Endorsements

I fancy wandering to mostly-unrelated places and soaking in the connections afterwards. Recently, I was looking at so many makers of pro audio stuff — mainly software synths, virtual instruments — and a couple names of artists I appreciate kept popping up: BT (Brian Transeau) and Richard Devine. They've collaborated and have no end of ingenuity when getting involved with new tools, so this didn't surprise me. Let's have a look, shall we?

• Camel Audio – Ooh, it's BT!
• Focusrite Liquid Mix – Click "Artist Videos" and there's BT again.
• Heavyocity Evolve – No surprise, BT in the Testimonials section.
• M-Audio – BT AND Richard Devine.
• Native Instruments – BT (page content is kinda broken, comes from an earlier version of their site) and Richard Devine.
• Open Labs – Richard Devine.
• Percussa AudioCubes – Richard Devine.
• RME – Richard Devine.
• SFX Machine Pro – BT again at the very top.
• SoundToys – Both BT AND Richard Devine.
• Sugar Bytes – Richard Devine!
• Symbolic Sound – BT. (But I know Devine also uses Kyma.)

These aren't the only ones, of course. Danny Elfman gets his name on varied stuff, and I've been seeing keyboard virtuoso Jordan Rudess on a range from the aforementioned Heavyocity Evolve and Sugar Bytes to iPhone apps like Bebot. Look enough and you'll see patterns.

Now the key question: have these endorsements swayed my buying decisions? It depends what a quote says. "It's awesome!" speaks positively but doesn't tell me why, which is why I prefer in-depth artist interviews examining the creative process. Nonetheless, I've begun giving testimonials to musical products & people I like very much:

• Imperfect Samples – Schimmel Braunschweig Upright Piano
• Sonic Charge Synplant

And I'm more than open to trying more creative audio tools & toys — playing with prerelease versions of a few you may hear more about on this blog in the future. Stay… tuned.