PC and Music News

Ueberschall unveils Urbanic II, the follow-up to their well known Urbanic collection. This massive release includes 30 Construction Kits providing 3.8 GB of full-range HipHop music as well as surrounding styles such as Crunk R&B and Dancehall.

All Construction Kits are filled with samples, beats, guitars, basslines, synths, pads, fx sounds and a whole bunch of drum- and Percussion-sounds. Every sample on Urbanic II is labeled with BPM information and root key (key signatures). Furthermore, every kit contains 3 sub-kits and a drum-shots folder, material is organized as follows :

• Main Kit - Includes the main theme, sounds and phrases
• Variation Kit - Provides an alternative track and phrases which are used to add contrast to the main theme
• Intro/Outro Kit - Here you can find the matching intro/outro track for the overall kit, along with it's individual parts
• Drum Shots - The single-shots are centralized in this folder, making it easy to find all percussive sounds used to make the kit.

This structure makes it easy to select the correct vibe needed for your track. Plus the integrated Elastik player allows you to fit the samples to your individual needs. The Content is geared toward Urban Music producers looking for authentic club sounds.

Urbanic II was made from well-established music industry professionals: Beneluxus, Drastic and Marc Steinmeier. This team has worked produced and remixed for well known artists such as, LL Cool J, Bootsy Collins, Alica Keys, DJ Tomekk and Eminem to name but a few.

Urbanic II is available now for Mac OS X and Windows in VST, AU and RTAS formats at a retail price of €99.

Wusik announces that it has licensed EVE (Electronic Vintage Ensemble) from Dash Signature / NUSofting and updated it to v2.5.1. This is a free update for all existing EVE owners.

Changes in v2.5.1 :

- Fixed: problem with message boxes freezing the host/sequencer.
- Added: Mac VST, double-click on any parameter will open MIDI-Learn (and/or Right-Click for the AU or Windows version).
- Changed: no more multiple messages when loading a preset which has missing sounds. - Only the last error message will be showed in the GUI/Editor.
- Fixed: Demo version, expiring message will no longer popup and free the host/sequencer. It will show in the GUI/Editor only.
- Fixed: missing sounds from the sounds popup-listing (WusikSND files only).

Changes in v2.5.0 :

- Added: New permanent preset browser at the right area. Plus, Up and Down buttons for easier selection of presets with the mouse.
- Added: Mouse Middle-Button click and drag does fine-tuning of any parameter. The same for Left-Click while holding the Shift key.
- Plus some minor GUI improvements and a few small internal bugs were fixed too.

EVE is available for Windows and Mac OS X in VST and AU plug-in formats and costs $99.95. New EVE orders also now include the Mellotronix sound library.

Note for the MAC version. In some hosts, you may need to Right-Click, hold and click with the Left button, in order to open the MIDI-Learn option.

One of the greatest challenges to home and studio recording is how to get a great amplified guitar tone at a low level. Introducing the Rivera SilentSister recording speaker cabinet.

With the new Silent Sister, Rivera claims that they have solved the major faults of all of the other Iso Cabs in existence today. First off, they all have the microphone residing in a sealed compartment with the sound pressure from the speaker moving the microphone diaphragm like a plunger sucking water in a sink with a clogged pipe. Instead of the microphone diaphragm existing in a free air environ, it is severely distorted physically in this sealed compartment-with the result that the recorded tone sounds terrible.

Secondly, the speaker feeds into this sealed compartment, as well as being mounted with the back of the cone in a

Markbass has announced the release of the Mark Studio 1 plug-in.

Based on three Markbass amp heads and six Markbass cabinets, this plug-in incorporates six different microphone choices, plus control over compression, mic position, tweeter level, room ambience, and more. The amps featured are the all-tube Classic 300, the tube-preamp R 500, and the solid state (with tube compressor) TA 501. The cabinets modeled in the plugin are the Standard 151HR (rear-ported 1x15"), Standard 152HR (rear-ported 2x15"), Standard 104HR (rear-ported 4x10"), Standard 104HF (front-ported 4x10"), Standard 106HF (front-ported 6x10") and Classic 108 (sealed 8x10").

Mark Studio 1 is available now for both Mac OS X and Windows in VST, AU, RTAS and Standalone versions with a retail price around $200.

Akai has just released Vintage Beat Machines, a sample library for MPCs containing all kinds of classic drums and percussion sounds. You'll find some of the most common sounds, and some sounds you've likely never heard before. These sounds are from drum machines, beat and rhythm generators, and other synthesizers dating from the 1980s all the way back into the 1960s ! This sample pack works with all MPC models and contains samples and analog synthesis-based sounds from more than 55 different beat machines.

Vintage Beat Machines is available now at an introductory of $19.99 (instead of $29.99) through March 12 only.

This great actor of the sound synthesis scene has just passed away on February 28, he was just turning 51.

He was mainly active on the Camel Audio website where he was a main player of the sound design of the production. A memorial of him is online here :