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Thomas Frey - Senior Futurist at the DaVinci Institute

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The Cybraphon Autonomous Emotional Robot Band

November 2nd, 2009 at 8:51 am » Comments (0)

Cybraphon is the latest project from Edinburgh-based artist collective FOUND (Ziggy Campbell, Simon Kirby and Tommy Perman).
Inspired by early 19th century mechanical bands such as the nickelodeon, Cybraphon is an interactive version of a mechanical band in a box. Consisting of a series of robotic instruments housed in a large display case, Cybraphon behaves like [...]



The Growing Threat of “Money Mules”

October 31st, 2009 at 7:09 pm » Comments (0)

Don’t you think a lot more people need to be aware of this?
Kevin Poulsen at Threat Level has a great item up about the growing menace of “money mules.” The term refers to bank customers who’ve been conned into unwittingly laundering cash that hackers have stolen from business bank accounts. The con and the funny [...]



Musical Trends: Gavari Violin Ahead of the Times by 300 Years

October 31st, 2009 at 4:06 pm » Comments (0)

Next generation violin
Check out almost any classical violinist, and you might notice that the instruments they use are based on designs first created over 300 years ago. World class players are even willing to pay millions to own an original instrument from the great 17th century Italian masters like Antonio Stradivari.
If you wanted to cross [...]



Jammin’ On The Playable Electric Guitar Shirt

October 29th, 2009 at 7:56 am » Comments (0)

(YouTube Link)
 The Electronic Rock Guitar Shirt isn’t just a t-shirt. You can actually play music on it. Use a magnetic pick over the string markings and press down on the frets with your other hand. There’s also a volume nob and an amplifier that fits on your belt. Has it been a long time since [...]



Ohio As A Piano

September 29th, 2009 at 11:20 am » Comments (0)

Andy Woodruff noticed that Ohio has 88 counties, the same number as keys on a piano. So he went to work on a map application that assigns a note to each county. You can play a song on the map (a couple of songs are plotted out for you) or reassign the notes based on [...]



‘Lucy In The Sky’ Dies At Age 46

September 29th, 2009 at 11:01 am » Comments (0)

The woman who inspired the classic Beatles song Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, has died at aged 46, a charity said today. The song featured on the ground-breaking 1967 album Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
John Lennon’s elder son Julian said it was inspired by a picture he drew of his classmate Lucy O’Donnell [...]



Birds Perched On Powerlines Transcribed Into Musical Notes

September 10th, 2009 at 10:00 am » Comments (0)


Monkeys Are Metallica Fans

September 3rd, 2009 at 7:50 am » Comments (0)

Master! Master! Where’s the dreams that I’ve been after?

Monkeys are found to be fans of heavy metal music, in particular Metallica, after a study showed it calmed them down.
A group of cottontop tamarins were played a variety of music, including Bach, Led Zeppelin and Miles Davis, but they only reacted when heavy metal rock songs [...]



Temperature Change Powered Music Player

August 30th, 2009 at 2:22 pm » Comments (0)

Treehuggers rejoice its a green friendly music player. Oh joyful day.
While treehuggers bustle about looking for better ways to gather solar energy or wind power, designer Dmitriy Shcherbakov thinks they’ve overlooked an energy source right in front of them: constantly changing temperature. That’s how he plans to power Greenergy, a music player that also inexplicably [...]



United Breaks Guitars Song 2 Music Video

August 19th, 2009 at 10:54 am » Comments (0)

When United Airlines workers destroyed Dave Carroll’s guitar in 2008, he tried everything to get fair compensation. After being denied, he promised that he would write three songs and post them onto YouTube.
 



Guitar Hero: Van Halen

August 8th, 2009 at 7:23 pm » Comments (0)

Do you honestly think you can push enough buttons to keep up with Eddie
The track list for Guitar Hero: Van Halen, due out December 22, has been announced, and as suspected, it will feature only tracks from the Diamond David Lee Roth era of the band, and feature new bassist Wolfgang Van Halen and not [...]



Multitouch Interactive Display Produces Music

July 18th, 2009 at 9:09 am » Comments (0)

While most multitouch displays designed to produce sound use a visual mode of interaction, the multitouch interactive Akustisch produces music with not much visual feedback. A new multitouch interface for production, control and manipulation of digital sound, the Akustisch is like a digital music instrument based on a touch interface. Developed by Balz Rittmeyer as [...]



