17-year-old Eric Zhu’s startup was built in a high school bathroom — now it’s raised $2.3M and is emerging from stealthEric Zhu started building Aviato, an analytical platform for private market data, in a very typical place for an entrepreneur: the bathroom in his Carmel, Indiana, high school. Now the 17-year-old’s startup is emerging from stealth with $2.3 million in venture funding. Aviato tracks funding rounds and headcount, similar to competitors like Crunchbase and PitchBook, as […]
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Four Tet’s production hack for creating “a world” within his tracks so people connect to them “without even understanding why”Four Tet has a production technique he uses to create atmosphere and the feeling of a unique world which exists within his tracks.
Appearing on the Tape Notes podcast, where he opened up some of his most-loved tracks to explore his approach to production, Four Tet – also known as Kieran Hebden – explained how he works with texture and subtlety to create a connection between the listener and the music.

READ MORE: 7 music production techniques you can learn from Four Tet’s Three

Delving into his track Skater, which is inspired by a time when he watched his daughter ice skating and felt cut off from the noise of the outside world, Hebden shares how he built the song and even used real-life recorded sounds of the skating.
“All the other things that happen are there to guide you through the track,” he says, playing some vocal parts. “They’re very quiet and subliminal. I didn’t make them like a lead part of the song because it’s like I want the melody and the groove of it all to sort of be here, and then the ice skating and the humans and all the people and stuff echoes around in the distance.
“There’s an atmosphere there that puts it in a sort of world. I use a lot of things like that where there’s little quiet echoey bits of vocals and noises and little things happening all the time combined with everything else.”

He adds, “I’ve always done it, but then working on the Burial records for instance, working on stuff with him… He invented so many levels of doing that in ways that people have never thought, like tons of subliminal little sounds and textures all the time.”
He later continues, “I learnt early on that having these little bits of texture mixed in with everything actually put things in a world. Especially when you’re doing electronic music, it really puts things in a zone that is a great device for giving a way for people to connect to it without them really even understanding why they’re connecting to it, you know?”
Check out the podcast below:

The post Four Tet’s production hack for creating “a world” within his tracks so people connect to them “without even understanding why” appeared first on MusicTech.

BandLab mobile users can now experiment with beats for free before buyingBandLab has made a significant improvement to the BandLab Beats marketplace, enabling users to try any BandLab Beat in BandLab Studio before choosing to purchase.
This change means within the BandLab mobile app, producers and vocalists can experiment with, add additional tracks and apply effects to a Beat with no up-front financial commitment.

READ MORE: BandLab hits “pivotal moment” as it surpasses 100 million users worldwide

Here’s how it works: on a Beat’s detail page within the BandLab app, the user can tap “Try for free in Studio”, where the Beat instantly loads into a Studio session, and creative touches can be applied and trialled to ensure the Beat aligns with their creative vision.
Once the user decides to commit to the Beat in question, they can purchase the licence with a tap and unlock the ability to save, download, publish and export their song with all of their previously-made personal touches remaining intact.
“This is the latest among many updates that demonstrate BandLab’s commitment to eliminating any barriers to creativity and making music creation accessible,” says BandLab. “This feature encourages users to try Beats in real-time, experiment freely, and immediately put their inspiration to work without upfront costs.”
Recently surpassing a massive 100 million users globally, BandLab continues to innovate and bring consistent quality-of-life improvements to its user base.
Earlier this month, the social music platform rolled out a number of advanced mobile features, including Mobile Automation, an expanded library of vocal effects and improved filters.
Learn more at BandLab.
Editor’s note: BandLab and MusicTech are both owned by the Caldecott Music Group.
The post BandLab mobile users can now experiment with beats for free before buying appeared first on MusicTech.

The frequency factor – when daily just isn’t enoughIn our digital lives today, we tend to use our favourite apps throughout the day. So, why does the entertainment tech industry still focus on daily, weekly, or, in way too many cases, monthly usage (we’re looking at you, Spotify!). The answer is simple, the less frequency your measure of activity, the bigger your audience figure. We are at the point where we need to move beyond inflated vanity metrics. Even the radio industry now measures in weekly usage terms. Meanwhile, Meta has long reported daily users. However, even daily stats are not enough to really understand an audience’s behaviour. This is why MIDiA has launched frequency tracking in our new report: “Entertainment behaviour: The frequency factor”. Here are some of the key insights from the report.

We tracked entertainment consumption across music, video, games, podcasts, radio, and social. For each we measured total time spent, the day parts in which these activities were conducted, and then the usage of the most popular apps for each. This is where we dialled up the measurement, looking not only at weekly and daily usage, but also how many times a day the apps were used.

