that goes to a chord a perfect fifth down.(i.e. Imaj7 to IVmaj7, IVmaj7 to bVII7)

Solid Circled Bracket: a m7 (m7b5) that goes to another m7 (m7b5) a perfect fifth down.(i.e. III-7 to VI-7, VI-7 to II-7)

Dashed Circled Bracket: a m7 (m7b5) that goes to another m7 (m7b5) a half-step down.(i.e. parallel m7 chords)

Dashed to Solid Broken Arrow: a dominant chord that goes to another dominant chord a tritone away:(i.e. V7 to subV7, subV7 to V7)

Delayed Resolutions & 1st Ending ResolutionsThe new version of Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro also shows delayed resolutions and 1st ending resolutions.

In the following image the A7b9 resolves to the D7b9 but there’s a related II interpolation (the Am7b5) before it. Now you can see this clearly indicated in the solid arrow from A7b9 to D7b9

And look at the last chord G7 inside the 1st ending. Now it shows the solid arrow, indicating that the 1st ending is a turnaround progression back to the Cmaj7 at the beginning of the A section.

Examples in actual tunes

Although these new symbols might seem like an overkill, they are actually really useful since they reveal harmonic paths often used in jazz progressions.

Stella By Starlight: In measure 4, the F7 actually resolves to the Bb7 (delayed solid arrow), but it also turns into a minor chord (headless straight arrow). This Fm7 (on m.5) is acting as a related II interpolation for the Bb7 (the V7/IV) targeting Ebmaj7.

And Ebmaj7 (the IV) keeps resolving down a perfect fifth (solid circled arrow) to an Ab7#11 (the bVII7) which resolves as expected, a whole step up (solid step arrow) to the Imaj7 (Bbmaj7) creating a backdoor progression.

Now the arrows & brackets paint a much better picture of the progression–once one’s learned them of course.

In Christmas Time Is Here, the descending parallel m7 chords, do not make much sense when looking at the roman numerals, but now the dashed circled bracket immediately shows this harmonic movement.

And we can also see the–so iconic–backdoor bVII7 to Imaj7 in measure 2 (Eb7#11 to Fmaj7)

In Are You Real the subV7 (Db7#11) was interpolated to delay the resolution of the V7 chord (G7) in measure 12 (dashed to solid broken arrow)

And in Have You Met Miss Jones? we can clearly see the 3-6-2-5 progression (consecutive solid circled brackets) measures 5-8

Color-coded chartWe’ve also added the option to toggle on/off the color-coded staff. Just click on the color button (red) to enable or disable color on the chart.

With color

without color

Minor chord symbolsYou can also change the notation for minor chords to show m or – (Cm7 or C-7). Just lick on the “circled m” or “circled -” to toggle between the two ways of notation.

Mapping Tonal Harmony Pro is available for macOS and iOS. Learn more on https://mdecks.com/mapharmony.phtml

Peppermint Creeps at the Whisky A Go GoDespite premature reports of its demise, there's still plenty of fun to be had on the Sunset Strip. Those that long for the heady and decadent days of glam, glitter, sleaze and hair can find all of those things on a regular basis at the Whisky A Go Go, as well as the nearby Rainbow and Viper Room.

On Friday, March 15, it was the turn of the Peppermint Creeps to wow the Whisky faithful. Before that, the last of the many opening bands, San Diego's Foxy Roxx, successfully warmed up the baying throng. A glorious mass of shocking pink, latex and stars, this party rock troupe had some shining moments in the '90s, an antidote for some to grunge and plaid.

Songs such as "Who Killed MTV" ampex up the celebratory atmosphere in this most historic of venues and, by the time they exited the stage, the crowd was pumped.

Headliners the Peppermint Creeps took to the stage to the sound of an apocalyptic yet completely indecipherable voice telling us something dark and deep about the future. No matter, the intent was the important thing and the atmosphere was appropriately built.

"In a world of one-hit-wonders, Peppermint Creeps stand the test of time," reads their online bio. "Where most bands only last as long as they feel relevant, Peppermint Creeps march on as the 'hardest promoting band on the planet' doing it for the fans before anything else. Whether people care or not, Peppermint Creeps spread their message regardless of what critics and skeptics think."

All of those ingredients made for a heady brew at the Whisky. Like a cyberpunk take on Mad Max, the Creeps make a statement out of black and luminous pink and green. They look like mimes at a rave, and they make it work.

The songs are crushingly brilliant -- a potent blend of power-pop, glam rock and trash punk. Covers of songs by Hanoi Rocks ("Boulevard of Broken Dreams"), the Vapors ("Turning Japanese") and Ramones (the closing "Beat on the Brat" and "Blitzkrieg Bop," plus the punked-up theme to Spider-Man that the Ramones recorded), betray their influences, though those same bands are pretty clearly present in the Creeps sound.

