Ableton Live 11: The biggest upgrades explained

Ableton announced Live 11 in mid November and now it's finally here. The latest version of its incredibly popular DAW is out of beta and available to all. The list of new features in Live 11 is long and impressive: Comping; linked track editing;...

Artiphon Orba review: Much more than a musical fidget toy

I am both fascinated by and skeptical of strange, nontraditional musical instruments. And it’s this very thing that drew me to Artiphon’s Orba. It’s about as nontraditional as you can get. It’s a tiny synthesizer and looper, and an MPE MIDI controlle...

Ableton Live 11 is coming next year with MPE support

Normally Ableton takes its sweet time between major releases of Live. And that’s not a bad thing. Performing musicians and recording artists demand rock solid reliability and performance. So, you don’t want to be throwing dramatic overhauls of their...

Jamstik Studio is the MIDI guitar you might actually want to use

The Jamstik Studio MIDI Guitar is, as the name implies a guitar. But to be clear, if you’re just looking to buy a guitar, there is no reason to get one. It’s serviceable, but nothing special. The mahogany body and rosewood fretboard feel decent enoug...

Joué Play is a cheap, simple and customizable MIDI controller

In 2016 a little French company called Joué launched a Kickstarter campaign for a shapeshifting instrument it simply called the Joué Board. It was one of a rash of new and experimental types of MIDI controllers that embraced emerging technologies lik...

Orba is a tiny, fun and surprisingly expressive instrument

I am simultaneously deeply fascinated by and deeply skeptical of strange niche instruments. As fun as a classic Stylophone is, for instance, it's pretty tricky to make decent-sounding music with. Even quirky controllers like Roli Blocks have a hard t...

The Osmose synth is both futuristic and familiar

Expressive E isn't quite the household name that, say, Korg is. It's a small French startup with just a couple of niche musical devices under its belt. But its Touché and Touché SE are unique in the way they allow musicians to con...