It will come as little surprise to learn that today’s entertainment consumer fits a lot into their week, with consumption fragmented across a mass of behaviours. Video leads, accounting for over 40% of time, followed by audio (boosted by a still sizeable audience of radio listeners), music, social, and finally games. When you think about the role social media plays in our lives, this usage hierarchy might feel counter intuitive. But this is where measuring frequency of daily behaviour comes into its own, providing us with clear pointers as to why this is the case.

For example, Netflix daily active users (DAUs) use the app around four times a day, while TikTok DAUs are on the app more than six times a day. Around a sixth of TikTok’s users are on the app more than five times a day, compared to 5% or less for Disney+ and Apple TV+. 

There are big variations within entertainment formats too. For example, it is the more niche music apps like TIDAL, Deezer, and Endel that have the highest rates of daily frequency, while more mainstreams apps like Spotify and Amazon’s Prime Music have some of the lowest. For example, Deezer’s daily frequency rate is more than a third higher than Prime’s, while TIDAL’s is just under a third higher than Spotify’s.

Daily frequency is still only part of the answer, however. To truly understand entertainment behaviour, we need to look at when they are consuming different forms of entertainment and what else they are doing at the same time.

When we look at which time of day people consume entertainment, social and music have the largest shares in the morning. Both steadily lessen in share towards evening but social rebounds at nighttime. The more passive music behaviour then makes way for video and audiobooks. As evening turns to night, people typically do less and so have more attention for less passive formats. It is the primary activity that really shapes entertainment behaviour. For example, a fifth of consumers listen to music at work / school, which is more than four times higher than for video. Similarly, more than twice as many active podcast listeners do so while on a walk compared to active gamers that play games while walking. Some entertainment formats are tailor made for doing alongside daily activities, while others might result in you walking into a lamp post.

If you like what you have read here, check out the full report. It is awash with data, featuring a 60-slide report and a data file with nearly 400 segments and more than 300,000 data points (yes, you read that correctly!).

If you are not yet a MIDiA client and would like to learn more about how to become one, or how to get access to this report and data, please email commercial@midiaresearch.com.

14 NBA teams sued for copyright infringement over alleged use of music in social media posts without permissionThe lawsuits target 14 teams, including the New York Knicks, Orlando Magic, Cleveland Cavaliers and Indiana Pacers, among others
Source

#ThankYouSteveAlbini: A tireless advocate for musiciansTouch and Go Records is using the hashtag #ThankYouSteveAlbini to turn today, Monday, July 22, which would have been Steve Albini’s 62nd birthday, into a celebration and an opportunity to. Continue reading
The post #ThankYouSteveAlbini: A tireless advocate for musicians appeared first on Hypebot.

Dyson launches “audio-only” headphones (this time, they don’t feature a built-in air purifier)When Dyson launched the world’s first pair of air-purifying headphones last year, it’s safe to say the world wasn’t quite ready. To refresh, the household appliance company’s Zone headphones featured an over-ear design, with an attachable air purifier that went over the wearer’s mouth. Yes, you can say it: it was a strange design, to say the least.
So now, Dyson has unveiled its next pair of cans, ones it describes as “audio-only” – a descriptor not usually necessary for headphones, but there we are. Dubbed OnTrac, this time, these headphones don’t feature a built-in air purifier.

READ MORE: “Do people care about tracklisting?” PinkPantheress says she doesn’t listen to albums

Starting at $500, the OnTrac headphones are set to sit at the higher end of the market price-wise, and look to be aimed at hardcore audio enthusiasts. They’re highly customisable, too; customers can swap out both the ear cushions and out ear caps, with an array of colourways available.

We don’t have a lot of other information to go on at this stage, but we’re told the OnTrac headphones also come with noise cancelling for up to 40 dB of noise reduction, and a battery life of up to 55 hours under normal use.
They also work in tandem with Dyson’s MyDyson App, which enables features like Head Detect – which pauses audio when earcups are removed from ears – and real-time sound tracking, which “continuously monitors in-ear and external volume, indicating potentially harmful levels through live reports in the MyDyson App”.
Credit: Dyson
They also feature 40mm drivers capable of reproducing sounds in a range between 6Hz to 21,000Hz.
Jake Dyson, Chief Engineer at Dyson, says: “Dyson’s audio engineering mission is to preserve the integrity of the artist’s sound wave, free from interference. We also wanted to create a set of headphones that people would cherish, be excited by, and be proud of. With over 30 years of experience in aeroacoustics, we’ve mastered sound physics. By reducing noise through in-house anechoic chambers and expert engineers, we’ve applied and further expanded our audio knowledge to develop the Dyson OnTrac headphones. Our first over-ear audio only headphones deliver best-in-class ANC, exceptional sound quality, and all-day comfort through unique materials, design and customisation.”
Dyson’s OnTrac headphones are not on sale yet, and we don’t currently have information as to when they will be, but we’ll endeavour to keep you in the loop as we know more.
To find out more, head to Dyson.
The post Dyson launches “audio-only” headphones (this time, they don’t feature a built-in air purifier) appeared first on MusicTech.

