Presented by Scott Hewitt, Sameul Freeman and Adam Jansch.

We have a review of Reason 8.

News

SSL releases AAX Native 64 Plugins

SSL have announced the release of AAX Native 64 versions of Duende Native plug-ins for Pro Tools 11. The release is compatible with 32 and 64bit ProTools systems. The new versions are available to download now at discounted pricing until the 25th of November 2014. link

Max 7 Released

Cycling74 have announced the release of Max 7, with new pricing and a raft of new features. link

IK Multimedia Holiday Deals

IK Multimedia have announced a holiday deal for the winter season with discounts on new bundles including, iRig Keys PRO + SampleTank 3 Bundle, iRig KEYS + iRig Pads Bundle and iRig PRO + iRig BlueBoard Bundle. link

IK Multimedia SampleTank Supports iOS 8

IK Multimedia have added support for iOS 8 to SampleTank along with support for iRig Pads and new sound collections. link

YouTube Music Key to go beta

YouTube’s new music streaming service Music Key is set to go beta next week. The service gives users access to high quality music and videos without ads. Tracks will be available through the YouTube app (which has been adapted to allow background playback). The beta is invite-only and will run for six months, after which time it will cost $9.99 a month ($7.99 for previous beta users). link

Bandcamp announces subscription services

Music platform Bandcamp have announced their new subscription service, which will allow artists to provide access to customisable sets of their Bandcamp catalogue for an artist-decided fee. This service sees Bandcamp moving into Spotify territory. Amongst other features, Bandcamp subscription tracks will stream through the Bandcamp website or app, and can be set as exclusive to subscribers (either temporarily or permanently). Bandcamp CEO Ethan Diamond says, “It’s kinda like what U2 and Apple did, except that it’s music that you actually want!”. link

Audiobus Bug Database

Audiobus have announced the intention to maintain an issues database for audio on apps on iOS8. link

Analog Four-Keys OS Update

Elektron have announced the release of an update for Analog Four/Keys to version OS 1.12.The update includes more precise CV pitch calibration routine and CV voltage trim. Available online now. link

Review

Reason 8

Sam F has a review of Propellerheads Reason 8 for us. link

It's been a few weeks since Reason 8 was released by Propellerheads, and I (SF) have finally taken time to spend a few sessions playing it by logging in via theAudioPodcast review account... In the run up to it's release I remember being quite reserved in my reaction to the user interface (UI) improvements that have been hyped as key to this update to Reason, but my excitement for this software is now renewed!

Only after experiencing the workflow possible with the improved UI did i remember how frustrating i had found certain aspects of the old patch browser in Reason. The new upfront and embedded browser that dynamically follows the action of other clicks in a logical way provides a subtle helping hand without trying to take over or dictate what happens next in the session.

After installing Reason 8 and logging in (not necessary if you have a dongle) I went through the Help menu to get to the account area of the Propellerheads website where the new Softube Amp and BassAmp Rack Extensions were available to download. Sadly I did need to restart Reason to be able to use these in the virtual rack, but this is forgivable. Having played with quite a few amp modelling plugins this year, I can say that these stand up well in comparison to their contemporaries in different DAW environments.

It's almost 14 years since I first made music with Reason, and in that time some updates have felt monumental (version 2.5 for example, and the time that Reason and 'Record' merged to bring Reason into DAW fold), whereas others have (for me) felt more pedestrian.

Reason 8 lives up to its hype; I recommend giving it a try!

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Web Winamp

Winamp2-js is a reimplementation of Winamp 2.9 in HTML5 and Javascript – source and info on GitHub. Also, as of 28 October 2014, HTML5 is now a W3C Recommendation. link

All about that base

And for those of a northern persuasion.

The Birth of British Electronic music

An interesting documentary, What the Future Sounded Like (2006), about the birth of British Electronic music.

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