A little bit of hype on these as Deadmau5 has been using them for a while in beta:

http://www.synthsquad.com/

http://www.beatportal.com/feed/item/brit...or-venues/

Quote:Live music fans and clubbers in Britain are currently petitioning the government over its plans to introduce sound control devices as a legal requirement for entertainment venues.

Although unconfirmed at this point, the organisers behind the online petition believe the devices cut-off point will be “dreadfully low”, at around 70 dB.

Unsurprisingly, the petition already has 32,000 signatures and is likely to gain many more supporters in the coming weeks.

The government wants to introduce the sound control devices to protect the hearing of staff who work in bars, clubs and live music venues, but those opposed to the plans believe it’ll cause irreparable damage to the nightlife scene in Britain.

Some are even saying it’s just another step towards a nanny state.

A 2004 study by the University of Edinburgh found that the average sound level for nightclubs in the UK was 96 db, with some even reaching 108 db.

You can sign the petition at: http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/NoNoiseControl/

Just came across this now in fact, the new groove quantize will be much appreciated..

If you own 7 the upgrade price is only 149 euro, so not too bad. Looking forward
to seeing more of these features in detail.


Berlin, Germany (January 15, 2009) - Ableton is excited to announce
the agenda for 2009: Ableton Live 8, Ableton Suite 8, new instruments
and three completely new product initiatives.



Live 8 and Suite 8 enhance the Ableton vision of creative, real-time
digital music with a wealth of new techniques, effects and most-wanted
workflow improvements. These include a new groove engine, revamped
warping techniques, live looping, five new effects (including the
Ableton Vocoder), crossfades in the Arrangement View, group tracks
and a reworked MIDI editor. Ableton Suite 8 includes all that plus
a massive, inspired sound library and all the instruments a musician
could hope for, including a wide range of synths, a sampler, electric
and acoustic drums (new: Latin percussion), mallets (new: Collision),
numerous sampled instruments and a new, even-mightier Operator.


New in Ableton Live 8:

• New groove engine: new groove library, extract grooves from
audio or MIDI, real time groove quantize
• New warping engine: warp audio events by adjusting the
events on the timeline, updated Beats Warp Mode, new Complex Warp Mode,
slice audio files to MIDI tracks based on transients
• Looper: classic sound-on-sound looping without the limitations
of a hardware device. Record, overdub, undo and more without touching
the computer. “First loop sync,” simple loop management
• New effects: Vocoder, Multiband Dynamics, Overdrive, Limiter
and Frequency Shifter
• Workflow enhancements: including real-time crossfades in the
Arrangement View, enhanced MIDI editing, group tracks, multiple track
selection, a screen magnifier and more
New in Ableton Suite 8:
• World-class sound library: completely new sound library with
real-world “Sound Objects,” presets, grooves, templates and, above all,
over 1600 beautiful sounds
• Collision and Corpus: a unique physical-modeling instrument
for authentic mallet sounds and creative percussion. Includes Corpus,
a separate effect that reproduces Collision’s resonator section
• Latin Percussion: a collection of acoustic percussion instruments
from the worlds of Brazilian, Afro-Cuban and African music plus a wide
selection of clips and grooves for authentic usage
• Operator, Ableton’s renowned do-it-all synthesizer, has been
given a major overhaul. New filter types, more modulation routing
options and additive wavetable synthesis with drawable partials make
Operator more powerful and flexible than ever.




Plus these existing Ableton instruments: Sampler, Electric, Tension,
Analog, Drum Machines, Session Drums* and the
Essential Instrument Collection 2*.
*Boxed version only.


GREAT EXPECTATIONS: NEW INITIATIVES FOR 2009

Share: effortless remote collaboration
Share Live Sets with others via the Web using this special feature
in Live 8. Ableton’s simple and intelligent solution for online musical
collaboration streamlines the sharing process with easy sharing and
loading, a simple system of setting access permission, speedy transfers
and no issues with external plug-ins and instruments.

Extend: Max for Live
Max for Live is a new product, co-developed by Ableton and Cycling ‘74.
Quite simply, it puts the power and potential of Max/MSP inside Live.
With Max for Live, it’s possible to create completely new instruments,
effects and extensions that go beyond the common and predictable and
transcend the limits that conventional tools impose. The possibilities
are virtually endless, from completely unique synths and effects,
algorithmic composition tools or radical, new music machines fusing
Live and controller hardware. Max for Live is a chance to join a
society of makers and share ingenuity.

Touch: dedicated controllers for Ableton Live
Ableton and Akai Professional are proud to announce the APC40, a
new hardware controller specially designed for Ableton Live. The
APC40 features high quality controls for real-time mixing, remixing
and production. 109 buttons, 16 endless encoders with LED rings,
nine 45mm faders and a replaceable crossfader give musicians and
producers complete control of Live’s Session View, effect devices
and virtual instruments. For anyone in the studio or on stage, DJing,
making beats, running backing tracks, firing MIDI loops or triggering
sound effects, it’s time to kiss the mouse goodbye.

