Complete Guide to Maschine Studio With Rob Jones

The second course in the range of Complete Guides on the Maschine Courses website has now arrived, outlining in detail every aspect of the Maschine software and vast Studio hardware. The lengthy set of tutorials, which comes bundled with written notes, Maschine projects and 240MB of bonus samples, not only thoroughly explains each part of Maschine but also shows how to use the powerful groove production studio to create a wide variety of musical styles.

Click to read more ...

Making Melodic Parts For House With Push By Paul Maddox

Continuing from House Production with Ableton Push Part I, experienced producer Paul Maddox takes you through the next phase of House production with Ableton’s award winning Push hardware controller. With releases under his own name and as part of the duo Spektre, on labels such as Data, Positiva, Tidy and Viscious, achieving BBC Radio 1 airplay and support from DJs Carl Cox, Richie Hawtin and James Zabiela, Paul Maddox is one of the hottest producers of the last decade.

Click to read more ...

Guernsey’s Auction Brings Country Megastar Waylon Jennings’ Personal Belongings to The Finest Marketplace

Jessi Colter, Waylon Jennings’ wife of more than 30 years, is offering his personal collection to the public to bring attention to the care provided at the Phoenix Children’s Hospital.

Click to read more ...

There Is Always Hope: How Music Saved My Life

A couple of months ago, I was asked by To Write Love On Her Arms to do a post on my experience with depression, music, and being a suicide survivor.

This is my story.

For as long as I can remember, my greatest aspiration has been to study psychological resilience and music. Having begun touring as a singer from age three, my furthermost joy and identity were formed in creating and performing music. As I attempt to place these thoughts in tangible form, I’d like to explain where the past year of my life has taken me, and how this hope has finally come to be realized. I’d like to tell you how music saved my life.

Click to read more ...

Samsungs Milk Music moves to wearable tech

Milk music is an Internet streaming service that is exclusive to Samsung smartphones—that is, until now. Today, Samsung announced that it is expanding its service to Web TV and wearable tech. As John Pleasants, vice president of Samsung Media Solutions Center of America, states, this will transform Milk Music into a “big-screen jukebox for the 21st century home.” So what can you do with Milk Music?

Listen on Your Smartphone

Since its launch in March, Samsung smartphone owners have been able to download Milk Music from Google Play. You don't need to sign up or do anything else before you can start streaming music, claims Engadget. A sweet deal co

Click to read more ...

12 artists talk about their biggest mistake

1. Never be too stubborn to accept constructive criticism
- 5 & A Dime 

2. Learn music theory
- Element

Click to read more ...

The State of Hip-Hop

The last year in hip-hop has been a glorious one. Long gone are the lukewarm mid-2000’s, and the spectral stagnation that plagued the industry half a decade ago is nowhere to be seen.

Click to read more ...

5 Ways to Thank the People Behind Your Musical Success

The only people who know and understand how challenging a musician’s career is are the ones who stand directly behind them. These are the people who have supported you all along the way. While at the end of the day you get showered with awards and accolades, their only reward is your success. Therefore, it's extra important to always let them know you appreciate their support. Small gestures go a long way in maintaining these relationships.

1. Goodie Basket

Gift baskets are something everyone loves. Instead of mass ordering gift baskets, choose one depending on what each person likes. There's a basket for everyone, ranging from indulgent toiletry sets to gourmet food selections. Goodie baskets are especially meaningful to those on tour with you as they likely miss the luxuries of home. Baskets can be ordered from a company like FTD wherever you can find a Wi-Fi connection and sent to your next location. Present them to people like your manager and key sound crew with a hand-written note. In your note, mention why they are an essential part of your trip and how their support is essential to you.

Click to read more ...

Complete Glitch Hop Production with Maschine By Defazed

In this latest course from Producertech, experienced producer Rich, aka Defazed, teaches how to make a heavy track in one of the most current and popular styles of electronic music - Glitch Hop. With a career spanning from classic Drum & Bass to the cutting edge of electronic music, and with releases on various record labels in the UK, Germany and the US, as well as a wealth of class-based teaching experience in a number of colleges, Defazed is ideally suited to teach the skills necessary to make professional music with Native Instruments’ Maschine.

In this course, Defazed breaks down a Glitch Hop track into its components, analysing the beats, bass and glitch elements, and demonstrating how to build up a track and give it the characteristic ambience. In addition, he takes you through Native Instruments’ Massive, a synthesiser with incredible flexibility, showing his techniques for creating hard-edged bass patches and building chord sequences, whilst discussing wavetable synthesis and the principles underpinning this technique, which is vital to electronic music.

