welcome

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AI is here. It won’t kill us, after all…

NEW RELEASES • COMMENT • INDUSTRY HAPPENINGS

App watch

We report on the latest developments in phone and tablet music making

Get with the programmers

Wave Alchemy started out as superior samplists but now make some of the best plugins in the business. Dan Byers is your alchemist…

10 years back

Our monthly shake-of-thehead at our younger selves’ news

Come on free the Noise

Noise Engineering, might be better known for Eurorack

Ins & outs

TAH VERY MUCH It might be fanciful to

Next issue

60 years of the synthesiser!

Sun-El Musician

Sun-El Musician has a huge fan base in his home country of South Africa, with tens of millions of Youtube views, but is on a mission to spread his brand of EDM across the world, even inventing a sub genre of it along the way – African Electronic Dance Music. We catch up with the man whose ambitions are as big as his setup is small. “I’m not one to have crazy things and just like my studio to be simple…”

Keinemusik

Keinemusik first caught our ear back in 2017 with their ambitious debut album You Are Safe. Since then, the Berlinbased trio have refined their creative process, linking up with a variety of collaborators to produce an impressive sophomore effort that expands their sound while remaining firmly focused on the dancefloor

THE BEST FREEWARE PLUGINS

It seems with each passing year, the number of exceptional free plugins, DAWs, instruments, tools and services increases tenfold. With such a rich field to harvest, we know how overwhelming it can be to know just where to begin when collecting free music-making software – and avoiding that feeling that your precious hard drive space is being clogged by software that you’re never likely to actually use. Luckily Computer Music is on hand to help, with some carefully considered groupings of the very best – and genuinely useful – free swag that you can download this very day…

Best freeware setup for EDM

Love or hate it, EDM is a genre by (mostly) and for the masses… and with freeware, anyone can have a go

Best freeware setup for electronica

Good electronica creates a rich tapestry of sounds. And what gets that creativity flowing better than a freebie?

Best freeware setup for guitarists

Rather spend your cash on [insert desirable plankspanker item] than some digi nonsense? Look no further

Tracktion Waveform Free

A great DAW base for further freeware explorations

Best freeware for soundtracking

Channel your inner cinema auteur – for much less than a bucket of popcorn

Best freeware for podcasting and YouTube

Make your voice heard! All you need is an internet connection and these free tools

Sampling

Take your first steps into sampling with TX16Wx

Modular synthesis

Create your first patches with this free emulation

Best freeware for live performance

Get beat-matching, vocal tweaking, clip launching and more… for free

Best freeware for singer/songwriters

The power of song, life’s greatest costfree tonic – and capturing it can be too!

Best freeware setup for hip‐hop

Hip-hop’s roots are in accessible processes – and this lot do it for free

Best freeware for mixing

This set of free tools really clean up – and will help you do the same for your track

Best freeware for mastering

It’s called the dark art, but a little knowhow costs nothing… literally in this case!

MOUSSE T.

Mousse T. is a legendary dance music producer whose hits back in the 90s paved the way for a three-decade – and counting – career in remixing and production. It has taken him everywhere from the top of the charts to Eurovision, and co-writing a Tom Jones smash to being a judge on the German version of Pop Idol. Here he gives us a couple of lessons in remixing, three decades apart…

#01 Creative basslines

Production masterclass with Ashley Thorpe

#12 LFO sequence

Synth masterclass with Dave Gale

Reverb

The idea of adding reverb is simple enough but how do they work, and what are your plugin options?

Delay effects

Our attention turns to a family of effect types that takes your signal and does weird and wonderful things

Moog Animoog Z $19.99

Proving that the old masters can still show us new tricks, we get animated by Moog’s latest update to their affordable software synth

PSP Audioware PSP Saturator $99

Saturation can be a fantastic tool for bringing sounds to life, but does this new offering from PSP have what it takes?

Solid State Logic Fusion Violet EQ and Fusion HF Compressor £139

Individually, SSL’s Fusion HF Compressor and Fusion Violet EQ can add polish to your mixes, but used in tandem they can make your mixes

MIA Laboratories 925 Compressor MkII & 358 Enhancer MkII €129 & €99

The team at Greek developer MIA Laboratories have been pretty busy of late with not one but two new outboard plugins…

Bitwig Bitwig 4.1 €399

With some interesting new features can this modern DAW continue its innovative path? Let’s find out

Martinic AX73 $119/£76

Retro specialists Martinic make an unlikely 80s hero from zero, in virtual instrument form. Time to grab your new AX!

Sonora Cinematic Poiesis Cello £79

Thought cellos were simply instruments of beauty? This latest instrument dispels the myth, extending to the darker side of the bow

Soundware round-up

Audiotent Realm £37 Time for a trip through

W.A. PRODUCTION MULTIBENDER CM

Get to know this issue’s freebie: a edition of W.A.’s incredible multiband, tempo-synced delay

4 new packs!

We’ve gone for a chilled, northern sample vibe this month as we head to Scandinavia to make a killing. Download them from filesilo.co.uk or wetransfer

SHIMMER & SPARKLE

FROM THE VAULT

Loopmasters 306 samples

01 5Pin Media Deep Tech & Minimal 02

cm/video

Download this month’s videos: filesilo.co.uk/computermusic