28 Jan 2015 
Posted by Alive At Night
While other girls faint for the Victorias Secret show, my highlight of the year concerning “big events that I can’t attend but wish I would” is NAMM. The “National Association Of Music Merchants” holds a show/convention every year and as every year interesting innovations and new products for musicians of all genres are introduced. We picked out some cool stuff announced this year which could get the beginning and more experienced harder styles producer/DJ a bit excited!
Korg Kaoss DJ Controller
For the controller-heads among our DJs this baby might be of certain interest. It’s a controller and interface featuring a 2-channel mixer, works over USB and might be around 300€. And as far as we know Kaoss, this might be getting quite crazy in the right hands.
https://www.musicradar.com/news/tech/namm-2015-video-korg-kaoss-dj-controller-demoed-614939
Spectrasonics Omnisphere 2
Epic. That’s what you know from Spectrasonics Omnisphere. Omnisphere 2 has promised to double that epic again. New features including new synthesis algorithmns, new effects and heaps of new features are just waiting to be explored. Omnisphere owners might be able to update from ±199€, which is a damn steal!!!
https://www.sonicstate.com/news/2015/01/23/namm-2015-spectrasonics-releases-omnisphere-2/
Novation Launchpad Pro
Production, Live-Arrangements, DJ’ing, Performing. Just a few thing the Launchpad by Novation stands for. Now it’s gotten a complete overhaul and it’s fantastic! See for yourself!
Pro Tools First and Pro Tools 12
Pro Tools 12 and Pro Tools First get released! While Pro Tools has gotten some really bad press lately for their new payment and costumer service handling, their new idea seems to be a Garage Band-clone. For free though! If you’re a producer who wants to take a look at AVID stuff, this might be a rather interesting chance, for everyone else this might be more of a “Not today, Satan” kind of deal.
https://apps.avid.com/ProToolsFirst/
Pioneer XDJ-RX
The XDJ-RX can work as a completely standalone unit. A all-in-one solution, a complete DJ setup in one piece. Portable; and the quality you might wanna expect from Pioneer. The price tag of about 1600€ might seem fine, but in the end you could buy a small CDJ350 Setup too. Have times changed? Check it out for yourself!
https://pioneerdj.com/english/products/djsystem/xdj-rx.html
M-Audio CODE Series Midi-Keys
M-Audio announced the visually striking Code series. It features a maximum of Midi-Control (Including a XY-Controller, Faders, Knobs, Pads,…), auto-mapping for a lot of DAWS and beautiful semi-weighted keys. Comes in 25- 49- and 61-key models! Prices might be around 170€-300€
Logic 10.1
Logic users have been waiting and they haven’t been waiting for nothing. New automation features, better integration in OSX Yosemite, customizable Plugin-Manager, massive updates for their internal plugins, Remote and MainStage and much more. Existing users can upgrade for free (as always) and new users can get Logic 10.1 for 199,99€
https://itunes.apple.com/de/app/logic-pro-x/id634148309?mt=12
