NEWS
UniqueSquared

UniqueSquared
April 14, 2013

Numark Mixtrack Edge DJ controller

It is funny how trends in the DJ industry seem to reverse themselves – and it mirrors the rest of our culture as well.  For example, remember when web pages in the early 90’s were first being produced and created?  I remember that many liked to use ultra small fonts, which seemed so much more professional than the bubbly playful fonts that we marked most amateur webpages.  Ten years later, people got tired of having to squint their eyes in order to read the damn page.  So now, you are more likely to see web pages with huge lettering.

This same ebb and flow is seen in equipment as well, especially in controllers.  On one side you have ultra small and portable controllers like the Vestax VCI series, but you also have some pretty huge controllers like the NS7.  Both have their purposes and are designed for a different audience …

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Taylor

Taylor
February 4, 2013

NAMM 2013: DJ Controller Review

NAMM 2011 and 2012 saw the unveiling of a whole host of DJ controllers from some of the top manufacturers including Pioneer, Numark, Denon, Vestax, and even the illusive Native Instruments unveiled their Kontrol F1 at an off site location in 2012. NAMM is also the place where a lot of companies allow the public to play on their new designs in an almost faux test market to see how people react and then subsequently make a few last minute adjustments. NAMM 2013 was no exception in this regard but Numark was really the only company unveiling a high performance controller with the Numark NS7 2. Nearly every other DJ controller manufacturer was unveiling low cost, portable, and lets face it, entry level controllers this year. This may have come as a surprise to most of you expecting to see the latest and greatest improvements to the DJ …

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paul

Paul
January 23, 2013

NAMM 2013 – Media Preview Day

Another year, another NAMM, and we’re back at it. Today was the Media Preview Day. If you don’t know what that means- today is the day to get the first scoop on products at the show, and also a great day to go ahead and get through the whole “hey, bro, where’s my badge at?” situation. Currently, my badge is secured,  and I have been and seen a few things worth mentioning.

My first stop was to meet up with Ben from Dubreq, who announced their new Stylophone S2 with a cool video from Brett Domino recently. We got to talk to Ben a bit about how he and his father (who designed the original) came to realize they needed to release this all analog, British powerhouse into the world. Having gotten my hands on one, I can self-assuredly say I am getting the hell out of one ASAP.

Meanwhile, …

NEWS
UniqueSquared

UniqueSquared
December 21, 2012

Philips Party Machine

If you were a hipster in the late 80’s to early 90’s you might have been seen walking around the streets with a boom box held to your shoulder.  The thing must have weighted forty pounds with the amount of batteries that it stored.  This was before people had the brilliant idea of using headphones, and before Sony got its start with the Walkman (something that Apple would eventually run with and do even better).  After CDs began to take over cassette tapes, a new trend emerged – but it didn’t have to do with carrying a behemoth around, it had to do with having one in your living room.

Stereo systems that came with their own speakers and head unit were the new boomboxes.  Sure, they couldn’t be carried on the shoulder, but they could throw down some serious SPL and the quality was mightier than tapes.  This trend was lost …