December 2008 Magazine Contents

Adam have gained a strong reputation for the quality and value for money of their larger reference monitors, but have they had to make any compromises in their smallest model?

Akai's MPC has been with us for 20 years now — an incredibly long time in music production. So is the latest addition to this venerable range, the MPC5000, a worthy bearer of its standard?

Eiosis' innovative plug-in processor allows you to completely isolate transients so that they can be processed independently of the rest of the audio.

• Schertler DYN-G Acoustic Instrument Pickup • Boss DD7 Digital Delay Pedal

Newer technologies may be available, but the CD is still alive and kicking... and this unique stand-alone recorder is arguably the pinnacle of CD technology.

It's easy to see where the Black Hole gets its name, but this novel microphone isn't all about appearances...

The Voyager Old School sees Moog returning to their roots, but is there a place for an all-analogue, 1970s-style synth in the 21st century?

Another crop of sound libraries fall under the scrutiny of the SOS reviews team: • Project SAM Symphobia • Propellerhead Reason Electric Bass • Big Fish Audio Found Percussion • Project SAM Woodwind Libraries

Spectrasonics' ambitious new sample-based power synth explores the realms of psychoacoustics and organic synthesis while running on a STEAM engine — what can this all mean? Let's find out...

Mixing on headphones is undoubtedly convenient, but you can never be sure if your mixes will translate well to speakers. This high-quality headphone amp and processor aims to address that problem.

Digital Village enjoy an established reputation for their custom music PCs, and are clearly looking to build upon that with their new Synergy range...

Is this latest addition to the Thermionic Culture flock something for the company to crow about?

Toontrack's DFH Superior received excellent reviews but perhaps didn't really make the impact that it deserved. Will the drums and cymbals of their new Superior Drummer 2.0 make a greater splash?

Will Zplane's musically intelligent software make the world a more harmonious place?

A Christmas song was an unexpected move from a group like the Pogues, but the story of heartbreak and pain that is 'Fairytale Of New York' eventually became the band's biggest commercial success.

If you're shopping for a new CPU, the number of processor cores it has may not be the most important factor in how well it runs your music software. Read on to find out why...

For the recording of their fourth album Only By The Night, Kings Of Leon and co-producer Jacquire King decided to aim high. The result: a worldwide smash and a long-awaited breakthrough in the band's native US.

Housekeeping tasks might not be as much fun as making music, but staying on top of them should ensure safely backed-up tracks and a hassle-free system performing at its best.

When you're trying to achieve a tight, commercial hip-hop sound, you might need to resort to some heavy processing — but not on every track...

Here are the links to the MP3 and WAV files that accompany the December 2008 Mix Rescue article for our newsstand/bookstore readers who do not have eSub-access to the main web article and don't fancy typing in all the long URLs by hand.

If you've lots of third-party plug-ins in different formats, it can be a pain to keep tabs on where they're stored and which version to use. We explain how DP's plug-in manager functionality can help, as well as offering guidance on DP6 features, including the essential new 'pre-generation'.

As iPhone-mania continues to grip the world, developers have been releasing music-related applications, some of which offer a surprising level of sophistication. Forget the idea of a laptop studio — it's time for the pocket studio!

Think computer music's got no soul? Think again! Join us as we explore Reason's ReGroove mixer...

There's more to dynamics than compression and expansion, and now transient shaping is part of Sonar 8, courtesy of the TS64 Transient Shaper plug-in.

You can save time and cut down on mouse-clicks by using Pro Tools' window management features.

Having done your best to capture a high-quality recording of your vocals, how best do you go about processing them so they work in your mix?

Manipulating the frequency spectrum is one of the most important skills in recording and mixing. We explain the different types of EQ you can use in your mix and share some tips on how to get the best from them.

I'm a Propellerhead Reason user and I plan to Rewire the software to Steinberg's Cubase DAW. My plan leads me to ask two questions about using MIDI keyboard controllers and control surfaces.

I'm looking for something to record my latest project with. I currently own an Apple iMac running OS X Tiger, and the main program I use for recording is Apple's own Soundtrack. I'm thinking of upgrading at some point to Logic Pro 8, but for the moment I'm with Soundtrack. I have eight Audio Technica mics for the drum kit and I'm really looking to record through a mixer into Soundtrack (Logic in the future). However, I still want to be in control of individual mic levels after I've recorded within Soundtrack or Logic, even having those individual mics on different tracks.

I have a Core 2 Duo PC, Yamaha MW10 USB mixer, Alesis RA150 power amp and JBL speakers. I use high-quality cable from amp to speakers, a TRS-wired jack lead between the mixer output and amp, and a good-quality USB cable between my mixer and computer.

We're often told that, barring serious illness, the two most stressful things in life are divorce and moving house...

As they celebrate 20 years in the business, sample library pioneers EastWest are on the verge of relaunching LA's legendary United-Western studio complex. They've also developed an innovative sample-playback engine to power their next generation of virtual instruments.

When they began work on The Seldom Seen Kid, Elbow had no record label and no producer. Two years later, it's brought them mainstream success at last.

Sponsored by breed-media.co.uk

Make me a record that sounds worse than My Bloody Valentine, and I'll make you a star.

Progress is a wonderful thing, if you're a composer of music for the media and you dream of a poolside studio in the Bahamas.