Computer Music

Computer Music's goal is to help its readers create great music with a PC or Mac. Each month find easy-to-follow tutorials for all sorts of music software, unbiased reviews of the latest products and answers to technical questions.

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Get with the programmers • This month’s free exciter was produced by plugin developers Venomode. Here’s the company’s founder, Adam Rogers, to tell us more…

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

Computer Music 10 years back • Our monthly shake-of-the-head at our earlier selves’ news choices…

Ins & outs

15 questions with… John Newman • John Newman may already be known as the chart-topping singer with hits like 2012’s UK number one Feel The Love (with Rudimental) and global top 10 Love Me Again, but this year he’s taken his own advice – “move on before it’s too late”. He’s now embarked on a new chapter, John Newman 2.0, which is more dance-orientated, but actually returns to his production roots where he discovered computer music via some breakfast cereals…

What does A.I. mean mean for your music? • As artificial intelligence seeps into every aspect of modern life – self driving cars, telephone answering systems, speech and facial recognition – so its impact in the world of music production continues apace. Here we reveal how it will impact on your music making. The good. The bad. The future!

What are the chances?

The genesis of AI in music production • As our hard drives get more crowded with AI-driven plugins, it’s easy to forget that not too long ago, the very idea of computer-driven musical decision-making seemed like scifi. So, how did AI grow from the giddy witterings of futurists, to an everyday norm?

Die, robot

6 innovations in AI music production and composition

The secret of smart plugins • 21st century music production is now dominated by machine learning plugins, smart algorithms and self-determining brains that can steer you to make mixes of a quality far beyond your capabilities. Let’s see how AI has integrated into modern mixing

6 smart tools for audio restoration

6 smart mixing tools

Track talk

6 smart mastering tools and platforms

Composing with artificial intelligence • Alongside the growth of ever-perfecting algorithms in task-specific products, we’ve also seen a groundswell in applications that can aid composition, alongside those AI platforms that can perfectly mimic human composers

A digital destiny

AI composition aids and AI music platforms

Artists at the forefront of AI • Perhaps the best way to demonstrate AI’s creative abilities is to zoom in on how numerous artists have already worked with it, and – together – crafted some quite astounding music

Fear not

10 recordings that harness AI

HANDS-ON TUTORIALS AND WORKSHOPS

#15 Tong organ • Fancy a bit of house or garage in your bass? Let’s build a contemporary classic, with our similarly classic ZebraCM soft-synth

BASS & DRUMS & ROCK ’N’ GARAGE

Dave Gale

#04 Creating an 808 bass • You can get 808 sounds everywhere, but there’s a lot of fun in creating your own, so let’s make one tailored for today’s music

TOOLS OF THE TRADE

Ashley Thorpe

SOUND +VISION • A-V artist Halina Rice tells Martin Delaney about the evolutionary process that took her immersive live show from dream to reality

Get out there and do it

Halina’s favourite plugins

Kit list

FURTHER LISTENING • Rice tells us the tracks she’s most proud of

The 21st Century • As we waved goodbye to the...