The Red Ferret: Bring out your inner Ibizan with the Discover DJ by Ion Audio. It’s a twin deck USB DJ controller with all the same controls that the big kids have. It will play m4a, aiff, wav, mp3, flac and ogg audio files, you can loop, cross-fade, scratch and tempo match. It also comes with the MixVibes software to mix and record your hits.

The deck is completely plug-and-play and only needs USB power to run. Best of all, the deck and software work with PC and Mac. £99 from Firebox. Read more…

DJ kids usb

Pioneer.eu: The art of DJing is now in the digital age, and the next generation of DJ mixers needs to keep pace with the CDJ revolution. Our DJM-2000 truly does that.

The brand new DJM-2000 is our most powerful performance mixer and is the perfect match for the new industry-standard CDJ-2000 digital decks.

With an innovative touch screen and arsenal of remixing FX, the DJM-2000 forms the ultimate club mixer. No less than six individual effects processors lay the foundation for hundreds of music manipulation combinations, so a DJ can always create their own unique sound.

The new DJM-2000 takes advanced features – thought only possible in software – and reinvents them in the physical world. Itsintuitive layout will feel natural to existing Pioneer DJM users allowing creativity to flow whilst keeping its technical complexity under the skin. Read more…

cdj dj mixer djm pioneer

Wired: Director Chris Cairns, turntablist JFB, drummer Will Clarke and prolific beatboxer Beardyman have teamed up to turn Cairns’ Neurosonics film — which features disembodied heads mounted on a selection of instruments — into a live performance that’s just as jaw-dropping as the original.

The director, who’s also behind the photomontaging Land Rover Freelander advert and Radio 1’s “infectious radio” promo, originally created the Neurosonics Audiomedical Labs film back in 2009. It’s set in a lab, and depicts three scientists mounting a number of different heads onto turntables and drum sets before playing them like real instruments.

The original video was created with plenty of CGI, so shifting it into a live setting was always going to prove troublesome. To bridge the gap between the virtual and the physical, Cairns enlisted the assistance of holographic projection experts Musion. The company set up the performance for the first Musion Academy Media Awards — which exist to recognise the most impressive holographic creations. Read more…

Neurosonics Live from Chris Cairns on Vimeo.

hologram innovation

Engadget: The big NAMM show’s not started yet, but Otus is rolling out its latest DJ controller just in time.

The Otus Raw is a controller that can work as one or two virtual turntable decks, depending on your needs, each with a SL-turntable-style pitch slider.

Other notable features include mega-sized velocity pads, a layer switch for “virtually unlimited” possibilities, and we’ve got a feeling that with one of these bad boys, chopping and screwing Ke$ha’s never been so mindlessly easy and entertaining.

Regardless, the Otus RAW should be available this spring, though we’ll have to wait a bit longer for pricing, unfortunately.

otus

Engadget: Not that we haven’t seen turntable capabilities shoved into production and concept devices alike before, but there’s something curiously seductive about this one.

Dreamed up by Sir Thomas Mascall, the Touchtable is a pocket-sized PMP that boasts a digit-friendly surface meant for scratching, mixing and all manners of interacting.

Aside from playing back your favorite MP3s, this bugger can (in theory, anyway) also mix jams on the fly, cue outputs and even connect with a second Touchtable wirelessly in order to establish a more traditional DJ setup (at 1:8 scale).

Plug it into a PC, and now you’ve got a MIDI controller. Pop that source link if you’re looking for a few more images and details, and feel free to contact your local VC if interested in seeing this fast-tracked to the commercial realm.

mixer PMP touchtable

Engadget: Your USB-based DJ-ing options aren’t exactly all that limited these days, but there’s few rigs out there quite as eye-catching as this new Spin controller developed by Vestax and Algoriddim.

Designed for Mac users only, this one packs two touch sensitive jog wheels front and center, along with a full multi-channel audio system complete with the requisite sliders, mic input (and included microphone), audio output, and of course that USB connection, which also eliminates the need for a power adapter.

On the software side of things you’ll get Algoriddim’s djay 3 mixing application, plus some out-of-the-box integration with iTunes to let you easily pull tracks for your mix.

Sold? Then you can snag this one right now for $250 (€167).

algoriddim mac vestax