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Review: Guitarist extraordinaire and former Kiss vociferator Ace Frehley's tenth solo album 10,000 Volts is the sonic equivalent of Gakuryu Ishii's bolshy film 'Electric Dragon 80,000 Volts' - a massive, electrifying, out-of-this-world experience that embraces the pure shreddage of the electric guitar, in an ultimate face-off between human and machine. The analogy of overridden circuitry is unsurprisingly useful for evoking related emotions in Frehley's case, as on the title track, on which a perfectly phased-out riff accompanies the lyric, "She hit me like 10,000 volts, when I saw her face". Then come the covers, such as 'Walkin' On The Moon' and the equally raw in-your-facers such as 'Cosmic Heart' and 'Life Of A Stranger'. No fillers here.

Notes: ***B-STOCK: Box opened, but product is in excellent condition and in perfect working order***


Part of 1010's excellent Nanobox series, the Tangerine is a tiny powerhouse sampler. A fresh new approach to sampling, from one-shots to loops, all the way through to four-hour recordings.

Supplier's Notes:
Sweet and Tangy Sampling

The nanobox | tangerine delivers powerful sampling in an ultra portable form factor. With this nanobox, you can add recording, sample playback, clip launching, slicing, and musically intelligent looping capabilities to your desktop or travel rig. With an intuitive touch screen interface, nanobox | tangerine makes easy work of selecting, editing, and tweaking your samples. You can stream large samples of up to 4 GB file size straight from the microSD card. Interact with other musical components via MIDI. Load multi-sample banks with over 500 samples for amazing instrument reproduction. Tweak your configurations to get them just right, then save them to multiple presets for future reuse.

Top features

Play up to 24 stereo polyphonic notes when your samples fit in the 64 MB of internal memory or up to 8 larger stereo samples streaming directly from the microSD card

Play multi-sample banks with up to 16 velocity layers and 576 WAV files loaded in one preset

Configure 8 stereo sample pads per preset as single or multi-samples, clips, slicers, or new recordings

Stream long samples from the microSD card with a max sample size of 4 GB, which can be many hours of audio

Trigger samples with the touch screen or MIDI input as one shots or melodic notes

Control how samples start and stop by choosing from one-shot, toggle, gate and piano (New!) launch modes

Tweak playback through a variety of sample parameters, including start position, length, pitch, gain, filter, loop mode, launch quantization, ADSR, Exclusive Grouping, clip synchronization, slice placement and sequencing, and MIDI note and channel mapping

Quickly and easily use MIDI mapped controls for more tactile access to common parameters

Record up to 16 sequence layers per preset.

Get into the groove with a fast, fluid, and intuitive workflow

Make music anywhere thanks to a compact and nearly indestructible design

Recording Capabilities

Configure each pad for stereo or mono recording with the option to synchronize the start and stop times to clock inputs
Trigger recording via audio level threshold
Create perfectly sized loops by setting the recording length
Enable immediate playback after recording for live looping capabilities
Make recordings up to 4 hours in length
Resample the master output without patching
Automate recording of a multi-sample bank via MIDI
Store recorded samples as WAV files on the micro SD card then remove the card to transfer them to your computer

What is Included:
nanobox | tangerine - Compact Streaming Sampler
MicroSD card with 85 presets and over 1500 wav files
Colour matched USB power cord
Type B TRS MIDI To MIDI 5 Pin DIN adapter
Quick Start Guide

Technical Specs:

Power: USB-C connection 5V, 500mA
3.5mm audio input and output
Maximum input and output level: 2Vrms
DAC and ADC resolution: 24-bit
Internal resolution: 32-bit
Sample rate: 48kHz
MIDI Input: 3.5mm Type A/B auto sensing
MIDI Output: 3.5mm Type B
Clock Input: 1,2, 4, 8, 12 or 24 PPQ selectable
MIDI support: Note On/Off, Velocity, Pressure, Mod Wheel, Aftertouch, CC mappings to common parameters, program changes and clock
H x W x D: 1.5" x 3.75" x 3"
Weight: 0.25 lbs.
2" touch screen, 2 knobs and 4 buttons in a 3.75" x 3" x 1.5" package

Additional information

Weight: 0.65 lbs
Dimensions: 7.75 × 4.85 × 2.25 in

Notes: Use this cable to connect your Bluebox to a data source and a power source at the same time. This will allow you to stream audio over USB. The cable has a USB B male connection on one end and two USB B female connections on the other end: red for power and black for data.

