Author: George Robinson

[the_ad_placement id=”top-content-300×250″] Continuing our Sound Design series, in Part 2 we are looking at the many facets of distortion for sound design purposes: from subtle warming up and saturation to guitar amp effects, parallel treatments and full crunchy bit-crushed obliteration. Dive straight in below. Catch up on the other parts in the series: Part 1 – Delay Part 2 – Distortion Part 3 – Layering Part 4 – Classic Modulation FX Part 5 – Stereo & Panning FX Part 6 – Pitch Shifting Part 7 – Reverb Part 8 – Step Sequencers & Envelope Generators Part 9 – Creative Filtering…

Read More

[the_ad_placement id=”top-content-300×250″] It’s never been more important to be able to craft distinctive and original sounds if you want to make your songs and productions shine and really stand out. Fortunately, there have also never been so many tools to choose from to enable you to do just that. With this in mind, we’re kicking off a new 10-part series of posts that explore essential sound design techniques, along with the very best and most cutting-edge plugins for the task in each corresponding category. Whether you are designing huge cinematic impacts, weird and unique layered drums kits and synth sounds,…

Read More

[adrotate banner=”4″] Whether you’re looking for the ultimate Christmas gifts for musically-inclined friends or family, or you’re the musician deciding what you’re going to ask for, here are our suggestions for a cross-section of the most awesome gear currently available, including absolutely new cutting edge releases, a few “modern classic” favourites from the last couple of years, as well as some studio must-haves that we’re confident producers of any budget will get genuinely excited about. Happy Holidays! If you’ve already narrowed it down and are looking for the best music-making studio software and DAWs (Digital Audio Workstations), your first stop might…

Read More

You can now use your Moog, DSI, Korg, Roland, Novation or other hardware synth as a fully integrated hands-on controller for Omnisphere, potentially turning one of the most versatile and feature-rich software synths into your dream software-hardware hybrid production solution. Following the initial announcement at Berlin’s Superbooth in May and public beta phase, Omnisphere 2.5 recently officially dropped, so we thought it was the perfect time to take it through it’s paces and check out the latest improvements and additions. Check out Spectrasonics Founder Eric Persing’s Keynote Presentation above, where he unveils Omnisphere 2.5 and takes it through its paces…

Read More

Loopmasters have announced the release of their brand-new synth Bass Master, that is completely dedicated to crafting heavy, speaker-shaking bass for every style of electronic music. Whether you are making House, Techno, Drum and Bass, Trap, Hip Hop or other electronic music, Bass Master’s huge variety of source sounds provide the inspiration for a weighty, powerful bass tone. Across two layers, the curated set of 217 waveforms (that’s almost 50,000 possible combinations), taken from a mixture of legendary hardware classics and cutting-edge synth science. Considering Loopmasters’ pedigree as purveyors of top-quality sounds for decades, why accept anything less? Bass Master…

Read More

Having previously looked at the Orchestral Swarm instrument pack, notably used by Hans Zimmer for the Blue Planet 2 score, as well as the Chamber Evolutions pack, created with famed Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds, Point Blank Music School’s resident compositional wizard Kevin Kerrigan has recently been turning his attention to the excellent ‘Chamber Strings’ from Spitfire Audio. The focus here is on getting straight to the nuts-and-bolts processes and workflows, rather than simply a general tour of a new instrument. Music composition forms an integral part of Point Blank’s music production courses, including their flagship BA (Hons) in Music Production…

Read More

After choosing your DAW and spending some time learning it’s features, strengths and limitations, a logical next step in evolving your ideal studio setup and furthering your production skills is investing in a solid suite or bundle of plugins from one of the top music software developers. Whether you’re after a mixing or mastering bundle as an upgrade to the mix plugins that come with your base DAW toolset, or you’re looking to extend your sound palette with a host of synths and sound sources, we’ve got you covered with our round-up below. The benefits of plugin bundles Save money in…

Read More

With so many Black Friday deals being announced over the coming days, it’s easy to miss or lose track of some of the very best offers out there right now. If you’re anything like us, you’ll probably appreciate the short list we’ve put together to highlight a few of the most exceptional deals we’ve noticed for musicians and producers this weekend in the realms of world-class software effects, synths and bundles. Whatever your budget or style, there are some real bargains to be had: 1. Sugar Bytes: Up To 56% OFF 20 Nov – November 29, 2017 Sugar Bytes do a…

Read More

Point Blank are back with a brand new tutorial series to help you get the most out of your productions. In this series, Point Blank course developer and instructor Chris Carter explores a number of sound design tips and techniques to give you a flavour of what to expect on their courses, including their comprehensive BA (Hons) Music Production and Sound Engineering degree, which is also available as an online degree. For those who want to master their craft in sound design, music production, mixing and more, Point Blank are currently offering a huge 35% discount plus a free copy of Ableton Suite or Logic…

Read More