These three initiatives combine in interesting ways:
Live 8 + Max for Live: Swap extensions, effects and instruments
created with Max for Live using the sharing technology in Live 8.
So Max for Live owners also get access to any number of additional
instruments, effects and extensions created by the Max for Live
community.

Live 8 + Max for Live + APC40: with Max for Live, it’s possible to
customize the APC40, turning its Clip Launch Matrix into a step
sequencer, for instance. Live 8’s sharing features allow users to
share APC40 mods with other APC40 users. And because communication
is two-way, this also means access to all the other shared APC40
goodies that the Ableton community has to offer.
PRICING AND AVAILABILITY
Ableton Live 8 and Ableton Suite 8 should be available in the second
quarter of 2009, following extensive testing and bugfixing. A public
beta version of these products will be available soon.

Prices for Ableton Suite 8 start at EUR 549/USD 699 (download version).
Prices for Ableton Live 8 start at EUR 349/USD 449 (download version).

Upgrades to Live 8/Suite 8 vary in price, depending on the Ableton
products you already own. More details at:
http://www.ableton.com/live-8-upgrades

Collision and Latin Percussion will be available individually or
as part of Ableton Suite 8. Both instruments will be available with
the Live 8 release. Collision will cost EUR 129/USD 159,
Latin Percussion EUR 79/USD 99.

Max for Live will be available later this year. Max for Live is a
separate product: it is not part of Ableton Live 8 or Ableton Suite 8.
No price available yet.

The feature “Share Live Set” is initially included in Ableton Live 8.
As the technology develops, Ableton may introduce new models for
handling this feature.
For more information on pricing and availability of the APC40, visit:
http://www.akaipro.com/apc40

so the NAMM show is on Jan 15th to 18th theyre displaying among other things this monster

http://www.akaipro.com/apc40

and apparently cubase 5, wish i had stuck with 3 had i known 5 wouldbe coming out so soon

How do you guys go about organizing your samples?

I've found that over the years, I've kind of cluttered my hard drives with samples. It starts out with one drive with samples; gets full....so add another drive; gets full...get another one.....delete stuff, change drives...etc..etc...
Now I'm planning to buy two new drives (one as a backup); maybe 1 to 1.5 Terabytes. Way more than I need, but thinking 'future expansion'.

So trying to get some ideas of how to do it from scratch. I'd love to break everything up into (snares, kick, bass, etc..) but am reluctant to break up the different sample packs, as they do kinda have their function as well as knowing where a particular sample came from in case of some legal issue. So I'm looking for a program that has some sort of database function that allows me to tag a particular sample (say a kick drum) in multiple ways so I can search for it later. (for example, I tag it "Kick" & "Electro Kick" and whenever I search for 'kick' or 'electro kick' , there it is). And of course, be able to preview it in the program.

Anything out there like that? Or another way to organize things?

Thanks!

I've read about this before, and I often work with a compressor on my drum bus, but not much more than that.

How does everyone here feel about working with their master bus loaded with plugins and eqs. Came across some opinions gearslutz today and was wondering what my trusted medway forums friends thought?

ps. is the a thread on here about this already. apologies if there is.

pps. if there is, did i start it? super extra apologies if thats the case. haha.

I've been spending a little more time recently focusing on eqing my tracks.

I've been searching out the resonant frequencies and cutting them. However, often it can sound worse then before I eq'd, especially my kick drum...it often ends up sounding flat and muffled. Am I cutting the wrong frequencies? Am I cutting the right frequencies too much?

What are the different types of eqs and what purposes can they serve? Generally on my kick drum I would low cut below 30hz, compress, then use some sort of eq like the UAD neve or pultec to add some punch, then I would use the Logic eq after that to take away what I think the bad frequencies are.

I would like to learn to eq my tracks better. But I am also nervous to send all my eq'd tracks off to mastering and there are all these frequencies missing from bad eqing.

So, thoughts, feelings, lets talking about eqing!

You not only go look for compressor settings written 2 years ago in your wallet of all places but end coming across yet another set of settings for a different compressor you forgot you even wrote down (thanks Gav that business card you gave me came in handy as now I've got the settings to emulate the Distressor)..

I've been using this recently to fatten up or give power to weak bass, and I must say that I love it. Even if the bass can hold its own, this plugin gives it a certain kind of (can't think of a word....presence maybe?)

I recommend you give it a try. I'm not sure how you guys usually add power to your bass, but here's another option. Cheers



http://www.studiodevil.com/products/

Spill, it let us know...