Stream Audio Over USB with Bluebox

If you bought a Bluebox for desktop before September 2023, this handy adapter will make it easier to connect your device to a computer. New firmware allows you to send audio from the bluebox to the computer and back.

The adapter splits the power from the USB signal to help avoid noise from your computer. It also enables you to power the device separately in case your computer or hub is not suitable for the demanding power requirements of the Bluebox.

Connect the male end to the USB Power port on your Bluebox. Then connect your bluebox USB B power cable to the red female jack, and a USB B data cable to the black female jack and you are ready to stream audio.

Specs

Length: 3.25", 8.25 cm

Weight: 1.2 oz, 34 grams
Dimensions: 6.5 × 2.5 × 0.75 in

Review: For their 12 year anniversary, Munich's Compost Disco serves up 15 previously unreleased tracks. The variety ranges across the floor from classic soul (Ed Lee's 'You Are The Star' feat Allison David - extended dub) to boogie (Dimitri From Paris & DJ Rocca's 'The Compass Point') to some Italo (Ron Deacon on 'Killersong' or Imperial Porcelain's 'Tulip Moon'), and even a bit of deep disco (as heard on Mark E's playful 'I'm Your Eversion'). 12 Compost Disco Years is what the label best described themselves as tasty, hypnotizing and emotional.

Review: 541 is in the middle of a big run of spacial double albums that they say are made up of "nothing but classix" and we're inclined to agree. This eighth volume of 12 Inch Lovers is another bumper collection of big dance sounds from the 90s to the present day by plenty of names you will likely know, from Erick Morillo to Michael Gray to Robin S to Bakermat. There is string-laced swing-house to start with, vocal anthems like 'Show Me Love' to finish with and main stage house bangers and feel-good festival favourites in between.

Review: 2023 was a knockout year for Portuguese artist Temudo, taking in techno totems like Blueprint, Klockworks and Hayes in pursuit of his driving, sharply-focused sound. Now he lands on Italian label Sublunar with more of that refined, precision engineered gear for the wormhole crew. 'U Where My Second Choice' is a taut, edgy workout with a nagging synth hook, but 'Asset 2' ratchets down to a pure, heady locomotion which will take you tunnelling deep into the night. '2029' has a restrained funk which will work the body good and proper, and 'Affection' simmers down to a minimal palette peppered with pointed blips moving in expertly sequenced formations - smart techno at its finest.

Review: Earlier this month, First Word Records dropped an epic, digital-only compilation in which members of the label's large family of artists either collaborated with or remixed each other. This 12" boasts four of the collection's undoubted highlights. The EP begins with a simply stunning Kaidi Tatham remix of Allysha Joy's soul-jazz treat 'Better' - think deep broken beat meets liquid jazz-funk and sultry neo-soul - and ends with a fiercely sub-heavy and surprisingly spaced out K15 broken beat rework of Teotima's 'But I Can't'. Sandwiched in between you'll find a jazz-funk-goes-bruk re-wire of Takuya Kuroda's 'Fade' by KEARL (that's K15 and Darkhouse Family's Earl Jeffers) and a wonderful fusion of squelchy synth-jazz and broken beat courtesy of Quiet Dawn and Sarah Williams White.

Review: Cyrille Aimee has forged a formidable reputation as a jazz singer across the world, developing a tone which draws on her Dominican heritage as well as her guidance from the gypsy tradition in France where she grew up. While she's normally know for her arresting interpretations of standards and traditional classics, on A Fleur De Peau she's developed an album of her own material alongside NYC multi-instrumentalist Jake Sherman. Written in large part in the jungle in Costa Rica where she built her own home, Aimee developed her songs with Sherman's instrumental input resulting in a brilliantly varied and unflinchingly honest, open-hearted album which will make you re-evaluate everything you thought you knew about the finest of contemporary jazz singers.

Review: It goes without saying that 'A Love Supreme' is in the upper echelons of jazz history. A spiritual and emotional proclamation from American jazz saxophonist John Coltrane, the 32 minute runtime is a narrative of strife and struggle with addiction as well as the notable repetition of his riff in all 12 keys throughout the session in 'Acknowledgement'. In many ways you could say Coltrane's playing wasn't improvised at all, and you could argue that the session was better off for it. At the end of the half an hour, the narrative unwinds and Coltrane is declaring a faith to God, a musical thankyou to his faith that kept him true throughout his trials following a spiritual awakening in 1957 - what resulted was an undisputed musical masterpiece.

