Music and apps

Thinkhouse's Matt with his favourite audio interface

Techno God Richie Hawtin is quoted at a recent music conference as saying that music is no longer to be thought of as a CD or an MP3, but an experience. More and more artists and labels are getting their heads around this and coming up with other ways to enhance that experience, at live shows it's through interactivity or boundary pushing stage shows like Nine Inch Nail's interactive stage. In retail there is big business in DVDs with premium content and hidden extras. Online and on mobile is where there is some real magic going on, magic you can put in the palm of your hand, through the power of ever more exciting apps. We picked a few of our favorites and stuck em' below.

Starting with Cold War Kids' live video mixer that lets you control the arrangement of pre-recorded loops in their recent music video. Lots of fun.
- Cold War Kids interactive music vid

We talked about the iDaft earlier here but it is also available (and highly fun/annoying depending on who is in control!) for the iPhone.
- The iDaft online and for iPhone

This first generation drum machine suffers from a bit of latency but looks the business.
-Ron Winter's Drums

Taking it to the next level though is electronic music label Mobilee who have come up with a pretty nifty DJ app. This might not look like much to the non DJ but it basically lets you mix records just like a DJ would in a club, on your iPhone. Read about it here - get the app here.

So that last one lets you mix tracks together; breaking it down even further though, Diplo and Switch's Major Lazer have teamed up with iZoetope to create a special edition drum machine app featuring loops and beats from their singles allowing you to remix them how you like. Definitely a fun and creative way to kill time on those bus journeys, it's free too.
Details are here - grab the app here.

Not to be outdone by the serious techno labels and hipster DJs, delicious meat alternative Quorn have their own music making software up on quornmix.com. It’s aimed at school kids so don’t expect too serious a setup but the prize of a mini-bus is pretty meaty.