In the first few modules, Defazed gives an overview of his workflow, grouping and use of Aux and FX groups. Next, he analyses the beats, including sample selection and processing, before creating and editing new patterns from the Maschine hardware. He then moves on to the creation of intricate glitch percussion and vocal stabs, before a detailed lesson on bass synthesis in Massive.

Click to read more ...

Backtrack Music Revolutionizes The Music Industry

BackTrack launched its much anticipated and innovative music service which consolidates the music industry into an online, accessible network of artists, managers, and record labels. BackTrack provides a unique platform for connections and communication throughout the global music industry, and also centralizes A&R to increase the efficiency of worldwide artist discovery and distribution of music. Tests conducted during the early staging process demonstrated that with Backtrack, A&R departments can now review submissions at a higher volume, and substantially more rapidly and efficiently than with current methods. In addition to helping emerging artists form relationships within the music industry, Backtrack also connects labels and managers to facilitate and enhance beat acquisition, global distribution channels and brand evolution, and to expand industry networking on an international basis.

Backtrack’s key features include its Advanced Matching Software, which processes information submitted by each user to create personalized recommendations of artists, labels, and managers for contact and networking purposes. Backtrack’sAdvanced Matching Software can lead to thousands of new relationships throughout the global music industry, and transform A&R and brand growth. Another key feature is Backtrack’s Advanced Analytics, which alerts users daily to the quantity and location of hits that their pages receive. For artists, the ability to get statistics regarding the average durations that their songs are played creates an entirely new method of developing specific, commercially successful sounds.

Click to read more ...

The New Music Social Network Platform - WIZZtune

Hey everyone!

My name’s Oskar Lelko / DJ wizzy and I am the founder of WIZZtune.com. WIZZtune is an independent social network meant to help artists get their art heard by their target audience and to help music lovers explore new songs depending on their mood that they can download for free and share with their friends.

We have built an intelligent system that helps you find just the music that you will enjoy, and to make sure that no good track stays unnoticed.

We love music just as much as you do, so we try to help you get the most of it.

Click to read more ...

Why do I need to make music?

I’m over 50 now,and still I have the urge to compose, play and record music.

I first begun playing the guitar at 14. We got a band together at our outer-suburban high school in Melbourne, but none of us could play. So we bought some instruments, had a few lessons, and started playing covers. Mainly Status Quo and a few of the ‘seriously’ cool 70s hard rock bands. You know the ones.

We spent a lot of money (mostly our parents money) on the gear, the rehearsal rooms,and when we played at home, we drove the neighbors crazy with our noise. Back in the 70s most ‘consumer’ music gear was expensive, badly made, and sounded crappy. Not like now. Most instruments are well built now, and most electronics are durable and have benefited from decades of refinement and automated production facilities. We never really even tuned up properly, lacking good ears or a guitar tuner.

Click to read more ...

The Broke Musician's Guide to Finance

For many musicians young and old, financial unrest is an unfortunate part of the game. Although there are many artists out there making way more than they probably should, there are still plenty of others putting in their time in the van and surviving off of Taco Bell and gas station hot dogs. 

If you’re one of those less than fortunate souls doing the road dog thing at the moment, you’re probably wondering where your next meal is coming from, but never fear, there are plenty of ways to cut some corners both on and off the road, and here’s how:

The Bare Necessities

That bear from the Jungle Book was really onto something when he started going off about the bare necessities. Granted he was a cartoon and was talking about pears or whatever, but he did make a few very valid points. Whether you’re on the road or at home trying to save up some money for new gear, keep necessity in the back of your mind. A lot of musicians make the mistake of pulling the trigger on big ticket items they don’t need too early in the game, and in turn, bankrupt themselves forever. 

Click to read more ...

WHAT STEPS ARTISTS NEED TO TAKE BEFORE GOING TO RADIO

“When it’s your time, it’s your time.” – Bruno Mars

 OK, so, you’ve raised enough money from your friends, family and (let’s hope) fans to record that set of songs in the way you’ve always wanted them to sound and now it’s time to share your creative output with the world. And what better way to do that than through the time-tested path of radio. And, indeed, there is no better way for your music to become one with the masses than through the repeated plays of radio. And it’s free!

No, actually radio is not free. But even if it were, there are numerous steps that you first need to take along the yellow brick road to reach the radio stations of Oz. You’d better sit down.

Click to read more ...