Walkman Named Top Music Invention of Last 50 Years

July 4th, 2009 at 11:50 am » Comments (0)

Sony’s music player has beaten Dolby sound, compact discs and the ubiquitous iPod to come top of the list of “ten most important musical innovations of the last 50 years” published by T3 magazine. Its victory comes in the week that the Walkman celebrated its 30th birthday.
The first Walkman was the blue-and-silver model TPS-L2, which [...]



Python Skin-Covered HOON Headphones

July 1st, 2009 at 9:01 pm » Comments (0)

Eeek is that hissing sound a snake? No its your headphones
French accessories company HOON has teamed up with audio company The Perfect Unison for a line of python skin skinned headphones.



Upbeat Music Creates Illusion That Everyone Around You Is Happy

May 8th, 2009 at 11:13 am » Comments (1)

 
Experts say that listening to Girls Aloud can convince you that other people are in a good mood
Listening to cheerful music can be one way to put you in a good mood on the way into work.  But beware – it can also make you think that everyone else feels just as happy as you [...]



Weird Origins of 8 Popular Band Names

April 29th, 2009 at 7:23 am » Comments (0)

There are some strange bands out there with some even weirder names. Here’s a collection of bands and the story of how they came up with their titles. Included are Pink Floyd, Porno For Pyros, Gogol Bordello and 4 others!
Black Sabbath

Ozzy’s band of mischief didn’t start off nearly as dark as it ended up. The [...]



Music Editing Phone Concept

April 20th, 2009 at 12:19 pm » Comments (0)

 Music Phone
Design firm Pilotfish unveiled on Monday plans to make an advanced music phone, hoping to tap untested demand for music editing on the go. (Pics)



Blaby: MP3 Player For Your Unborn Baby

April 18th, 2009 at 10:05 am » Comments (0)

The Blaby; a touch sensitive MP3 player designed to play soothing songs to an unborn child  
Pregnant mothers will soon be able to play their favourite songs to their unborn children with the invention of an MP3 players for babies.



10 Worst Music Videos Ever Made

March 23rd, 2009 at 1:29 pm » Comments (0)

Bonus – This is Zlad! and the song is Elektronik, Supersonik. Words cannot describe this one!
This was a hard task to accomplish because there have been so many horrific videos made since bands started making videos. Many of the worst ones were made in the eighties, go figure since that has to be one of the [...]



Reactable May Be The Future Of Music

March 17th, 2009 at 10:53 am » Comments (1)


Software Reveals Drummers Who Used Click Tracks

March 4th, 2009 at 8:13 am » Comments (1)

Because it’s much easier to hack music that has a perfectly even tempo, drummers often use a click track to make life easy for producers and remixers. Coder and music technologist Paul Lamere developed a program that plots the deviations of a drumbeat from its own overall tempo, which tells us who brings a metronome [...]



Top 5 Memorable Naked Moments in Music

February 8th, 2009 at 10:01 pm » Comments (1)

 
HA HA HA … DUH….You dont want to miss this!
Before the days of ladies tramps popstars parading around without their gitch on and giving us all the money shot of their down-belows, naked used to mean something. (Here’s a helpful tip – right before you leave the house, just do a mental checklist, you know… [...]



Making The Masses Smile: T-Mobile Dance Videos

February 7th, 2009 at 10:00 am » Comments (0)

 /p>
Watch this video FIRST
As we go through our days we should always look for and share humor with others. Life is so much better when you’re smiling!
Here’s a fun example of making the masses smile.



Secrets Of Stradivarius’ Unique Violin Sound Revealed

January 25th, 2009 at 1:25 pm » Comments (0)

 

For centuries, violin makers have tried and failed to reproduce the pristine sound of Stradivarius and Guarneri violins, but after 33 years of work put into the project, a Texas A&M University professor is confident the veil of mystery has now been lifted.



Why Do Songs Trigger Specific Memories?

January 22nd, 2009 at 10:53 am » Comments (0)

 
Just thinking about a particular song can evoke vivid memories of the past or special events in your life.