‘Bad Gear’ guy says Uli Behringer is “up there with Elon Musk” as a “truly visionary businessman”AudioPilz, host of the YouTube series Bad Gear, has described Uli Behringer as a “truly visionary businessman”, and likened him to Elon Musk.
Uli Behringer is the founder of the famed gear brand Behringer, which is sometimes viewed as controversial due to its emulations of popular or classic gear, often offered for significantly lower prices. Though many may view such a statement as bold, AudioPilz is the guy famed for running a meme-based series after all, so he could just be pulling our leg on his proclamation of love Mr. Behringer himself.

READ MORE: Behringer reveals smaller UB-Xa D synth which comes without a keyboard

In an interview with Weaver Beats, AudioPilz is asked if he is trolling when it comes to his love for Uli. “My views on Uli Behringer work on many different layers,” he begins. “First of all he is a truly visionary businessman, he’s up there with the greats like Elon Musk and stuff like that. I mean he’s in a niche but he’s up there with people who are considered to be really good at what they’re doing.”
He adds, “The next thing is that he is one of the rare cases [where] he’s not only a good businessman but he also knows his stuff on a technical level, he can build a synthesiser himself, he’s capable of doing this because we know he did. He’s got a company that has a reputation of being evil, I mean it’s a company after all.”
The pair later get into discussing the brand’s gear emulations, to which Pilz says, “I don’t want to comment on the whole cloning thing. I don’t really have an opinion on that, it’s just not really fun to do something with or about Behringer. I did a few videos on Behringer stuff and I always had the impression, I don’t know if it was necessary, that I have to be very careful what and how I say it.
“People got sued for stuff, that’s not too far fetched. After the last Behringer video I did about the [TD-3] thing that I Barbie-fied, I released a video between Christmas and New Year because I assumed that the lawyers would be on a vacation there and because I more or less implied that I had a romantic relationship with Uli Behringer and stuff like that.”
It seems the brand was just fine about this video, as Pilz says they posted a link to it after the Christmas period. Asked what he loves about Uli, Pilz jokes, “He’s got the best lawyers in the world.”
You can watch more below:

Behringer’s approach to public relations and professional etiquette has gone under scrutiny numerous times in the past. Back in 2020, Uli Behringer launched a bizarre crusade against veteran journalist Peter Kirn, who had previously criticised the legal practices of Behringer’s parent company, Music Tribe.
In other Behringer news, the company recently unveiled the UB-Xa D, a keyboard-less version of its UB-Xa synth, which itself is inspired by the Oberheim OB-X.
The post ‘Bad Gear’ guy says Uli Behringer is “up there with Elon Musk” as a “truly visionary businessman” appeared first on MusicTech.

Positive Trends for Independent Musicians: Insights from Luminate 2024 Midyear ReportThe Luminate 2024 Midyear Report reveals positive trends for independent musicians and highlights critical shifts in consumer behavior, streaming patterns, and emerging genres.
The post Positive Trends for Independent Musicians: Insights from Luminate 2024 Midyear Report appeared first on Hypebot.

Increase your YouTube Subscribers with this Easy HackDiscover an effective method to increase your YouTube subscribers using a straightforward link hack. This guide provides step-by-step instructions to help you optimize your subscriber growth effortlessly.
The post Increase your YouTube Subscribers with this Easy Hack appeared first on Hypebot.

Notes: Free sample pack from Song Athletics The latest addition to the Song Athletics range comprises a selection of instrument loops and samples designed to spark new ideas.

AVA Music Group announces Decadence Trailer Toms by Karel Psota (Intro Sale + FREE Copies Inside)
Decadence Trailer Toms is a cinematic drum library crafted by the renowned sound designer Karel Psota and released by AVA Music Group. The library is currently available for €86 (excl. tax), and we have three FREE copies available for three lucky BPB readers. This fully NKS-compatible Decadence Trailer Toms library works with the free Kontakt [...]
View post: AVA Music Group announces Decadence Trailer Toms by Karel Psota (Intro Sale + FREE Copies Inside)

Muse Group update Muse Hub & Audacity The latest versions of Muse Hub and Audacity introduce a range of new content and features aimed at music and audio creators.

What Kamala Harris has said about AI, tech regulation, and moreWith President Joe Biden dropping out of the race, Vice President Kamala Harris may become the Democrats’ new nominee. In announcing his plans, Biden offered his “full support and endorsement for Kamala to be the nominee of our party this year,” while Harris said her “intention is to win and earn this nomination.” That said, […]
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Metaverse book gets boring rename in latest sign of waning enthusiasmThe growing malaise for metaverse hype is reminiscent of the AI sector directly before the launch of GPT-3.