This was the first time in a while that a band from the glam-esque world has invoked a circle pit at the Whisky, and that's to be admired. Besides those covers, highlights included "Lesbian," "Fuck Off and Die," and "Pop Culture." All of them feature sugary-sweet, infectious melodies, super-cynical lyrics and anthemic choruses, and that all made for a great Friday night.

SpaceX doc leaks, TikTok ban gains steam, and Grok to go open-sourceHey, folks, welcome to Week in Review (WiR), TechCrunch’s regular newsletter recapping noteworthy happenings in tech over the past few days. This week, TechCrunch viewed leaked documents out of SpaceX showing some questionable practices related to employee stock options. X CEO Elon Musk announced that he would open source Grok, X’s AI-powered chatbot meant to […]
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A Nine-Year-Old’s Z80 Drawing ProgramFull disclosure: [Óscar] isn’t nine now, but he was in 1988 when he wrote LOCS, a drawing program in Z80 assembly modeled after Logo. You can see a demo of the system in the video below. You might wonder why you’d want to study a three-decade-old program written for a CPU by a nine-year-old almost five decades ago. Well, honestly, we aren’t sure either. But it did get us thinking.
Kids today are computer savvy and have hardware that would seem to be alien tech in 1988. How many of them could duplicate this feat? Now, how many could do it in assembly language?
LOCS had a few simple commands and was sort of a stripped-down scripting language. The BORRA command clears the screen. TORTUGA centers the turtle. PT (pone tortuga) moves the turtle to any spot on the screen. Then SM, AM, DM, and IM move the turtle up, down, right, and left. Probably helps if you speak a little Spanish.
The program fits on three pages of handwritten code. When was the last time you wrote code on paper? [Óscar] revisits the program to run it on an MSX. The original program was under 500 bytes but adding the code for MSX balloons it to 589 bytes. Gotta love assembly language.
You could argue that LOCS isn’t a language because it doesn’t have variables, expressions, or looping. [Óscar] retorts that HTML doesn’t have those things either, and yet some call it a language. Honestly, if a 9-year-old can create this, we think they can call it anything they want to!
By 1990, he’d graduated to full-blown games. If turtle graphics are too abstract for you, try a Big Trak.

A Simple Seismometer You Can Build YourselfIf you’re a child, there are certain things you’re taught even though they’re probably not directly relevant to your life. We teach young kids all about dinosaurs, and we teach older kids all about how the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. We also teach kids about natural phenomena like earthquakes, and the equipment used to measure them. Namely, seismometers. You might like to satisfy your own child-like curiosity by building one of your own, like [mircemk] did.
Output from the build showing tremors in the Earth.
The build starts with a sensitive geophone of [mircemk’s] own design. That’s basically a microphone but it’s for picking up vibrations in the ground, not in the air. However, a geophone is not enough. You need to be able to pick up the signals from the geophone and then plot them if you want a seismometer.
First, the signals from the geophone must be amplified, which is achieved with a small circuit based around the LM358 op-amp. From there, the signal is sent to an Arduino where the output is captured via the analog-to-digital converter. This passes the signal to an attached PC which plots the results using a piece of software called NERdaq, which was developed for schools that built their own slinky-based seismometers.
[mircemk] reports that this setup has served as a reliable tool for visualizing earthquake activity for over 6 years. Though, it bears noting, it’s not calibrated so don’t expect to get science grade results out of it. Regardless, though, it’s a super cool way to understand more about what is going on with the geology around us. Video after the break.

Getting It Done – The week in D.I.Y & Indie Music: Living Wage bill, release tips, finding a manager and moreLast week, our tips and advice for the independent, do-it-yourselfers out there covered how to promote a music video, how to find a manager and much more…
The post Getting It Done – The week in D.I.Y & Indie Music: Living Wage bill, release tips, finding a manager and more appeared first on Hypebot.

REWIND – New music industry’s week in review: SXSW protests, Spotify adds video, TikTok under fire & MoreIt was a busy week by any definition, and the music industry was no exception. Spotify added music videos, TikTok angered a congressman into unanimity, Instagram trumped TikTok for the first time, and more......
The post REWIND – New music industry’s week in review: SXSW protests, Spotify adds video, TikTok under fire & More appeared first on Hypebot.

FAC launch Punchlab AUv3 plug-in FAC Punchlab is an all-in-one processing solution that comes loaded with nine modules and boasts a user-friendly GUI with comprehensive metering and feedback.