Last.fm is a UK based internet and music community website founded in 2002. It claims over 21 million active users based in more than 200 countries and has so far tallied some 450,000 tracks. Last.fm users “scrobble” tracks through their servers on a massive scale, aiming to collectively build the world’s largest social music platform. The big day has come for independant musicians that are not affiliated with a label or royalty collection agency. Last.fm has launched a unique Artist Royalty program, a transparent payout system. Wether your music is broadcasted to a listener on-demand or through radio shuffle, royalties can be collected through  Read more...

This is the ever present message in the career of Japanese DJ Kentaro. The world first heard Kentaro’s name at the 2002 DMC/Technics World DJ Championship Final in September 2002 when he became the first ever Asian World Champion of the renown DJ competition. The people who were there that night witnessed a historic moment, it was a smashing victory, out of the 16 judges on the panel, 15 picked Kentaro as champ and the difference in points between him and second place was a double score, a feat very rarely achieved in the close cut world of turntablism. Skillfully jumping between Hip-hop, breakbeats, reggae, drum’n'bass and  Read more...

Richie Hawtin, a man who really puts the TECH into Techno, is one of Techno’s best known, most respected and most established producers. Although he was born in Canada he is synonomous with Detroit, partly responsible for breaking the second wave of Detroit Techno. Hawtin has been at the cutting edge of Dance music for more than a decade-and-a-half. Whether it’s his futuristic productions and mixes, his work in develloping Final Scratch, or in defining Minimal Techno via his Minus label, Richie Hawtin has become one of electronic music’s most recognisable figures. His search for new sounds, posibilities and continued interest in the latest audio enge  Read more...

Once in a while a product comes along that really takes things to another dimension - I am talking about ‘Celemony Melodyne’ - it recognizes the music in an audio file and represents it directly as notes; in this way, it offers highly intuitive and far-reaching access to the musical material and permits a sensationally flexible and creative way of working. Apparently it is the perfect tool for pitch shifting and time stretching in convincingly natural sound quality, for correcting the intonation and timing of singing, for audio quantization, producing harmonies, and remixing and restructuring the melody, tempo or timing of existing recordings. The first thing I did was download the demo version because I just couldn’t believe it. Trust me, it is REAL ! Editors and journal  Read more...

Meet Maxence Cyrin… a genuis classical pianist who creates acoustic versions of early electronic classics only on his piano. Though ‘classical schooled’, Cyrin started composing electronic music in his late teens, deeply into New Wave, Electro and Industrial sounds. Around that time he also disovered Techno and hits his first raves. Heavliy impressed by the whole dance movement he soon saw himself releasing several 12 records on independant labels like Rave age, Superstition and PCP. Drawing from his background, the French pianist soon started working on his interpretations of ‘classics’, adding completely new dimensions, ranging from the most delicate pianissimos to driving rhythmic forte staccatos. His work soon gained the attention of living legend Laurent  Read more...

Noisia is their name, Drum & Bass their game and the world’s their playground. Time to pay some respect to these young supertalents from the ‘far north’ of Holland. Noisia, made up by the three schoolfriends Nik Roos (23), Martijn Van Sonderen (23) and Thijs De Vlieger (24) got together in the late 90’s to create some music. Martijn already had some experience playing keyboard and classical piano, but the one to really ignite all was Nick who bought some software (Fruityloops and Rebirth) and started to experiment. The guys were ‘caught’ by the work of Ed Rush and Optical who inspired them to create their own unique productionstyle. Everything really started rolling when the guys posted some tunes on a music forum and got picked up by Mayhem of Read more...

Hey you guys, it’s been a lil’ while, but first and foremost a happy new year to you all and all the best wishes for 2008! Normally I am not the one to be looking back on a past year, but it’s been an interesting one for us to say the least. So just for this very ocassion I’ll make an exception. Last year saw us taking the concept for our platform from drawingboard into production. And it has been a hard one on us all. Since we sort of need to re-invent the web things are very complicated and the process is slow. I Guess changing the world isn’t that easy . The good news however is that we finally have climbed the highest mountain, so things might speed up a little. 2007 also was the year we first made our public performance. Despite the fact we were allready  Read more...

We came across a very useful resource if you’re into phat analogue machines! This ever-expanding source of reviews, images, sound bytes and links regarding more than 600 popular vintage synthesizers, drummachines and samplers is just too good not to share. Vintage Synth Explorer features a very useful ’synth finder’, the rise of analogue synthesizers set out on a timeline (one slick and cool feature if you ask me!). Over 80 manufacturers and developers are represented, varying from legends like ARP, Korg, Moog, Oberheim, Roland and Sequential Cir  Read more...

With plenty of joy we bring you the second episode of this beautiful BBC documentary. Part 2 showcases the next chapter of the revolution as House music left shore and began its European journey. The Chicago godfathers took their Chicago House across the Atlantic straight into the Hacienda (shown on the photo) in Manchester. Detroit Techno soon joined Chicago House and the legendary ‘Summer of Love’ was a fact. People went mad, DJ’s became superstars, massive queues and sold out nights became common. It was unstoppable… though the English police tried hard enough. The BBC once more managed to talk to those closely involved back in the days. People like A Guy Called G  Read more...