Review: Fela Kuti and Tony Allen are your key starting points when it comes to the wild frenetic Afrobeat fusion Nigeria gave us in the late 60s but dig a teeny bit deeper and you'll find multi instrumentalist Tunji is right behind them. Armed with his band The Benders, Tunji ran a tight ship and perhaps should've done with a little more recognition. Now living and gigging in London, he's curated this essential collection of tracks from Afrobeat's most prolific era.

Review: Armin van Buuren's A State Of Trance Year Mix 2023 is yet another meticulously crafted journey through the best trance music of the year from the Dutch genre king. Spanning over two hours, this mix showcases the genre's continued diversity and evolution and features tracks from both established artists and rising talents. With seamless transitions and expertly curated selections, van Buuren captures the essence of the trance scene in 2023 with all the usual hallmarks - from uplifting melodies to driving beats, euphoric atmospheres to epic synth lines. As such this it a must-listen and more proof no one quite knows the genre like Armin.

Review: The present face of IDM is here heard occupied by dream duo D'Arcangelo and Karsten Plum, whose latest joint effort for Acid Avengers bowls us over with its acid tweezings, pangs, twingings, twangs, thrums and flits-past. The pH scale skyrockets to the point of insanity on Pflum's side, with 'Hornfish Acid' and 'Aroe Acid' jointly corroding the full length of the Earth's core with their snippy but incisive sizzles and 'ows, until we reach a forbidden underworld uncannily reminiscent of Oz - except the faces of the protagonists are horribly twisted into a yellow, illegal-raved rictuses. D'Arcangelo's 'Gawain' does equally as much with its eerie sprung-verbed chroma-chords and muted but moving melodies; so too does 'Walker Two' raise the tempo to silly speeds, coming as a veritable velociraptor of Druqks-y breaks and drill bits, all let loose from the barrel at a surely illegal rate of fire.

Notes: ***B-STOCK: Light marks on the screen***


A serious trigger sequencer for generating complex, multi-layered rhythms. Eight channels of Euclidean pattern generation meet probability, modulation and CV control for real depth and power.

Supplier's Notes:
Constellation is all about rhythm. It is an 8 channel pattern generator that works by combining multiple dense and sparse patterns to create long, complex and musically interesting trigger and gate rhythms. Constellation takes a "parametric" approach to rhythm - there is no explicit step sequencing on the module, rather the rhythms are defined by euclidean (and more) parameters that build the rhythm mathematically.

Constellation aims to evolve the concept of euclidean rhythms far beyond the useful but repetitive patterns we often think of when we hear the term "euclidean rhythm". This is accomplished by by combining up to 8 individual euclidean patterns of different lengths and density. Each pattern may provide only a small component of the final output, but together create immensely musical and varied rhythmic material over a very long time frame - up to 999 steps! If each of those steps are 1/16 note in length at 120 bpm, that's a full 2 minutes of explicitly defined, yet non repeating rhythmic material.

In addition, Constellation's parametric approach allows any of these parameters to be modulated with CV through one of 8 freely assignable CV inputs. CV modulation introduces further ability for Constellation's rhythmic output to vary over time. Paired with a Maestro or Navigators, hours of interesting morphing rhythms are possible without the need for tons of step programming or the uncontrollable chaos of a purely generative approach.

When writing music, rhythmic interest is often built through the combination of repeating and non repeating elements that work together to anchor the overall feel but also keep the ear free from boredom over the duration of the piece. Constellation provides a unique set of tools to accomplish this goal and achieve rhythms that are intentional, unexpected and exciting to use as the foundation of your compositions.

28hp, 25mm deep
75mA +12, 18mA -12

Review: In terms of being an afrobeat legend, Pasteur Lappe is Cameroon's Fela Kuti, an unsung hero who was ahead of the game back in the 1970s and 1980s, and one whose been famous for burning the pockets of many diggers nowadays. Luckily, Africa Seven have compiled some of his best work onto a ten-track LP, ranging from the funky oddities of "More Sekele Movement" or "Na Real Seke Fo'ya", to the future-zouk sound of "Sanaga Calypso", and plenty of jazzy, popped-out, disgruntled soulfulness to satisfy anyone from Gilles Peterson to Cherrystones. Heavy and warmly recommended.

Review: African Spirits is the coming together of musician and producer Nicola Conte with his friend and colleague Gianluca Petrella, who is an ECM and Blue Note associate and internationally renowned talent who emerged from the Italian jazz scene. Their recent album found them exploring a wide range of music in our globalised world with nods to Detroit, disco, house, and jazz. Now Berlin-based New York don Fred P offers up two of his reinterpretations. They are of course long, deep, spiritual and moving in both physical and emotional ways.