Talk of a Gibson bankruptcy in 2018 intensifies

Talk of a Gibson bankruptcy has intensified recently, with some now expecting the US guitar maker to part ways with its current CEO and owner Henry Juskiewicz in 2018. Here's the story so far...

Flat pack musical products coming from IKEA and Teenage Engineering

Electronic music design and home design collide in a potentially interesting collaboration between fellow Swedes IKEA and Teenage Engineering. The FREKVENS collection coming to stores in about a year.

Ritual: A droning, echoing, atmospheric synthesizer from another time

Beautifully handcrafted Ritual synthesizer from Resonance Circuits with a playful, if slightly disturbing, front panel is a unique sound generating, noise making, drone enthusing atmospheric device.

Hear360 8ball omni-binaural microphone goes on sale for 2500 USD

Over a year after its announcement, the 8ball microphone from Hear360 is finally launching. The 2500 EUR multi-channel recording tool has eight capsules (all in all) on the left and right.

Best free plug-ins this week: Bakuage, Sennheiser AMBEO, SampleScience Player

We are covering the nicest free plug-ins that show up each week. This time, we have three really good tools - plug-ins by Bakuage, a binaural panner from Sennheiser, and a big-boy ROMpler from SampleScience!

Behringer asks if you’d like an OB-Xa clone as a desktop or keyboard

While Uli Behringer asks whether you'd like your OB-Xa clone with or without a keyboard, I wonder how long it will be until we can design our own synth in their online store?

Yamaha announces new MG10XUF & MG12XUK compact mixers

Yamaha has a pair of new compact mixers on the line, the Yamaha MG10XUF and MG12XUK. They are based on the third-generation XU models of the company's MG-series, but offer different controllers.

SPINK0: Ableton Link for Eurorack is almost a reality

The Pink-0 open source project investigated how to put Ableton Link sync technology into a Eurorack module. Seismic Industries appeared to have cracked it with SPINK0 and now I can sync my laptop to my modular!

Universal Audio updates UAD to version 9.5 with Helios 69 EQ and Preamp

Universal Audio have released a new update to its UAD software, with new goodies for 9.5 including an emulation of the Helios 9.5 preamp and EQ, Friedman's Buxom Betty amp and the A/DA flanger.

Elektron’s Overbridge DAW integration app delayed again

9 months since the release of the Digitakt and there's still no Overbridge. Elektron put back the release date for a second time and ask for our patience as they try to get their awesome integration to work.

Krotos is coming in guns blazing with Weaponiser, a hot shot sound design tool

Krotos' upcoming tool looks interesting and capable. It's focused on weapon sounds, with a library of SFX organized by gun type and firing mode. The sounds can be edited in great detail!

Time-stretch any sound into oblivion with PaulXStretch!

If you want to do some seriously mean time-stretching with your audio - we are talking stretching a 3-minute song into a 10-hour ambient masterpiece, for example - you are going to love this one!

Olympus’ new LS-P4 looks like a great portable recorder for the money

Olympus introduced a new portable recorder, the LS-P4. Up to par with competing offerings from Roland and ZOOM, the LS-P4 records audio in 24-bit, 96kHz lossless .FLAC format.

TEM Mini monophonic synthesizer inspired by the Minimoog

In light of the Behringer Model D is there still room for a boutique analogue synthesizer based upon the Minimoog? ADSR seem to think so and offer up the TEM Mini for your consideration.

TouchPad: groovy programmable shortcut and macro controller

Navigate your DAW like a boss with this palm-sized programmable keyboard shortcut and macro controller. TouchPad has 36 keys for up to 5 commands per key for super fast audio editing.

Behringer VC340 Vocoder Plus spotted in the wild

A prototype Behringer VC340 Vocoder Plus was spotted languishing in the studio of Facebook user Firechild. Now with a video demonstrating the awesome heart of this nonsense instrument.

Golden Age PRE-73 Premier and PREQ-73 Premier 1073-style preamps are coming

Golden Age is introducing Premier versions of its affordable Neve 1073-style preamps, the PRE-73 and PREQ-73 Premier. Priced reasonably and built with high-quality components, these could eat up the market!

Get those 50s and 60s vibes going with Audiority’s Tube Modulator plug-in

Audiority has released a really cool-looking vintage modulator and tremolo effect called Tube Modulator. It emulates several tremolo, vibrato, and spatial positioning effects, starting with a late '50s unit.

Free plug-ins this week: A mic sim, a saturator, a distortion and two synths!

After a brief hiatus, we're back with coverage of the best free plug-ins that popped up throughout the week. We have a whopping five of them to present and we think they will make a fine addition to your ...

Gibson Modern Flying V boldly goes where no guitar has gone before

Finally! The full details of the Gibson Modern Flying V are now official - this guitar first beamed onto the Earth's surface at this year's CES. Make it so!

Line 6 Helix 2.5 Update now available – and it was worth the wait

As we reported during NAMM, Line 6 had planned a big Helix 2.5 update - now it's here and adds a bag of effects and two very convincing boutique amp models.

Vermona release randomRHYTHM trigger sequencer Eurorack module

randomRHYTHM is an 8 channel 2 x 4 rhythm section with on and off-beat randomisation, CV controlled muting, swing, clock division and endless percussion pattern generation.

DDMF Plugin Analyzer tells you what your plug-ins are doing to your audio

Plugindoctor is an analyzer for VST and AU plug-ins that comes recommended for plug-in developers who want to test their creations or users who want to understand exactly what a plug-in is doing to their audio.

Output’s new Analog Brass & Winds instrument: “Next level air”?

We're pretty sure Output's new baby is capable of some bad-ass sounds in the right hands. Remember Nine Inch Nails' Capital G? Yeah, that's what distorted brass can sound like!